Free The Kissing Coach by Mimi Strong

bag at my feet. “A few errands.”
    “No client meetings today?”
    I smiled. “Nope.” I had nothing planned, but had ducked out of lunch with Steph so I could go home to a root beer float and sugar coma.
    He said, “I can't help but be curious about what goes on with your other clients.”
    My cheeks warmed. “None of the other sessions are at all like what we've been … working on.”
    Our cups of chai tea arrived. Devin raised his eyebrows as he blew on the tea. The mug was enormous, which made him look younger, like an adorable little boy.
    After a moment, he said, “What do you think of dinosaurs?”
    “They're interesting.” I smiled and sipped my chai. The air conditioning inside the restaurant was powerful, and the warmth of the cup in my hands was comforting. “And you?”
    “I try not to think about them very much,” he said. “Because even though scientists are still uncovering new details, like how some of them may have been covered in feathers, we'll never really know, will we?”
    “If I could be a time traveler, I think going back to see dinosaurs would be at the top of my list.”
    He grinned. “Me too. But you'd have to go back in a dinosaur-proof cage so they wouldn't eat you—”
    “—and alter the timeline, right?” I finished. “Like, you'd give some poor velociraptor family indigestion and they wouldn't fall into the tar sands that day, and then there'd be a domino effect and your grandparents would never meet and you wouldn't exist.”
    He kept grinning. “Of course, if you didn't exist, then you wouldn't be around to cause the indigestion. Hence the paradox.”
    “That's why there are multiple timelines.”
    “Oh, of course,” he said. “Infinite timelines and parallel universes. That's so much more reasonable than ruling out the possibility of time travel.”
    I fidgeted with my chai, swirling the foamy milk on the surface so it resembled the surface of Jupiter. “In one of these parallel universes, you might be my coach.”
    He reached his hand across the table to shake mine. “Hi. I'm parallel Devin. What are your top three goals for our work together? What can I help you with?”
    I glanced around for something to change the topic to, but he kept waiting for a response.
    “Dating,” I said. “Once upon a time, I wasn't fussy at all, and now I'm too fussy. All the good ones are taken.”
    “Not all the good ones,” he said. “You have to put yourself out there, where the guys are. Have you ever tried climbing?”
    “Mountains?”
    “You can start with some indoor walls. It'll really increase your upper-body strength, and when you get to the top of the wall, you feel invincible.”
    I stared at his beautiful face. The guy could be a model or an actor, I thought. Damn, he's prettier than me. Why didn't I spend more time blowing out my hair this morning?
    “That was almost inspiring,” I said. “But if you were my coach, I wouldn't come back for a second session.”
    “Why?” He had the look of a burst bubble.
    “Because I have zero interest in climbing, and you're pushing your interests onto me, which makes me want to resist you.” He crumpled a little before me. I continued, “Plus you're way too cute.”
    His hands went to his hair, ruffling it around, and then splitting down the middle. He smoothed down his shiny, black hair so it was slicked flatter on both sides. “How about now? This is how I used to look as a kid.”
    The waitress approached our table with fragrant plates. “Devin!” she said, laughing as she put our food in front of us. “You look so nerdy.”
    “He was telling me about time travel and causality,” I said to her. “I'm afraid he might actually be a nerd.”
    She reached over and ruffled his hair back. He closed his eyes, seeming to enjoy her touch, and I died a thousand times inside.
    “That's better,” she said, then she walked away.
    I tried to enjoy my lunch, but I found myself with little appetite.
    I thought about the