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The first thing Gary did when he got home that night was look up Dr. Jeffrey Wright on Google. "It isn't stalking if it's publicly available information," he informed Margeurite, who was lying across his wrist and purring. She was making it very difficult to move the mouse.
There wasn't much there Gary didn't already know. Dr. Wright was handsome – average height, but with a strong jawline and a head of thick, salt-and-pepper hair. He was a lead researcher in the cardiology department of Johns Hopkins, frequently donated to the ASPCA, ran the occasional marathon (there were pictures on his Facebook, posing at the finish line with his adult sons, looking sweaty but victorious.) He seemed like a genuinely good person, with next to no political ambition at all.
Gary mostly just resented that Wright had managed to ask Selina out on a date without him knowing. Even if the "date" was a pretty minor heart health awareness function with little to no press coverage. The evening news showed a three-second clip of it, Selina waving at the camera with her arm looped through Wright's – there would be some speculative buzz about that online. She looked great, in a red dress with a plunging neckline. (Earlier that evening she'd asked Gary's advice on that dress – "Do you think this is too cleavage-y?" He'd said no, and then she'd decided she didn't care either way. She'd made a joke about having a literal date with "Mr. Right", and giggled. An actual giggle, which was alarming. Gary didn't think he'd ever heard her laugh like that before, and he wasn't sure what it meant.)
"I don't know," he said out loud. "He seems pretty nice. Do you guys think he could make her happy?"
Marguerite's whiskers tickled his wrist. Priscilla batted a plastic ball across the kitchen floor, the bell inside tinkling until it hit the wall and bounced to a stop. High atop the cat tree, Broderick completely ignored all of them.
The box of chocolates his mother had sent him was on the cushion beside him, and Gary could just barely reach it with his left hand if he stretched carefully. He'd eaten half a row and was browsing the Romantic Comedy section of Netflix when he realized he'd left his Valentine's gift to Selina in a pocket of the Leviathan. Well, he could probably sneak it onto her desk in the morning; a day late, but it would be a nice surprise.
-----
Selina was all smiles when Gary brought her coffee the next morning.
"I take it you had a nice evening, ma'am?" Sue asked.
"I did!" Selina gushed. "Jeff is charming, handsome, intelligent, an excellent dancer, a perfect gentleman--" She lowered her voice to a stage whisper. "We did get to second base. Oh, and look what he sent me this morning?"
Gary barely managed to keep himself from spilling the coffee as he set it down on her desk, because Selina was pointing to the necklace he'd gotten her. He'd left a note with it – had she not read it?
"Niiiice," Sue said, eyeing it. "Classic, tasteful, but also expensive-looking. You should hold on to this one."
"I know, right?" Selina said. "And he sent this sweet little note. 'To SM from GW. Always first in my heart.' How romantic is that?"
"It's not, uh, necessarily romantic, is it?" Gary hoped they didn't notice the sweat he could feel beading on his forehead. "Couldn't it just be a message of eternal friendship and platonic support?"
"Oh, sure. Platonic heart-shaped gold jewelry, wrapped with a red ribbon, on Valentine's Day. Nobody buys a gift like this for someone they want to 'platonically support'. He wants me. He wants me bad."
Gary felt a panicked laugh building up inside himself and ducked out quickly, managing to hold it in until he was safely alone in the bathroom. He got the laughter out of his system, washed his hands for no reason, and went back to get Selina a protein bar; she hardly ever remembered to eat an actual breakfast. So what if she didn't know he'd gotten her a present? She was happy, that was what really mattered, he reminded himself.
-----
It wasn't until the next day, when Jeff sent over an arrangement of orchids (so much better than roses, Selina thought approvingly – much less cliche, and they actually smelled good) that she read the attached note and realized that the man she was dating was named Jeffrey, not Geoffrey.
"Huh," she said out loud, touching the heart-shaped pendant at her neck. Then she shrugged and put it entirely out of her mind.