Total pages in book: 102
Estimated words: 96178 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 481(@200wpm)___ 385(@250wpm)___ 321(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 96178 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 481(@200wpm)___ 385(@250wpm)___ 321(@300wpm)
Which meant this: Ren was possibly, probably, maybe going to be sleeping in the same bed as Fitz. She might be sharing a bed with him, and his basketball shorts and those strong thighs she tried her very hardest not to look at when he walked to and from the bathroom.
“Okay, then it’s settled,” Ren said. “If there’s a couch, it’s an easy solution. If there’s space on the floor, it’s my turn for a floor bed. If not, I bet we’ll be farther apart than we were last night in the twin beds. It’s fine.” It was so not fine. “This is our fourth night sharing a room. We’re practically pros by this point. It’s just a sleepover. We can—”
“Ren,” he cut in, gently. “Breathe.”
She took a deep, steadying breath as the elevator dinged on the twelfth floor. Why did this suddenly feel so different? They’d shared a room for three nights now, and approaching each of those had never felt like they were heading toward a room that might catch fire the second they walked in.
Fitz swiped his key at the door, gesturing her inside, and Ren swore they deflated in unison: no couch, just a chair and a desk, and a bed that seemed to eat up more of the floor every second she continued to stare at it. Truly, it swallowed the entire floorplan. They set their things down and looked at each other across the expanse of the mattress.
Ren tried to smile. “It’s very nice.”
Fitz shrugged stiffly. “It’s just a bed.”
“I know it’s just a bed,” she said. “I’m just saying it’s a nice one.”
“Doesn’t matter if it’s nice, it’s just for sleeping.”
“Of course it is.”
Silence yawned between them.
He reached up, scratching the back of his neck. “Should we get some dinn—”
“Yes, absolutely, let’s get dinner.”
They made the short walk through downtown, stopping at a white brick Art Deco building with a large sign proclaiming it to be Winstead’s Steakburger. Fitz had barely spoken the entire walk over, and the silence was starting to feel like a third person on the sidewalk between them.
“Is it a steak or is it a burger?” Ren joked, expecting Fitz to give her the standard smile-fighting, eye-rolling routine.
But instead, he didn’t say anything at all, walking toward the door and holding it open for her. So distant, so formal.
Ren came to a full stop just inside, forgetting about Fitz’s mood as she gaped at the room around them. With pink neon on the ceiling, pink tables, turquoise booths, and a jukebox in the corner, Winstead’s Steakburger looked like a diner right out of Grease.
The hostess led them to their table and Ren sat down, unable to stop staring at the decor. “Holy cow. I bet I could order almost the same thing Danny orders at the Frosty Palace.”
Fitz glanced up from his menu perusal. “Should I know what that is?”
“Hello, Just Fitz! It’s the malt shop in Grease! He orders a double polar burger with a cherry soda and chocolate ice cream.”
“Exactly how many times have you seen that movie?”
“At least a hundred.”
He looked at her, baffled. “It’s funny, because your parents don’t really sound like the park-your-kids-in-front-of-the-television types.”
“They weren’t, but I didn’t grow up watching all kinds of movies and TV shows. We only had a handful of video tapes and an old VCR. Over years, even once a week, it adds up.”
“It also doesn’t seem like the kind of movie they’d approve of, either.” He laughed. “It’s, like, horny teenagers, gangs, premarital sex, and drag races.”
Ren hoped her expression didn’t betray exactly how much she liked hearing him say the word sex. She cleared her throat. “Gloria probably felt safe because we had the edited-for-TV version.”
“Oh, God. With commercials and everything?”
She nodded. “I probably asked for Captain Crunch seven hundred times after I first watched it.”
Fitz made a sad womp-womp sound. “I’m guessing Steve and Gloria didn’t give in.”
Ren laughed. “You guess correctly. Anyway, imagine how confused I was when our old tape finally gave out, and I borrowed a copy from the library and heard Rizzo ask Danny if he was going to ‘flog’ his ‘log.’” Across from her, Fitz choked on a sip of water. “I didn’t even know what that meant, until one day it hit me.” She looked around and then leaned in, whispering, “It means masturbation.”
He appeared to lose the fight with the water, lifting his fist to his mouth as he coughed harder. Ren quickly grabbed a handful of napkins from a dispenser and shoved them at him. Her delight at having broken his stoic façade was overshadowed by guilt over the brief coughing fit. “Oh my God, I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry,” he said, wiping his mouth. “You just surprised me. Didn’t expect you to say that word aloud.”
The waitress came to take their order, and Fitz’s words rolled around in her head until a streak of irritated rebellion flashed through her. The moment the waitress left, Ren leaned in again. “For the record, I’m not that innocent, even if I haven’t done certain things.”