This Love | ✓

Part 25

"So, Leena," Claire began, eyeing me carefully. "There's something I wanted to talk to you about."

Slumped next to Claire on the couch after a heavy dinner, I turned to her and asked, "Yeah?"

"Now that you and Jason are dating," she said, her eyebrows shooting up as if to verify the truth to her statement.

I nodded for her to go on.

"I think it's time you told your father about Jason," she said in a rush.

I blinked, perplexed.

I didn't see that coming.

"You should tell your father about this, Lee," Claire insisted.

Pursing my lips, I stared at her with scepticism.

"I don't know," I said after a moment's silence.

With her posture straight and her chin angled authoritatively, Claire appeared to be using her courtroom tactics to convince me to oblige.

"Jason is a very nice boy, and I'm sure your father will be happy to hear about him," she continued. "You can also tell him that I've met Jason."

"Claire, I'm not worried about whether Dad will like Jason or not," I explained truthfully. "It's just . . . it's going to be such an awkward conversation."

I bit my lower lip, refraining from adding, Almost every conversation with my father is awkward these days.

"Call him tonight, Lee," she chuckled, patting my knee firmly.

***

"This is quite important," I said into the phone. "I'm all right, but I need to talk to him."

"I'm afraid Mr Faye can't speak to you right now, Leena," Rita said in her typical, calm tone. "He's on a conference call, but I can have him phone you in about twenty minutes."

"Okay, thanks," I said quietly before hanging up. 

Calm down, I told myself as I paced the length of the bedroom. It'll be easy. Dad won't ask too many questions. He's too busy for that.

A few minutes later, I sat cross-legged on my bed and opened the email application on my phone. For what was probably the hundredth time that day, I admired my new profile picture. I had uploaded the picture of Jason and me at The Secret Garden right after breakfast that morning.

My mind wandered to our conversation at Java Lava that afternoon.

"So, I know this guy, Greg. He works the night shift here,"  Jason had said, a hopeful smile resting on his lips. "He said he could swap shifts with me on Wednesday. I thought we could rent Snakes on a Plane and watch it together." 

My heart instantly warmed at Jason's willingness to take the night shift just to spend the day with me.

"Yeah, that'd be great," I enthused, biting into my half of the fluffy and delicious chocolate muffin.

The idea of spending an entire day with Jason, alone in Claire's house, sent my heart racing with anticipation. 

I was snapped back into the moment when my phone vibrated in my hands. The screen indicated a call from my dad.

"Okay, calm down," I said to myself, inhaling and exhaling deeply. Clearing my throat, I pressed the Answer button and said, "Hi, Dad."

"Hey, Lee," my dad's authoritative, deep voice sounded unusually exhausted. "How are you?"