“Oh, God!” Bree yells and I glance over. A big piece of her hair seems to have come undone and just landed in what looks like a large pile of feta. “Yuck,” she says as she picks up her hair. Jude hands her a napkin. She laughs as she wipes at it. “Guess the Duchess never had this problem in space. Zero gravity and all.”

Jude smiles weakly and nods, but even I can tell he has no idea what she’s talking about. I guess he’s never seen Undersea. I’ve been obsessed with it for so long that I didn’t even entertain that possibility. Maybe our first order of business is to remedy that. A very small price to pay to get in this girl’s good graces.

“Excuse me a minute. I think I’m just going to go fix this . . .” Bree gestures to her hair.

“Of course,” Jude says and he gets up to pull her chair out, but she’s out of it and on her way to the bathroom before he can get there.

Once I make sure Bree is out of sight, I walk over to him.

He’s running his hands through his own hair. “I’ve never particularly been up on avant-garde fashion,” he says to me.

“Uh, that’s not avant-garde fashion,” I say. “It’s from the movie Undersea. Mary Clarkson?”

“Oh,” Jude says, and then I see it dawn on him what I’m talking about. “Ohhhh. Right. I remember it. Vaguely. Haven’t seen it since I was a kid . . .”

“Well, we might have to do something about that because obviously she is very into it.”

“Right,” Jude says, though he sounds unsure.

“Don’t worry,” I assure him. “It’s awesome. Easiest homework you’ve ever had.”

“Okay,” he replies. “But homework . . . do you really think . . .”

“Shit, I gotta go.” I leap onto my barstool as Bree comes walking back to the table. Her hair is down and normal now and she’s carrying what can only be described as a cardboard dunce cap in one of her hands.

Jude stands up and this time manages to pull her chair back for her.

“Thanks,” she says.

He sits down and smiles at her. “I get it now,” he says overenthusiastically, gesturing toward her head. “Undersea!”

“Um . . . yeah,” Bree says, but she looks like she’s thinking about nothing except placing the dunce cap on his head.

* * *

The date does not last much longer than that. Suddenly, Bree isn’t so hungry anymore, Jude has finished his flight, and I’m hearing murmurings of “that was fun,” with no talk of a further date.

Crap.

Jude comes back to join me at the bar once he’s seen Bree out. He orders a water, since he’s apparently already filled his beer carb quota for the day. I order a Jameson on the rocks.