Free Good Girl by Susan Wright

advice regardless of who she was dating.
    By the time Hunter texted her saying: I’m
downstairs , Kali had made her up mind that it wasn’t going to work out
between them. She couldn’t get serious about a man who was the kind of person
her friends had to warn her about. She would have to consider this an
adventure, and that was the end of it.
    She grabbed her purse and ran down.
    One look at Hunter, and all her good
resolutions flew away. He was so sexy, standing there on her stoop. His face
lit up when he saw her. It was flattering. Especially coming from such a
handsome man.
    “Beautiful!” he exclaimed.
    “Thanks. You look good, too.” He was
also wearing jeans, this time with a sleek button-down shirt. Kali was glad to see
she had judged the tone of their date correctly.
    Kali was very aware that Pam and Karen’s
front window was right next to them. Karen peeked through the curtain, getting
a good look at Hunter. Then with a little wave, she was gone. Hunter never saw
it happen.
    “I thought we’d stay in your
neighborhood. I know a great Afghan restaurant nearby. Do you eat meat?”
    “Yes.”
    “Good. It’s near the bridge. Do you mind
a walk?”
    “I love to walk.” It was a pretty night
out, and since it was Saturday, there were plenty of people on the sidewalks.
    “You sure picked the right neighborhood
to live in,” Hunter said. “It’s changed a lot since I first moved here. It used
to be much more affordable, but then everyone discovered it.”
    “I’m lucky. My floors are slanted and the
kitchen needs a desperate renovation, so it doesn’t cost too much to rent.”
    In that way, they talked about the city
and what it was like living there and trying to succeed in a place where
everyone came to try to succeed. Most of the people that Kali met came to New
York from someplace else, trying to make a better life for themselves.
    As they moved on to their past, Kali
told him a little bit about her professor mom and dilettante dad, and what it
was like growing up as an only child. He was surprised at that, saying she
didn’t seem spoiled at all. She didn’t want to tell him that her father was the
one that she and her mom had to take care of. She loved her father because he
was interesting and fun, but he was not very reliable.
    “My mom and I have a really great
relationship,” she told him. “We always have. I guess she treated me more like
a sister.”
    In turn, Hunter told her about his
roving childhood in city after city as his father chased job after job, all of
them in trucking. “Sometimes he’d be gone for weeks. But he was hard to deal
with, and we never seemed to make ends meet. My mom was working, too, so I took
care of my younger brothers and made sure they got off to school and did their
homework. I’ve been working summers since I was fourteen. One place was a metal
fabricator. They let me sweep up and do odd jobs at first. That’s how I got
interested in metal casting, and when artists came I got to see how it was
done.”
    “Where did you go to college?”
    “High school was the most I got. I’m
self-taught. My first piece was accepted in an outsider art show that got some
press. There were paintings by prisoners and spray paint artists. People who
never had any training. There’s something raw and primal about that kind of art
that I’ve always respected.”
    It was fascinating, but Kali knew her
mom would hate the fact that she was dating a man who only had a high school
degree. It proved even more that Hunter wasn’t her type. She was drawn to him,
but she didn’t understand him.
    “What’s wrong?” Hunter asked as she went
silent. “The restaurant is only one more block.”
    “It’s not that.”
    “Then what?”
    She hesitated. “I don’t want to offend
you.”
    “You can ask me anything. How can we get
to know each other if we tip-toe around everything? Besides, I’m not easily
offended. Or surprised.”
    “Okay, since you insist. After a