I'll Be Here

me, is the person he shares his bedroom with, though Adam has a serious girlfriend (Sarah) and he stays at her apartment off-campus most nights.  I can tell by his words that this is a person that Alex genuinely likes.
    I reciprocate with stories about my mom and Jake and Aaron and Ferdinand.  I mention art school and when he pushes me further, I say it all.  How I bailed on my dream and never even applied to art school.  I realize how much easier is to describe what a tremendous failure I’d turned out to be over a keyboard and monitor.  He writes me back right away. 
     
                            You could never be a failure at anything Willow.
     
                True or not, it is one of the best things that anyone has ever said to me. 
    Then on Thursday night comes a text that makes my heart skip.
     
                Alex: Can I take you out tomorrow night on an official date?
     
    ***
     
    I hate to sound like every girl on the planet but I am in the middle of a crisis.
    I can’t decide what to wear!
    It’s like the clothes hanging in the closet, seemingly unaware of their treachery, have morphed into a puzzle far too advanced for me to decipher.  I will myself not to start freaking out and pull down a shirt and jeans.
    No…
    Cropped pants and a light grey sweater.
    No…  The pants are all wrong and the short sleeved sweater washes out my complexion.
    A vintage inspired skirt and plain fitted green tee-shirt.
    No, no, no.  All wrong.
    Ferdinand stares up lazily from the bed and I stick my tongue out at him.  Not surprisingly, his response is to close his eyes and go back to sleep.  Cats. 
    Alex is going to be here in ten—no— five minutes and my brain is starting to spin the roulette wheel of panic-inducing thoughts.  With make-up splayed out on the floor by a propped mirror and discarded clothes in a frenetic pile near the closet, my room has taken on the hectic look of a department store the day before Christmas. 
                In a last-ditch effort for casual-yet-fashionable, I pull down a lightweight cotton dress—dark blue, nearly black—and slip into clunky grey shoes with a thick strap that buckles on the side.  I assess myself in the mirror.  Not terrible, but will he think I’m trying too hard if I’m wearing a dress?  The hemline dances across my upper thighs.
    I turn to one side to check my reflection from this angle.  I’m about to change back into the lengthier vintage skirt but then I hear the doorbell chime and the muffled tones of a greeting. 
    Alex has arrived.  I brush aside the sticky cobwebs of doubt and open my bedroom door. 
                He is standing in the arched entryway that leads into the living room. And if my pulse skips or speeds up I can’t hear it over the whirling of my brain.  My mother is half-blocking him and Jake is beside her, his hand hovering above her back as if to guide her to one side.  All that I can see are his shoes—black and leather and peeking at me, and his dark messy hair. 
    Mom moves a step to her left opening up my line of sight.  The first thing that I think of is the way that his mouth felt on my flesh  last weekend so of course I’m staring at his lips and it’s like the dormant embers under my skin have been rekindled and are beginning to burn.  I’m betting that a warm, red flush is creeping up from my neck.  Alex lifts his gaze from my mother and when his eyes land on me, his head snaps up.  I watch his as he takes in my bare legs and loose hair and I’m suddenly very glad that I settled on the dress.  His open-mouthed expression sends a tingling sensation through my veins. 
                Mom is smiling widely.  Almost to the point of looking ridiculous and although I’d been hoping to avoid the thousand and one questions that will likely accompany this situation, I can tell by her face that she won’t be appeased so easily.  The look she gives me as she opens the front door for us clearly says: “And we’ll talk later.”  
                After the step-down from the porch the front path widens with room enough for two people to walk side-by-side.  Alex keeps pace with me and opens my car door.  I try to think if Dustin ever opened the door for me.  I can’t remember.  Images from our first few dates pass through my head but I realize that I shouldn’t be thinking about one boy when I’m on a date with