Practice Makes Perfect (When in Rome, #2)

by Sarah Adams

For introverts like me with social anxiety, the process of dating is equivalent to waxing your bikini line. Menstrual cramps on day two of your cycle. An emergency dental procedure you weren’t expecting—and guess what: they’re fresh out of novocaine.

I am the quiet one in my family. The one with her nose always in a book because she prefers worlds where she doesn’t have to interact with other humans. It’s so much easier to read about relationships than to foster them. Less dangerous too. I can’t offend anyone written into a book. I can’t say the wrong thing. And book characters don’t make judgments about me.

“Why do I feel like I just missed out on an important opportunity?” Because you did. Now, get lost, she’s mine.

“No, Annie. Don’t get it twisted. I already think you’re sexy without a tattoo. So I know for sure you would be with one.”

You’d do that for me? WILL: I’m quickly learning I’d do anything for you.

But the thing about quiet people is, we’re only quiet because our brains are so busy overthinking everything.

“Please. Just let me be here. I don’t know why, but I can’t be anywhere else. I tried but my feet keep bringing me back here to your door.” He pauses, looks to the soup and then to me. “This . . . isn’t something I would normally do, but I just need to take care of you. Please let me.”

Ten minutes later, even though it’s against his rules, Will is slipping into my bed and wrapping his arms around me. He kisses my neck and my jaw and my temple and then with his arms around me, I fall asleep with my finger tracing the raised lines of his butterfly tattoo—scared of the day when I call and he’s too far away.

I was looking for the perfect person with the perfect traits and the perfect timing, when really, all my heart actually wants is to be fully known and loved. Someone to share the quiet moments with—someone to turn to when everything is good or everything is bad. Someone who wouldn’t be mad if I snuck in to see him before the wedding and ruined traditions—but who’d be just as eager to be with me as I’d be with him. Someone like . . . Will.

I tap the screen on his phone, pausing briefly to marvel at his new wallpaper photo: me standing in the flower shop the night we kissed for the first time.

I realized that leaving this town without you was the scariest thought I’ve ever had.