Fluffy(13)

“Stager. Fluffer. You know.”

“And you’re pretty sheltered,” he adds. “I’ve never heard the term 'house fluffer' before. Stager, yes. Fluffer, no.”

“And I’d never heard of fluffer as a porn term,” I say with a rush of heat to my face.

“Fair enough.”

“Nothing about today is fair, Will.” Saying his name to his face tastes like ice cream with toffee pieces and hot fudge.

“Maybe your friends were right.”

“Right?” I peer at him, eyes dry, my mouth parched from stress.

“Remember that day in the parking lot? When they painted your windshield?”

“You remember that?”

He holds his hands up like he’s imagining a marquee. “Mallory Monahan. Most Likely to Become a Porn Star.”

Oh, God. He does remember.

A light laugh comes out of him as he shakes his head, eyes hard. “I assumed that was a joke.”

“It was!” I sputter. “A total joke! I’m not — ”

Karen returns, fingering the zip-tie cuffs. “Am I taking her in?”

It’s tempting to say yes right now, to escape this unending humiliation.

But I may be embarrassed, but I’m not stupid.

“Please,” I say to Will. I’m super close to begging. “Today has been awful, and I just realized I’m not getting paid. There goes three hundred bucks.” My shoulders drop in defeat. “And I gave them good feng shui advice about the living room.” I look up, troubled by that misaligned furniture. “All that work for nothing.”

Karen leads us into the living room as Will huddles with her, their voices just whispers that make me feel even more ashamed and needy. Technically, Will should not have a say in whether the cops arrest me, but in small towns, this is how it works. The wealthy family has pull. Notice how he punched Beastman and no one’s talking about charging him with assault?

And I really did rat Karen out twenty-two years ago, so she has a reason to hold a grudge against me. After watching twenty minutes of that horrible horror movie, I peed the bed in fear for a week before telling Mom what happened. I thought she got her payback when Karen busted that house party when I was in eleventh grade, but I guess not.

While Will and Karen chat at the front door, I make myself useful, pushing with my shoulder to move the sofa. They stop talking and watch me as I grunt.

“What are you doing?” Will finally asks.

“I know why you can’t sell this house,” I blurt out. “It’s not the lukewarm market. It’s your energy flow.”

“Energy flow?” he chokes out, face half amused, one eyebrow up.

“Are you arresting me or not?” I ask Karen. “Either release me and let me go home to lick my wounds, or take me in and make this day suck even more.”

“Lick,” one of the other officers says with a snicker.

“Suck,” Karen snorts.

Great. My permanent record is in the hands of the cop equivalent of Beavis and Butthead.

“I don’t want any charges pressed against Mallory,” Will declares, giving me a look of kindness that takes me back to my teenage self, when he could have melted my heart with one one-hundredth of that power. “It sounds like this was a case of wrong place, wrong time.”

“Wrong industry,” I agree.

“I don’t want to add another wrong, so let’s not read her her rights,” he tells Karen, who tucks the zip-tie handcuffs into her belt and gives me a stern look, as if she’s telepathically making sure I understand I’m getting away with something.

“Thank you,” I say to him, tears finally emerging, a wave of relief surfacing on the churning ocean inside me.

“You’re welcome,” he says as I leave, his body a wall I have to pass as he opens the front door. Reflex makes me inhale, his scent similar to high school, yet different. His cologne is more sophisticated, but the essence of Will Lotham is still there.

Still strong.

Still hopelessly out of reach.

I’m halfway to my car when I hear him shout, “Mallory!”

I turn around. He is standing on the top step, his arm pulled back in perfect quarterback form. “Here! Catch!”

The object sails through the air like he plotted out y = -x2 and followed the parabolic curve.

I fumble, but complete the pass.

No. Not that kind of pass. I wish.

I take the dog's chew toy–okay, string of anal beads–he threw at me back to my car, turn the key in the ignition, and drive away.

With my phone charging this time.





5





You know how I know I live in a small town?

When the garbage man shouts through my open window: “Hey, Mallory! Heard you finally found a new job! Nice ass!”

My pillow doesn’t act as a good shame silencer, sadly.

The beep beep beep of the truck backing up, pivoting to leave the cul-de-sac where I’m renting someone’s in-law apartment, adds insult to injury.

I’m up now.

There are only two good things about being unemployed: my time is my own, and I can sleep in.

Tom the Trash Dude just ruined one of those.

Habit makes me pick up my now-charging phone from my bedside table and check notifications.