Shane walked into the USPS, down the hallway and approached the door to the DLO. She wondered if everything would feel different today. She and Oliver had their first date—their first kiss—and she'd never thought about what things might be like at work afterward. Once again, because of Oliver, she was nervous.
Only Rita was going to be in the DLO this morning. Oliver was spending the morning in one of those less-than-exciting monthly meetings. Norman would be spending the day at a postal forensics conference. That meant some time for girl talk. For a while, Shane had felt like a mentor to Rita, but when it came to her budding relationship with Oliver, Rita had been somewhat of a mentor to her. And she knew Rita would be dying to find out the details of their first date.
Just thinking about it made her smile. He'd brought her yellow roses from Blooms and Hugs, and that meant the world to her. Their work had helped Ellie's father realize that the couple should be married. Though the beginning of the night had been a bit rough, they'd gotten beyond it, talked about their relationship, and their kiss at the end of the evening had rocked her world.
She sighed and pushed open the door to the DLO. She looked over to Oliver's empty desk, a force of habit, even though she'd known he wouldn't be there. Rita scurried up to her.
"How was your date? Ooh, I can tell by the look on your face that it was great. Did he kiss you yet?"
Shane chuckled, putting down her bag. "Rita, slow down."
"I can't help it. I'm excited about this!" Rita waited expectantly for the answers to her question. "Come on, Shane. Spill it!"
"Our date started off really awkwardly", Shane began. "I could tell he was nervous. He brought me yellow roses from Blooms and Hugs."
"Bobby's and Ellie's shop," Rita asked.
"Yes. Ellie made the bouquet look amazing. Oliver said that once she found out the bouquet was for me, she wanted to make it look even prettier."
"Hmmm…so Oliver told them the flowers were for you. That's a pretty big deal."
Shane smiled, nodding in agreement. "I thought so too."
She continued her story, picking up a stack of mail that looked as if it had been soaking in a pool of water. "We went back to Montaldo's. And I was really wondering if it was a mistake to go back there. I'd had three disastrous dates—or non-dates there—"
Rita interrupted. "Three? Oliver took you to Montaldo's three times and each time was bad?"
Shane took a deep breath, looked down. No. Oliver took me there once, and you know how that went. Steve and I went there—broke up there, too. And I went there once…with Lester."
"Wait…what? Lester? Kimsicle?" Rita shook her head in disbelief. "I had no idea. You never told me about Lester," she said in an accusatory tone.
"And I had no idea there was ever a Bob." Shane said, as if Rita's nondisclosure righted her own.
"Ok, ok. Just keep telling the story."
Shane and Rita sorted the now dry but wrinkled, address-obscured mail into two piles…one pile where the address was somewhat legible, and one with addresses completely obscured.
Shane picked up where she left off. "Nicki was our waitress again. She seated us at our table, and then it was so awkward. Oliver just wasn't saying anything."
"That's weird. Oliver's usually not silent. When he gets all nervous around you he just does this adorable sputtering thing, like he can't form the words."
Shane looked at Rita, puzzled. "What? You've never noticed? There are so many times when he's around you that he keeps saying 'Uh', and then he puts his hand to his head and paces a few steps…and then he starts again. You seriously haven't noticed that?"
Shane shook her head.
"I was worried that I'd done something to upset him. He ordered red wine, and I just needed to know if he was upset with me, so I asked him if he'd noticed the linguini with clams special."
"What does that have to do with anything?" Rita cocked her head trying to figure out the connection.
"When Holly was here, she told me that when Oliver was upset with her, he'd order red wine and clams. And when we went out to dinner at Donatello's while Holly was here, sure enough, he ordered red wine and clams."
"Did he order clams during your date?"
"He did not."
"Good!"
"I was so relieved". But once our menus were gone, he was still quiet. But then the music started and he asked me to dance."
"So things got better when you started dancing, right?"
"Not right away. He still wasn't talking. So I stopped and kind of pulled away and admitted that I was nervous, that the silence was making me nervous, and asked him what was wrong."
"Well, what did he say?"
"Come back, Shane".
Rita burst out laughing.
Shane smiled. "And that's exactly what I did. Then he admitted he was nervous too, asked if we could start over, and things got better from there."
Rita put the last of her letters into the appropriate pile and pointed to the rather large bin filled with packages. "Small local post office closing. It turned out their back room was filled with packages they didn't deliver. We need to check and see if the addresses are complete and we need to see if the recipients match the address and get them sent."
Shane pulled her laptop rolling workstation next to the counter where Rita was sorting. She pulled up addresses and names. They sorted into 2 bins, one where the recipients and address matched, one where they did not.
"So you said things got better on your date. What happened from there?"
"Well, once Oliver made me laugh, we started talking, and it was like everything was normal. So when Nicki came back with dessert menus, and neither of us really wanted anything, so I suggested we go sit and talk on my porch swing."
"Awww…that sounds so romantic," Rita exclaimed.
"It was. We talked about a lot…about when he and Joe were stuck in El Dorado Canyon, about how afraid we were. About how we'd both prayed…"
Shane's voice trailed off.
"You prayed?" Rita asked.
"You did tell me to," Shane began. "Rita, I was so scared. I did everything I could, and there was nothing more I could do. I was afraid something had happened to Oliver…and Joe. So yes, I knelt down right there in on the mountain and prayed. And then you and Norman arrived with Sandy."
"Divine Delivery", they said in unison.
"We held hands, and then he put his arm around me."
"Aww", Rita commented, smilig and tilting her head. She then prodded Shane on, looking at her pointedly. "And?"
"And then I asked him if he remembered that he told me he didn't want our first date to be our last."
"Wow. You just put it right out there. So what did he say to that?"
"He told me that he wanted a second, third, and fourth date, but only if I was serious about us. He told me that he'd ended up in a bad marriage after casual dating and it hurt him and his other relationships".
"I'll say it did," Rita said sarcastically. Then she faced Shane and grabbed both her hands "Well, what did you tell him?"
"I told him I'd done casual dating too, and that it wasn't for me. I told him I wanted a serious relationship too." She smiled. Saying it out loud to Rita felt good.
"Yes! You have a boyfriend, Shane."
Shane wrinkled her nose, but grinned too. "That sounds so strange."
"Come on, Shane…so what happened next?"
He told me he wanted to kiss me. And he even asked my permission."
"I'm totally swooning now, just like Renita Haywether, Frontier Duchess. You said yes, right? Tell me you said yes."
"I said yes." Shane deadpanned.
"Shane, you're killing me. Did he kiss you? Did he chicken out?"
The dam broke. She smiled a huge smile. "Rita, he kissed me. And it was amazing. My heart raced. My stomach did complete flip flops. I felt like a schoolgirl. I imagined so many times that the moment would happen, and I thought it would be good, but it was…incredible."
Rita closed her eyes and smiled. "I knew it. I told you that the two of you had chemistry. You're not only sweet together. You have chemistry."
Shane smiled, tucking her hair behind her ear.
"I'm a little nervous now, though," she said.
Rita nodded. "You're worried that it's going to be awkward today".
Shane nodded, and Rita grabbed her hand. "It will be ok. Norman and I went through it too. You'll get through it, just like we did. And maybe it won't be awkward at all."
"I hope not."
Rita picked up the bin filled with packages whose recipients matched the addresses. "I'm going to run these up to the sorting floor so they can be delivered right away."
As she headed toward the door, Oliver was heading in. He held the door wide for Rita. "Good morning, Rita," he said cordially and nodded.
"Good morning Oliver." She said, then added "I'll be back in 10 minutes". She shot a look Shane's way.
Shane had picked that up loud and clear. Rita was taking advantage of good timing, giving them a moment to get used to the idea of being in the workplace together after their first date and first kiss.
"Good morning, Shane," Oliver said, and looked her in the eyes. She could feel herself flush. He came to her desk, kissed her cheek, and placed a bud vase with a single yellow rose, baby's breath, and a star on her desk. He brushed his thumb right over the spot where he'd kissed her. He heard he breathe in a quick breath.
"It was a lovely weekend, wasn't it, Shane?"
She smiled, nodding her head. "It was."
Took a deep breath and let it out, grateful that Rita had given them the moment to adjust to this new reality. It hadn't been awkward at all.