Free Next to Me by AnnaLisa Grant Page A

with.”
    “A doctor! My goodness, Jenna! You’re on a roll,”’ she says with that sexy tone.
    “Yeah, I’m hot stuff,” I reply blankly. “Has Landon been back to class?”
    “No. I haven’t seen him since Saturday. I’m sure he’s going to call you. He’s a fool if he doesn’t!” Carina’s hopeless romanticism is endearing. I just nod and work to convince myself that she’s right. I never told Landon that my class attendance is sporadic, and that I won’t be back at the Saturday morning class for three weeks.
    I make it through class, doing my best to let the euphoric feeling I usually get from dancing take over. I think about my Tango with Landon last night and remember just how ridiculously in sync we were. All that seems to do is wash me with embarrassment for my behavior last night.
    I walk home and slowly approach my building, hoping to find Landon waiting for me again outside the coffee shop. No such luck. The sidewalk tables and chairs are empty. I let out a big sigh and walk into my building and up to my apartment with the intent of finding something terribly fattening to drown my sorrows in. Spring and I are both relatively healthy eaters, so there isn’t much in the way of totally fattening in the kitchen, but my search does reveal that I have everything I need to make a hollandaise sauce. So…eggs benedict it is!
    I stuff my face and drown my sorrows with the freshly made orange juice Spring made the other day. I hope she doesn’t get mad that I drank almost all of it. It literally took six bags of oranges and two hours to make this one pitcher.
    Feeling a surge of energy, which I can only attribute to the massive quantities of Vitamin C I just consumed, I take to cleaning the entire apartment. I turn on the mix playlist Mercy, Spring and I made one night after too many bottles of red wine and start fluffing the pillows on the couch from where Landon and I flattened them. Not able to look at this couch any longer I grab the supplies from under the kitchen sink and scrub and scour the bathrooms. I dust and polish the furniture, and finally vacuum every room before I collect our laundry.
    We’re fortunate to have a closet for a full-size washer and dryer in the apartment so I spend the next two hours doing all of our laundry, folding it and putting it away. I pause only a few times when random songs play as proof to our drunken state when we make the playlist. Like when KISS’s Rock and Roll All Nite ends and Barry Manilow’s Can’t Smile without You begins.
    There’s a knock at the door precisely at seven just as I’m deciding which shoes to wear with my dark jeans and orange top. I know Dr. Adam Fisher is standing on the other side of that door and I wish I felt the same kind of crazy butterflies as I did when it was Landon. It’s not that I’m not excited. He’s a well-respected, attractive doctor for crying out loud. I just don’t feel that same spark as I did with Landon.
    “Hi, Adam,” I say opening the door with a determination to enjoy myself tonight. Adam is standing there smiling wide and wearing a suit, with a baby blue tie and everything. I feel terribly underdressed and Adam’s quick-changing facial expression tells me he feels the same way about my choice of clothing.
    “Hi, Jenna. I’m sorry…I really should have told you where we were going. We have time for you to change,” he says, the smile returning to his face.
    “Oh, uh, ok. I’ll be just a minute. Make yourself at home,” I tell him. I close the door and motion to the living room before going back to my room to change. I would never have done this before my new resolve to grow up and start looking at the potential a date has. I would have rightfully used his rudeness to end the date right then and there.
    Now I really have to be determined to have a good time tonight. Adam clearly isn’t a go-with-the-flow kind of guy. He’s got a plan and we’re going to stick to it. Don’t compare him to Landon.