the vampire diaries matt and elena first date - l.j smith (first color ebook reader .TXT) 📗

have the first bite of chocolate soufflé. Finally to save the ice cream that was melting, Matt took a heaping dessert spoonful, dabbed it in one of the melting ice cream balls and smiled at Elena. Then, while Elena opened her mouth to ask if it was good he swiftly brought the loaded spoon to her mouth and pushed. Elena had only a fraction of a second to decide. Either eat the dessert or get soufflé all over her moonlight-colored dress. She made the right decision, almost too late and by the time large drops of brownish white were falling off the spoon it was safely over a napkin that Matt was holding with his other hand.
“I can be stubborn, too,” Matt said. And then, hoping she wasn’t mad, “Is it good?”
“Delithious,” she said a little indistinctly, finishing up with a sip of water and a last dab. The, before Matt knew what was happening an object loomed out of nowhere at him and cold steel touched his teeth. “Open wide,” a sweet voice chimed in his ears and he quickly opened as wide as he could to take in a huge sticky bite of delicious hot chocolatey-goo mixed with sweet cool vanilla ice cream.
He was sure that he looked like an idiot as he sat there chewing on the giant mouthful, but it was so good, and Elena looked so pleased with herself, leaning forward as she did to scoop dollops of gloop off his chin as carefully as a barber.
“S’wonderful,” he managed, swabbing his face with the only napkin in sight.
“It is, isn’t it?” Elena twinkled back. Then her face looked serious. “No, it’s not.”
“It’s not?” Matt’s heart almost stopped.
“It’s . . . perfect!” And she laughed, showing white and shining teeth despite the chocolate. Matt could only hope that his own relieved grin was as free of goo.
“You know what?” Elena said, then, looking him deeply in the eyes.
“What?” Matt barely breathed.
“We’d better eat all this quick before it melts.”
And so they did, laughing and feeding each other an occasional bite. The dessert was wonderful, but more wonderful was the look in Elena’s eyes every time Matt looked up. Of course, he had a hard time believing the look, so he had to look up frequently. This resulted in a number of small spills of chocolate—fortunately none on the moonlight blue dress.
They were just drinking the last of their coffee when a shadow loomed over Matt’s left shoulder. What do you want now? I paid the bill, Matt thought, but it wasn’t the waiter.
It was an elderly couple, perhaps in their sixties. Oh, no, God! Matt thought. They’re going to ruin everything by complaining about the noise, by complaining about how long Matt and Elena had stayed, or by complaining about . . . something.
“We’ve been watching you two young love birds,” the man said, in a slightly quavering voice that made Matt readjust his age by maybe ten years up. “And I have to say—“
“—it brought us both right back to our first date again,” the old woman said in a flutey voice that made Matt readjust again up to maybe late seventies or even eighties. Normally he liked old people, loved to listen to their stories, loved to see their old attics full of memoirs. But now he was gut sure that this couple would say something that would take all the shimmer off the date, like rubbing a butterfly’s wings with dirty fingers.
“You two obviously have something very special,” the woman fluted, smiling at Elena. “You’re a very lovely young woman.”
Elena blushed charmingly and said nothing.
“And you, young man,” said the gentleman, “obviously have money to burn.”
Matt could feel his face turn red. He’d known they’d spoil it. They were making fun of him.
“Or at least to step on, anyway.” The old man nodded toward Matt’s shoe. “Do you realize you’ve got a bill stuck there?”
Everything went very sluggish and hazy. Slowly, with a dark mist obscuring most of his vision, Matt pulled up one foot and then the other, looking at the soles.
And there, on the bottom of his right foot, was the hundred-dollar bill.
It was almost like a message—a joke—from old Uncle Joe. You think I’d really leave ya in the lurch, kid? Nah. But the way to this girl’s heart isn’t through showerin’ her with fripperies—yes, Uncle Joe actually said that: “showerin’ her with fripperies.” It’s through showin’ her yer own heart. What, now are you gonna pout? Just look at her!
Matt looked through the dimness at Elena’s shining face.
“I—I’m so sorry,” he managed. “It must have fallen out when I first opened the wallet and then I stepped on it and then I couldn’t see it—but—everything that I put you through—”
“Matt, isn’t it wonderful!” Elena was saying. There were tears in her eyes. “And thank you, sir, for noticing it before we got outside and it got all muddy.”
“To tell you the truth, I’d have mentioned it before,” the old gentleman whispered. “But you were managing so well yourselves—we were in the booth right here”—he indicated a booth behind him—”that I couldn’t bring myself to spoil the dream.”
To spoil the dream.
And that was what this had been in reality—a dream date.
Matt looked at Elena and Elena looked back and then she laughed and hugged the old man. “Thank you,” she said. “Thank you for not spoiling it. I’ve been here to this restaurant”—Elena shrugged—“twenty times or so, but tonight was the best.”
“And I say that any boy who can wow a girl while feeding her only bread, lettuce and chocolate must have something special.” The old man chuckled, looking at Elena appreciatively. “Hang on to this one, my dear.”
“Thank you,” Elena said again, and she added, “I think I will.”
And she took Matt’s hand and held on to it all the time it took to ask the valet driver if he had change for one hundred dollars.
To Be Continued . . . Imprint

Publication Date: 07-26-2010

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