Total pages in book: 133
Estimated words: 128069 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 640(@200wpm)___ 512(@250wpm)___ 427(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 128069 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 640(@200wpm)___ 512(@250wpm)___ 427(@300wpm)
And everything—every single thing—about that image is all wrong. Especially the flip side of it. What if she wants to do the same thing after she goes out with a dude? I grimace. But then, I try to do the right thing as I say, “Or if you do.”
It comes out like there are stones in my throat.
She shakes her head. “I won’t.”
I cross my arms. “I won’t either.”
It’s a face-off. For a too-long beat, we stand here in the kitchen, waiting for the puck to drop. Problem is I’m unsure what we’re even fighting about. “Josie, it’s all good. I’m happy to have you here. And you are definitely, absolutely not going to look for another place to live,” I say, then lock my eyes with hers. “Got that?”
Her pink glossy lips twitch in a smile. “You’re still bossy.”
That’s what she said to me the night we spent together. And just like that, some of my tension melts away. “Yes. I am.”
She breathes out a big sigh. “Okay, then.” She hesitates. “But I’m truly fine with us making rules. For anything. It’ll make this whole roomie thing easier. And I just want us to…get along.”
“Me too,” I say, but the thought of making rules for when we want to screw other people makes me clench my fists. “But let’s deal with that rules thing another time.”
Speaking of time, I check the clock. “Hey, I need to meet up with my dad while he’s in town,” I say, then a terrible thought lands in my head. Frieda. What if she’s there at lunch? What if she brings up the woman in the T-shirt? I don’t want to deal with that with my dad. Don’t want to tell him I have a roomie now. Don’t want to hear how other people are distracting. Still, since Josie and I are trying to be honest, there’s something she should know from that night. “Frieda from the art gallery is his girlfriend.”
Josie’s face goes pale, her voice strangled as she asks, “Frieda the Witch?”
“Unfortunately,” I say with a laugh. I tilt my head, considering this woman who landed in my life with her words, and her gifts of fruit and song, and her belly button piercing, and her letters, and her clever mouth and her bright attitude. “Do you have a nickname for everyone? The Prick, Frieda the Witch, etcetera.”
“Yes. I do,” she says and before I can ask if she’s given me one—though I probably shouldn’t ask that, she adds in a worried voice, “Are they coming over?”
I scoff. “God no. He’d critique my walls and my choice to not buy art. I already got an earful the other day. Through my sister. Apparently, Frieda told my dad and my sister about the woman in the T-shirt.”
I figure that’ll ease the tension more. Make Josie laugh. But instead she looks like she’s just seen a monster for real. She’s covered her face with her fingers.
“What’s wrong, Josie?”
When she drops her hand, she looks like she’s bitten something sour. “I went to the gallery on Thursday night to get your last name.”
If I were on the ice, I’d skate into the boards in shock. “You did?” There’s no way she said that. No way she did that. There’s no way she was doing the same thing I was doing. Amped up, I take a step toward her, like I’m going to close the distance between us, pin her against the wall and devour her.
Which would be a very bad idea.
And yet it has a hold on me.
She nods. “I did.”
I’m this close to breaking our first roomie rule till she says, “I went there to thank you. For helping me the other night. So if she brings it up, that’s what happened. I wanted to thank you. With…a cactus.”
She spins on her heels and takes off for her room like I did last night—leaving me with more questions than before.
“And when you do the late-night workout, it can improve your performance,” Dad says as he spears his fork into his salmon dish.
We’re at his favorite seafood place by the Marina, and he’s eating the same thing I ordered—seared salmon with asparagus, a little lemon on the side. I used to think this was ordering solidarity. But I’m pretty sure he eats like this when I’m not around too. The dude is made of iron and discipline.
“Yup,” I say since that’s what Domingo said already—the guy my dad hired who I worked with all summer.
“It’s nothing that different from what you do during your regular workouts. Dead lifts, weighted push-ups, side planks…” he drones on. It’s not that I disagree with Dad or Domingo. I’d just rather discuss something else during lunch. “Sports science shows the benefits of this. It’s a productive time to keep up your strength,” Dad adds.