White Space Season 1

still slipping between their toes.
    “How did you know Sarah was The One? ”
    Jon sniffed at the surprise inside the question, blinking twice before rearranging his face and saying, “I don’t know. I’ve never really thought about it.”
    “Think about it now,” Cassidy said. “If Sarah was The One That Got Away, like you said, then you must know when she became The One.”
    Jon tugged on his bottom lip with both rows of teeth slowly nodding. “That’s a damn good question.”
    “So,” Cassidy said. ”Do you have a moment.”
    Jon nodded. “I do.”
    “So?”
    “So, you’re gonna have to wait.” He turned to Ryan, standing at their table, notepad in hand. Jon seemed surprised to see that Ryan was an attractive woman in her late 20’s, rather than the pimply faced teenaged boy he probably expected to see. “Good morning, Ryan.”
    “Good morning,” she smiled, surprised by the greeting. Cassidy tried her best not to roll her eyes.
    “Welcome to Powdered Sugar. I see that your menus are closed. Does that mean you already know what you want, or maybe you’d like me to come back, or I could give you a suggestion?” she offered.
    Jon smiled. “Yes, and no thank you twice.”
    Ryan smiled back.
    Cassidy opened her menu, waiting to see what Jon would order before she decided what she’d get. “One second. You order first, Jon.”
    Jon said, “Okay, I’ll have an order of waffles. And a glass of ice water.”
    Ryan scribbled on her notepad, then said, “That it? Anything special on the waffles?”
    “How would you eat it?” Jon asked. “What do you think makes the perfect waffle?”
    Ryan’s face flooded with red, as though blushing at the reality of Jon Conway asking for her honest opinion. She said, “Well, I’m really not sure. I like my waffles all sorts of ways. They’re all really great, every one on the menu.”
    Jon said, “You think about it. Whatever waffle you think is the best waffle, that’s the one I want. If there’s a better way to make it that you guys aren’t telling anyone about, then I want it that way.”
    She laughed and said, “Okay.”
    Cassidy said, “I’ll have waffles with butter, maple syrup, and some whipped cream, please. And a glass of milk.”
    Ryan left the table and Cassidy whispered to Jon, “What if she likes waffles buttered with shit?”
    Jon laughed. “I’ve had worse.”
    “Ha, I doubt that,” Cassidy scoffed. She rolled her silverware from its napkin nest, then sat the napkin on her lap and said, “So, after all the suspense, your story better be good.”
    “All my stories are good,” Jon said. “That’s why they pay me to tell them.”
    Cassidy shook her head. “Nope. They pay writers to tell them. They pay you to be pretty, and show people who are too lazy to read what the stories look and sound like.”
    Jon laughed.
    Ryan returned to the table with a glass of water for Jon and milk for Cassidy. “I forgot to ask if you wanted coffee.”
    “That’d be great,” Jon said. “I’ll take mine black, please.”
    “No thanks,” Cassidy said.
    Ryan left the table.
    Jon took a sip of water, then turned back to Cassidy. “Do you remember the junior trip to D.C.?”
    “Of course. The optional trip that cost a million dollars and only fuckers from Cedar Park could afford to go?”
    Jon said, “Most of the class came, Cassidy. More than 2/3. And half of the trip was paid for by the school.”
    Cassidy sipped her water, ignoring Jon’s facts.
    “Look, it sucks that you guys couldn’t go. But being away from Sarah for that long, well, that’s when I knew. Sure, we left the island all the time for family vacations and stuff like that, but I’d never been away from Sarah for so long in a place where she should have been, too. And seriously, I ached.” Jon laughed. “I couldn’t get her off my mind the entire time we were gone. Remember when we came back, the picnic we had that weekend?”
    Cassidy nodded.
    “The second I saw Sarah step onto the grass, I wanted to drop to one knee and ask her if she’d marry me. Totally ridiculous. I barely had my driver’s license.” He shook his head, laughing. “So I guess that’s when I knew.”
    Cassidy let Jon’s story sit for a moment, and then said, “So what’s next?”
    “What do you mean?”
    “For you, for everything … for Emma.” She left out the other part of the question she was also wondering — what was next for them? Had this been a fling? Or was there