5 Times a Day

Anybody speaks Chinese? If you do, please let me know. I've developed a translator, and I intend to implement it in my site. Don't know if the translated bit is correct though. Hence why I need someone. If you do, let me know in the comments, messages, or my Patreon. Looking forward to it.

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**Chapter 94**

“We’re splitting the bill, right?” Carol asked once the plates were cleared.

It had been a simple steak dinner. No wine. Two hundred dollars for the whole thing, which in this city barely counted as trying.

Aunt Elise’s voice sounded at the back of my head.

‘Pay the bill. Whether it’s just the first date and there are no chances of you getting lucky, always pay the bill. Even if she offers or says she’s a strong independent woman, still pay the bill. But be cool about it. Make her realize you’re being a gentleman.’

I didn’t really know what she meant by the last bit. Cool was not my native language. I improvised anyway.

“You don’t honestly think I’m gonna let you pay, are you?”

“What do you mean?” She wasn’t offended. She looked amused, chin in her hand, like she had been waiting to see how I would fail.

“Simple. You’re giving me your time and attention. That’s worth something, right?”

“So this is an exchange?”

“To me, it is.”

The second it left my mouth I knew there was nothing gentlemanly about it. Aunt Elise had said *cool*. I had said *transaction*. Carol leaned in anyway, close enough that the ribbon at her collar moved.

“So? What are you hoping for after spending all of this money?”

She seemed amused. Safe water, if I didn’t drown myself.

I smiled and kept the panic off my face.

“Nothing much. Hopefully you’ll continue to spend your time with me.”

“So you’re trying to fix a client with discounts?”

“Yep.”

“Haha. This is so your first date.”

Was it that obvious? Apparently, the steak had not saved me.

“Well, hopefully I can learn a thing or two from this one to improve our next one.”

I put the words in on purpose. *Next one.* A door left open instead of a compliment.

“Oh, you’re doing great so far. Let’s see where else it leads.”

“Okay.”

The smile I gave her was mostly *phew* with better posture.

After that, I was empty again. The waiter could have asked me for a destination, and I would have named the parking lot. Thankfully, the lustful milf who was also my aunt had already built the rest of the night in my head.

‘Don’t end it after dinner. Some may think that a dinner should come at the end, but no. Have dinner before everything else so it digests by the time you’re done. If you catch my drift.’

‘As for what to do after dinner, you have multitudes of choices. The best would be a cinema. Do your research before going. Ask her mutual friends what movies she likes. Make sure you have a few options and then pick one with the least amount of viewers.’

*That gives you a dark, secluded place where not many can interrupt you.*

“What do you think about a movie?” I asked.

She said yes before I finished pretending it was a casual idea. I had asked Mira before I left the house, not Sara. Sara was still treating me like a criminal. Mira had answered just to make me go away. Action.

“Any preferences?” I asked anyway, because aunt Elise had also said not to look like you already owned the night.

“Surprise me.”

A test. Of course it was a test.

“Well, I don’t know about you, but I’m kind of craving something with a little action.”

The wording was not smart. Carol didn’t flinch. She smiled like she had caught the string and decided to let me hold it.

“I see someone’s done their research.”

I could only sigh and give her the face that said *you caught me.*

“Let’s go.”

She hooked her arm through mine.

At the counter I slipped the kid ten dollars and asked which action movie was the deadest. He pointed at something I had never heard of. Ten people in line. Starting in ten minutes. Good enough.

Butter popcorn. Two colas. We walked in as the lights dropped.

I didn’t have to steer. Carol did it herself, leading us away from the little cluster of strangers, into a row where the dark would hide us once the trailers died.

Aunt Elise’s voice again.

‘Try to touch her a little. Don’t be creepy. Just place your hand on the back of her chair, like you’re putting it around her shoulder, but try to keep your distance. If she notices and leans back, put your arm on her shoulder. If she notices and shifts uncomfortably, it’s too soon, and immediately back off. If she doesn’t notice, then keep it there until she does.’

I put my arm along the back of her seat. Close enough that if she reclined, she would find me.

The movie started. Explosions. Quips. A plot that needed less attention than her breathing. I watched the screen and her shoulder at the same time.

She felt the arm within seconds, as if she were on the lookout for it. Smiled. Leaned back into it.

That was the cue.

I was still hesitant, borderline bashful, which would have been funny to anyone who had seen the rest of my week. I let my arm settle around her, hand on the covered curve of her shoulder. Warm, I thought. She did the rest. She closed the gap until her hair brushed my jaw, and after a few minutes she put her head on my shoulder like she had decided the movie was furniture.

I stiffened. Aunt Elise had told me not to. I forced the stiffness down and stayed still.

Nothing else happened. No porn situation. As much as I would have loved it. We shifted when the seats got cruel and then settled again. She stayed stuck to me. I stayed stuck to her. The dark did the work I was too new at doing aloud.

When the lights came up, she looked happy. That mattered more than whether I had followed the lesson perfectly. Happy meant the night was still alive.

Outside, the air was cooler. She took my arm again without being asked.

‘The third step is to walk. Take a walk anywhere. On the sidewalk of the road, or the most optimal place, a park. Pick a cinema near a park as well, so it’s easier to shift. And make sure to pick a cinema in a busy district too.’

When I asked a question at the last part, she simply said, ‘You’ll see.’

‘In the park, see if she has space for desserts. If she doesn’t, just walk and talk about your life. It’s best to be honest, but also make sure not to pry too much. Keep it basic, like life goals and all.’

There was a park across the street. Of course there was. I had picked the theater for that reason, and I still felt like I was cheating.

I asked if she wanted ice cream. She did. She licked it while we walked the path under the lamps, and I smiled because the next part was the one that would either end the night clean or open a door I was not sure I should open.

“Tell me about yourself.”

“Like what?”

“All I know about you is from others. I wonder whether that’s true or not.”

She thought about it, turning the cone in her fingers.

“I don’t know. I don’t think I know how to describe myself. I’m confident when it comes to interviews, goals, all that. In this situation I honestly don’t know what to say.”

Too deep. Too vague. A date was not an interview panel. Emotions could show up uninvited, and she looked like she didn’t have a script for that.

So I went first.

“I want to be a doctor.”

That thawed her a little. I pushed it.

“But you wanna know a secret?”

“Sure.”

“I didn’t really want to be a doctor.”

“Really?”

“Yep.”

“Then what did you want to become?”

“Nothing. I had no dreams. I just thought helping out the school doctor would keep the sports coaches away. My grandmother took it as interest and started building me a hospital. I didn’t know what to say to that, so I just thought, ‘meh, why not?’”

She watched me while she ate. Not judging. Measuring.

“So you made your decision based on others’ decisions?”

“Actually, no. Looking back, I didn’t have a decision to make. I just didn’t want to be bothered, so I went on with the lie. Maybe that was the decision. The other one was made for me because I didn’t know how to make it.”

She was quiet long enough that I thought I had killed the mood. Then she spoke, softer.

“I was twelve when I saw a kid bullying someone at my school. No one did anything. The next day I compiled a report from the witnesses, the victim, and past victims. I published it in the school paper. The boy was punished the next day. It made me so happy I stuck with it.”

The action movies. That explains it.

“So you wanted the injustice from the world to stop? No wonder the action movies.”

“Hahaha.”

We laughed in a park that had gone mostly quiet, ice cream dripping, her net sleeve hooked through my arm, Aunt Elise’s third step going smoothly.

The night was still long.