"I guess I should get going," Steven said. "I don't want to keep you."
"Yeah, I have to get back to my parents'. My mom is probably making dinner as we speak; she'll be pissed if I'm not there by the time it's served."
Steven tentatively went in for a hug and she reciprocated. It was a short hug, and then Steven walked on.
"Hey," Mackenzie called after him.
He stopped and turned.
"Listen, Stevie...do you think we could do something tomorrow night? Grab something to eat, maybe?"
"Yeah; that'd be great."
"You can pick me up. Is seven o'clock good with you?"
"It's perfect. I'll see you then."
He turned to walk away but she stopped him again.
"Wait," she said, giggling lightly. "You don't even know where to go. My parents have moved since the last time you picked me up for a date. Here, let's put each other's numbers in our phones, and I'll text you the address later."
They exchanged phones and put in their numbers. Standing near her, he could smell her perfume, a fresh floral scent. They parted then. Steven didn't check his phone until he was in the car. He looked for her name, but it wasn't listed in the "M" section. A small smile spread across his lips as he scrolled back up until he found it. She'd entered her name not as "Mackenzie", but as "Kenzie". Just as she'd been the only one he allow to called him "Stevie", it was a name only he'd been allowed to call her.
Gary was at work the next day, none the wiser about Steven's tardiness the previous day. Steven did his best to look busy, but in truth he was distracted all day. He couldn't help thinking about his date (was it a date?) with Mackenzie. Though he'd been to a dance or two with a girl before her, she'd been his first real girlfriend. She had been dating Ben Hogan up until then. Ben was your typical jock, a star quarterback and one of the best wrestlers in the state. He was also an asshole who didn't even try hiding the fact that he was cheating on Kenzie with half the hot girls in town. Steven recalled an argument between them he overheard one day at Dairy Queen, where he'd stopped there to grab a bite to eat. He'd gone around to the side of the building and sat down on the ground, taking the food out of the DQ bag and eating it right there. He hadn't seen Kenzie and Ben inside, but they must've been in there, because halfway through his meal, they came outside; he couldn't see them from where he sat around the corner of the building, but he could hear them bickering with each other.
"Don't lie to me," she said. "Two different people told me what happened between you and Becca at that party."
"I don't care who told you anything," Ben said. "They're liars if they said they saw me with her."
They argued some more.
"Fuck you," Mackenzie finally said.
Steven could hear tears in her voice. He peeked around the corner of the building to see Kenzie stalking away from the DQ. Ben watched her go until she turned a corner, then he shook his head and crossed the street to Wild Bill's Music Store, disappearing inside. Steven was angry on Mackenzie's behalf. He'd had crush on her for years, though he'd never had the courage to make a move. He thought that, if she were his girl, he would never treat her like that prick Ben was treating her. He pictured himself walking across the street and going into Wild Bill's, confronting Ben and kicking his ass. But he knew it was just a fantasy; Ben could easily pick him up and fold him like a pretzel. So he finished his food and went home.
As fate would have it, Steven only had to wait another three months for the girl of his dreams to become the girl of his reality. After braking up with Ben, it was Steven who'd comforted Mackenzie, her friends having abandoned her in favor of Ben. After that, he and Kenzie became close, hanging out almost every day. He was afraid Ben might be jealous, but Ben didn't seem to care. Though he still had a massive crush on her, he was afraid to cross the line and ruin their friendship, so he kept how he felt about her a secret. It was she who finally acted to change the nature of their relationship. They were hanging out at the park after dark, seated together on the merry-go-round and talking everything and nothing at all, when Kenzie leaned in and kissed him on the cheek. From then on, they were officially a couple.
Even back then, Kenzie had a deep interest in acting. She was in a bunch of plays, with Steven in the audience. When the cast would come out at the end of the play to take a bow, when he clapped he was clapping especially for her. Sometimes, in the middle of a performance, she would find him in the audience and make the briefest eye contact. He thought she possessed amazing talent, and he wasn't alone in that belief. Strangely, he never gave much thought to something that should have been obvious to him: if she were to pursue that talent and the potential career it might lead her to, she would have to fly away someday. It wasn't until graduation neared, when she kept being vague whenever he asked about which universities she was applying to, that he saw the end coming, a break from that brief paradise they had found together. Sure enough, one day Kenzie told him they had to talk about something serious. He knew what was coming, but it still hurt when she said she was going to university in Quebec, on the other side of the country. She didn't think a long-distance relationship was going to work. She still cared about him, she said, but thought it would best for both of them if they each went their own way. He was angry and said cruel things, but soon apologized. She left for Quebec six weeks later, and the next time he saw her was on the TV.
Now, this date with her. Since parting ways, Stevie had been in a long-term engagement that ended when his fiance decided fucking her yoga instructor was a good idea. He'd intentionally avoided ever looking up information on Kenzie's private life on the internet; she could be married, dating, whatever, he had no idea. Before leaving work, he bit the bullet and Googled "Mackenzie Davis significant other" and found she was rumored to be in a long-term relationship that she'd said little about publicly. So maybe she meant for their date to be strictly platonic. He'd have to be careful not to show how much he still cared about her; he didn't want to make it weird for her.
After work, he showered quickly, debated what to wear for a half-hour (settling for something casual but not overly so), and picked her up at her parents' home, a large but not ostentatious house in an exclusive neighborhood. She was waiting for him outside the house when he pulled up; she jumped into the car and they headed for the place she'd picked out, a small diner where they had spent many a night while dating. None of the people who'd worked there then were still around, even the owner having changed in the almost two decades that had passed. The food was still the same, and they talked while they ate, catching up on each other's lives. He didn't ask about her job much, which she seemed to appreciate. Neither of them brought up her boyfriend. Steven was pleased to find that he still had the power to make her laugh.
After dinner, she asked if they could go back to his place. Still unsure what the exact nature of the date was, Steven took her home. He was a little embarrassed by the apartment, which screamed "male living alone" in its sparseness (he'd cleaned up before heading to pick her up at least, a part of him maybe hoping they'd end up back there). She asked for something to drink and all he had were a couple of beers. They drank these while watching some show on streaming (he'd never seen it before and didn't care for it, but she seemed to enjoy it). At some point, she leaned her head on his shoulder, her feet curled up underneath her on the couch. Her presence was warm, comforting, and she smelled so nice. He couldn't help himself, taking a whiff of her hair, smelling her herbal shampoo. She turned her head up, catching him in the act, but she smiled and gave him a light kiss on the lips.
"This is nice," she said.
He agreed. Steven hadn't realized how much he missed her until that kiss. He took a chance and went in for another kiss, and she accepted it; soon, their tongues were entangled and she had a hand on his crotch, rubbing him.
"We shouldn't," she said, but even as she was saying it, she gave his dick a squeeze through the fabric of his pants.
There was little talking after that. They kissed awhile longer, and then she had his pants open and she took him into her mouth. At first, she did all the work, but after a while, Steven pressed down on her head with one hand as he gently thrusted upward. When he let up for a moment to let her catch her breath, she made it clear she didn't want a break by going all the way down on his cock, spit dribbling down his balls.
