Two days had passed and I still couldn’t believe that my robbery scheme had worked. Harry called me yesterday to see if I was available to work as his bodyguard. I told him that our company didn’t have any spare bodyguards at the moment and that I wouldn’t be free to work for him for at least a week. The real reason why I was holding off on taking the job was that I wanted to get my security license first and I had to take a 40-hour class next week to get it. He probably wouldn’t ever ask to see it, but I wanted to do this by the book just in case.
Angelo and the rest of the crew all agreed that we shouldn’t let the rest of the gang know what we were up to until we got the first check from Harry. Once they saw that we were pulling in good money from this, there was no way they could get mad about it. Probably. Plus, we’d gotten a decent payout from pawning the chain that we stole. All in all, this scheme seemed like a success so far.
But I couldn’t bring myself to feel good about it. The moment when the gunman tried to intervene kept playing in my head in a loop. I’d just gotten lucky. If the system hadn’t given me enough points to unlock the Brawler skill, things would have turned out very differently. It made my stomach turn just to think about it.
I’d been annoyed earlier when Mello kept acting like I didn’t know what I was doing, but in the end, he was right. I’d put all of our lives in danger. We might have gotten away unscathed, but I couldn’t consider this a success. My overeagerness and lack of preparation could have gotten us killed. I couldn’t let something like that happen again. I vowed to myself that I would never go into a quest or job again without taking the proper precautions.
It was 6:57 PM. I knew that because I kept checking the time on my phone every minute like a weird nervous tick. This was the night I was supposed to be going on a date with Mia. She’d left it up to me to plan out what we’d be doing, so naturally I turned to the internet to find some good first date ideas. I wanted it to be casual and low-pressure but also intimate so we could get to know each other.
Deciding on something turned out to be harder than I’d initially expected. Movie dates were kind of boring and didn’t give you much time to talk. Going to a fancy restaurant would’ve been overkill. Eventually, I landed on the idea of meeting up at one of those outdoor food markets and checking out the different stalls. It seemed like it could be interesting and this place was supposed to have live music as well. I just hoped that she wouldn’t think I was being a cheapskate.
We were supposed to meet up at 7. I always tried to arrive at places 15 minutes early, but somehow I got there at 6:30. That was the first time I’d ever been annoyed about there not being any traffic. I killed time and my phone’s battery by looking over the food market’s website and looking at the menus of all the restaurants there. Deciding what I wanted before I even walked in seemed like a good strategy to come across as self-assured, but I had trouble narrowing down my options. I was nervous and excited about how the date would turn out. In the brief time that Mia and I had talked before, she’d come across as a very sweet and intelligent girl. But after my last relationship had ended so badly, I wasn’t so sure if I was such a great judge of character. And what if she turned out to be as great as she appeared but I ended up making an ass of myself somehow?
I laughed out loud. It felt like I spent all of my time overthinking things these days. I wondered if the system would eventually give me a skill that would make me less of a worrywart. A lot of intense things had been happening in my life lately, but if I obsessed over everything I’d just end up driving myself crazy. I didn’t know what the future would hold, but I decided to try my best to be in the moment and just have fun on the date. Thinking things over for work was something I needed to do more of, but there was no need to overdo it for something like this.
Mia walked up to the entrance at 7 o’clock on the dot. She was wearing a casual white top with a red skirt and open-toed shoes. It wasn’t the most extravagant outfit, but she made it look classy. When we locked eyes, she smiled and brushed away a strand of wavy, dark hair that had fallen out of place before walking over to me.
“Hey, good to see you. You look great,” I said.
She smiled and looked over my brand-new button-down shirt and khakis. “Thanks, you don’t look so bad yourself.”
“Thanks, I try. Are you hungry?” I said.
“Starving. I can’t wait to check this place out. One of my friends went here before and told me the food is fantastic,” She said.
“Yeah, I’ve heard a lot of good things about it too. We should head in,” I said.
We walked through the gate and joined the crowds of hungry people who were streaming in. Delicious aromas from all the different stalls mixed in the air and left my mouth watering. There were vendors selling artisan pizza, authentic tacos, traditional Vietnamese food, fancy-looking sandwiches with a million different ingredients, and every other type of cuisine that you could think of. It was like traveling around the world without leaving home. Even after researching the place beforehand, I still felt overwhelmed by all the choices. I kind of wanted to try everything but that wasn’t an option.
I turned to Mia. “Do you know what kind of food you’re in the mood for?”
She shook her head. “Not really. Let’s keep walking around and see what they have.”
After taking a lap around the market, we managed to narrow down our choices to a stall that had dinosaur-sized burgers & milkshakes and a hibachi stall that was preparing some heavenly-looking Japanese food. I was leaning towards the burgers but she seemed set on the Japanese food, so I gave in and we went there instead. I guess we could’ve split up and bought food from separate places, but I wanted to be a “gentleman” and pay for everything myself.
Even though the market was packed with people, it didn’t take us too long to find an empty table. I got a chicken meal that came with steamed rice, vegetables, and miso soup. Mia got a combo meal that came with your choice of a few different types of sushi. The food exceed my exceeded my expectations.
“You made the right call on going with hibachi. This might be the best Japanese food I’ve ever had,” I said. “How’s your sushi?”
Mia swallowed a bite of her food. “It’s really good! If you ever come back here again, you should try it.”
“Sounds good, I will,” I said.
There was an awkward silence after that. I wasn’t sure what to talk about. “So.. um, what type of work do you do?” I said.
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“I work in customer service. Dealing with angry customers all the time can be draining sometimes, but I like helping them with their problems,” She said. “What about you? Oh, wait. You work at that casino. Duh.”
“That’s more of a side gig. My main job is being a bodyguard. I haven’t been doing it for very long though.” That was close enough to the truth.
“It sounds like an interesting job. How’d you get into that?” Mia asked.
“One of my relatives runs the business and he helped me out when he heard that I was looking for work,” I said.
Mia smiled. “That was nice of him. What’s it like to work with your family?”
“It’s been good so far. We might not always see eye to eye on things, but we don’t let the job come between us. I’m starting to wonder if I’m cut out for this line of work though,” I said.
“What makes you say that?” Mia said.
“My family has been in the… security business for a long time, but I never wanted any part of it. Somehow, I fell into it anyway and it feels like I’m just surviving by the skin of my teeth. I’m doing alright for now, but luck can only take me so far. I don’t want anybody to get hurt because I made a mistake or overlooked something,” I said.
Mia frowned. “I can imagine how stressful that must be. But if you’re not feeling it, can’t you just quit? I’m sure your family would understand.”
“It’s not that simple. My family is counting on me. Besides, I begged them to help me get this job so it wouldn’t be right for me to bail on them. And it’s not like I have a lot of other options,” I said.
“What do you mean by not having other options?” She asked.
I facepalmed internally. Letting her know that I was a loser on the first date probably wasn’t the smartest idea. But since I’d already said more than I intended to, I figured that I might as well be honest. It’s not like I could convincingly backpedal on that anyway.
“It’s kind of a long story, but promise not to judge me too harshly,” I said sheepishly.
“Uh oh, that doesn’t sound good. Now you’ve got my attention,” She laughed. “I can’t make any promises, but I’ll try my best.”
I took a deep breath and told her all about the rise and fall of my college paper-writing empire. Once I started talking, I ended up going in-depth about the entire process of starting the business, the crazy lengths I had to go through to keep from getting caught, and the crushing feeling I had inside after it was all over. For obvious reasons, I left out the part about joining the mafia afterward. I hadn’t really had a full conversation about this with anyone since it had happened, so it felt good to get some of this stuff off my chest. While I was telling the story, I searched her face for signs of disgust or repulsion in my unethical behavior. But to my surprise, she just seemed interested in listening to what I had to say.
“So long story short, I didn’t have many career options left after that,” I concluded. “If my family hadn’t hooked me up with this job, I didn’t know what I would do.”
“I know that I said I’d try not to judge you, but can I be honest with you?”
“Sure, I can take it,” I said.
“I think you’re being a coward,” She said.
“What?” Of all the things I’d expected her to say, that wasn’t one of them.
“If you were able to write all those essays for your classmates, then you’ve got to be pretty smart,” She said. “But as soon as you were expelled, you seemed to give up. If you want to get your degree, you can always try to enroll in another college. Instead of feeling sorry for yourself or being scared about the future, you can take action. You don’t have to just accept your fate.”
I took a sip of my drink. “Damn, you don’t hold back, do you?”
Mia laughed. “Sorry about that. I’ve been told that I’m too direct sometimes.”
“Don’t apologize. You’re right,” I said. “I was down in the dumps after I got kicked out of school and it felt like my life was over. I could’ve kept fighting to finish my education but I didn’t even try. Thank you. You’ve given me some things to think about.”
“Glad I could help,” Mia said. “I probably could’ve worked on my delivery though, so sorry.”
I waved her off. “It’s fine. Sometimes you need people to be blunt. Can I ask you something now?”
“Go for it,” She said.
“Why did you stick around after I told you my story? It didn’t exactly paint me in a good light, so I wouldn’t have blamed you for making up some excuse to try and get out of here.”
“You’ve definitely made some questionable choices, but it seems like you regret what you did,” She said. “And it’s kind of refreshing to talk to someone willing to be so honest. Most guys would’ve tried to sweep something like that under the rug. I like that you’re so open.”
That caught me off guard. This girl seemed to have an interesting way of looking at things. I wasn’t sure how to respond.
“Thanks,” I finally said. “There’s something about you that just makes me want to be open.”
“Dude, I thought we talked about the cheesy pickup lines,” She teased.
“Those are the only kind that I have,” I laughed. “And you know you’re into it.”
Mia rolled her eyes but there was a smile on her face. “Well, maybe just a little bit.”
“I knew it!” I grinned. “Speaking of being open, I think it’s your turn to open up. I feel like I’ve been going on and on about myself. Tell me more about you.”
“What do you want to know?” She said.
“What’s your background? Do you get along with your family? What do you want out of life? Tell me everything.”
Mia scrunched up her face. “Is this a date or a job interview?”
I deflated. I’d gotten too excited and went overboard. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to throw so much at you.”
“No, it’s fine. I was just kidding. Sorry, bad joke,” She said. “Let’s see. I’m an only child. My family immigrated here from Cuba in the 90s and we get along great. I don’t know what I’d do without them. If I had to choose one thing that I want the most, it would be to help others. I know that sounds corny, but it’s the truth. I’ve been thinking about going back to school myself, so I can become a nurse.”
“That’s amazing. I think you’d make a good nurse. You’re easy to talk to and you’re good at putting people at ease.”
“I don’t know about that, but thanks. It’s sweet of you to say that,” Mia said.
“You’re welcome. And I said it because it’s true. I’m Mr. Honesty, remember?”
Mia blushed and it was adorable. She’d kept me off balance for most of the date, so it felt good to return the favor for once. The conversation flowed from there. We must have talked for at least two hours straight. By the time we left the food market, I felt like I’d known her for ages.
“I had a good time tonight,” Mia said looking up at me.
“Yeah, me too. We should do this again sometime,” I said.
“I’d like that.”
I opened my arms to give her a parting hug. But she surprised me by moving in for a kiss. I quickly got over my surprise and kissed her back. You always hear people describe kisses as feeling electric or like fireworks going off, but this was the first time I experienced that spark myself. It sent chills down my entire body. Time froze and we were the only two people in the world. I never wanted that moment to end. It was hard to disengage when her lips finally moved away from mine.
“Wow, that was… wow,” I said like an idiot.
“You weren’t so bad yourself,” Mia smiled. “See you around, Nico.”
“Yeah. See you,” I said, still dazed.
And with that, she turned and walked away. I just stood there dumbstruck. What a night. What a woman.