Wooing The Ex-Wife

Liza looked at the place before her in amazement, as Steve glanced around uncomfortably, his smooth and slick mask melting away and being replaced by a man trying to impress the woman he liked. Steve had shown up at Liza's house with potted roses in his hands and a handsome smile on his face, sharp at 7:00. He was wearing black jeans with a forest green button-down, which somehow matched perfectly with the color of Liza's dress. His hair was messily styled and the way he presented the potted roses to Liza with a flourish, no one would have assumed that he was the author of a bestseller. Liza looked at him and her heart fluttered, not with excitement but with uneasiness, as to what was to come.

Liza had taken the flowers from him and had handed them to Melanie, who had gushed over how cute they look, effectively embarrassing Liza and making her feel like a sixteen-year-old teenager going to prom instead of a 28-year-old grown woman. Steve had opened the door with her, with a cheesy bow making her burst out in laughter and the uneasiness that Liza had felt slithered away making a place for a warm fuzzy feeling which Liza was yet to recognize. They drove in comfortable silence with occasional bursts of chatter and after an hour or so, they had finally arrived at their destination.

Steve kept shifting his glance, tapping his foot looking every bit as nervous as he felt and Liza couldn't help but find it cute. Their destination was in a secluded part, a little way from the highway but still full of life. People called it 'Literature Lane', which could only be described as a festival of literature. There were huge banners of books and below those banners, people were enacting scenes from books or were reciting them, she also a book discussion group somewhere. The books were from almost all the genres, from classics to contemporary, philosophical to young adult, and by the way, Steve was avoiding a corner she suspected that there was erotica as well. The whole place was decorated with silver and blue fairy lights. Ornate lamps hung low from the rows of fairy lights which twisted and met each other to form a huge chandelier-like structure in the middle of the tent-shaped place. It felt like an otherworldly experience.

love it" Liza replied honestly. Steve let out a sigh of relief before his nervousness vanished away and he returned to his true smart-ass self. "I knew that you would like it. Didn't I tell you that it would be the best date ever?" he asked with a smirk on his face. Liza rolled her eyes and retorted back "Hold your horses, Steve. We are just getting started with a date."

trying various foods based on books, clicking pictures with various characters, and even dressing up as one. Liza had laughed so much, that her insides hurt and she almost begged Steve from being his dorky self. She had always thought of Steve as a handsome author, who was playful at times but was always sophisticated, however, the date had completely changed her view of him and she wondered if she would ever be able to not see him as the man who dressed up as Rapunzel.

asparagus with lavender infusion, dragon carrot risotto, Sweet Pea sorbet, Green Garlic Gnocchi with red mustard leaves and Cremeux with passion fruit.' Accompanying then was a bottle off wine and though Liza usually resisted Wine and all its near relatives, she loved the taste of this one. "The wine feels like bottled stars