Girl Most Likely To by Poonam Sharma Read Free Book Online

building, and the ten f lights up to my door. Love is the only thing in life that is not anticlimactic; and as much as I hated to admit it, seeing him in my doorway made me feel like I was home.
    Jon was tall, dark and Sicilian, in that broad-shouldered, olive-complexioned sort of a way, so I often told myself that we looked good together. We met in his restaurant, Peccavi, eighteen months ago when I requested a rare vintage of Chateau Cabrieres for myself and my girlfriends. He complimented my choice while personally delivering the wine to our table, and stayed to chat us up and steal a glance down my blouse. I’m the first to admit that I was not above doing whatever I could to make it easier for him. I’ve got to use these puppies while they’ve still got the inclination to stand and salute.
    Eventually, he gave me his business card with the following scrawled across the back: “Bella, I would love to continue our conversation alone, some other time.”
    I called three days later (sending the message that I was interested, but not desperate), and refused a Saturday-night date but agreed to an early dinner on Sunday (making it clear that while I was far too fabulous to have a Saturday night unbooked four days in advance, I wasn’t dating anyone exclusively enough to have my Sunday evenings reserved).
    He wooed me expertly from the start, which naturally made me uncomfortable; would Chinese takeout and a rental of Say Anything be too pedestrian for him? After our first dinner, he draped his jacket around my shoulders as we strolled through Central Park. Then he kissed me, after holding my face in his hands, looking into my eyes and smiling in a way that asked for my permission.
    “Do you think he’s embarrassed?” he had asked me, as we passed by a dog who stared at us with one leg raised, peeing against a tree.
    Emotional risk-taking never came easily to me. My plan was to have a few months of fun with the big, sexy man, and (All together now…) “to keep it casual.” A year later, I was drafting speeches that might dissuade my parents from disowning me for bringing home an Italian and an engagement ring. Since I had already ventured so far outside my original romantic parameters, I even surprised myself by deciding to end our relationship over his disinterest in my ticking biological clock. One of the few things I knew I wanted for sure in this life was a child. So I had broken up with Jon in a no-fault sort of a way. He got Anne & Marie, the CD we purchased from the band we saw in Vermont on our inaugural weekend getaway. I got David and Melissa, the couple we met at the weekly Latin Dance class he had suggested. And I thought we had split the regrets right down the middle. I thought a lot of things back then and I ignored his attempts to reach out and get back together. A clean break, I reasoned, was the best way to end something that was never supposed to have begun at all. I was the picture of restraint: totally successful in ignoring the chocolates, the e-mails and the phone calls day and night. What I mean to say is that I was totally successful, until he showed up at my door in the middle of that blackout.
     
    “I just wanted to make sure you were okay, I guess.” He gasped for breath, wiping his face like the fireman had in that movie Cristina gave me last Christmas.
    “Thanks, Jon.” I smoothed the hair off of my face. “That’s sweet of you. Come in.”
    “You were at work when it happened, right? You okay for food and water here?” he asked, scanning the inside of my fridge, and the rest of my apartment, as if for intruders.
    “Yeah, sure…I walked home from the office and I’ve got a bunch of water bottles, anyway,” I cleared my throat, “Listen, we might run out of water pressure in the bathrooms, and you’re pretty sweaty. So if you want, you can take a shower. There are clean towels in there.” It was odd to hear myself sound so casual with him.
    “Thanks, I think I will. And you