Neat (Becker Brothers, #2)(33)

“God, you love this, don’t you?” She shook her head. “I’m over here watching the minutes tick by like years and you’re geeking out over putting everything in its place.”

I smiled, peeking down at her before I flipped the new file open in my hands. “I can’t help it. I’ve always been this way,” I said. “There’s just something so satisfying about putting things in order, giving them a place.”

“You’d freak out if you saw the shop right now,” she said, crossing one leg over the other. “There’s not a corner of that previously empty space that’s not covered with shit right now. I’m trying to set everything up, separate the room like I told you I envisioned. And Chris tried to help, but…”

“Chris has a different vision, I’d wager?”

She made a noise. “That’s one way to put it. I mean, you know Chris — he’d have that place covered in glitter if I let him have his way.”

I chuckled, because I did know Chris — at least, I knew him back when we were younger. He was the first person I’d ever known to come out, and the only one in our high school at the time. I didn’t hang out with him, and didn’t know him personally, but I remembered talking to Dad about it the day Chris told everyone he was gay.

I was confused, mostly because all the other guys in our school were being dicks to him suddenly — although he was the same guy he’d been the day before, when everyone adored him. Chris was the captain of the JV soccer team. He was on student council. He was hilarious, and was always surrounded by a huge group of friends who loved to watch him, to let him entertain them.

And it all changed overnight.

I could still remember Dad’s furrowed brows as he listened to me, the calmness in his voice as he explained to me that people didn’t understand people who weren’t like them, and so they lashed out, afraid of the unknown. He told me not to be like them, not to run from what I don’t understand, but to embrace it, instead.

And the last, most important thing, he told me was that I needed to be ready to stand up to those guys at school should they pull any shit with Chris.

Luckily, Chris proved that he could hold his own over the years, but he had a silent ally who watched his back from a far — just in case.

“It’s my own fault,” Mallory continued on a sigh. “I shouldn’t have ordered everything at once. I don’t even know where to start.”

“Maybe I could help you,” I offered — a little too quickly. My eyes darted to hers before I turned my attention back to the file in my hands, aiming for nonchalant as I shrugged. “I mean, if you want an extra hand. I could come by sometime this weekend, help you sort through it all.”

“You’d give up your weekend to sort through the pile of crap in my art studio?” she questioned. “Come on now, I can’t take you away from your hot dates.”

I scoffed. “The only hot date I have this weekend is with a Nat Geo documentary on Sunday night.”

She hummed a soft laugh. “That so? I’ve been wondering what you do outside of this place,” she said, motioning to the closet around us. Her eyes skated over the mountain of boxes we had yet to get to before they found mine. “What’s the documentary about?”

I scratched the back of my neck, murmuring a reply into my chest before tossing the file in my hand in the trash box and picking up the next.

“What was that?”

I sighed. “It’s called Creatures of Light Underwater,” I said, loud enough that she could actually hear this time. “And I know what you’re thinking, but it actually looks really cool. It’s all this new footage put together by deep sea scientists who are finally able to get deep enough to capture some of the wildest displays of light from species that live in pitch black water. No external light reaches that far down, yet they create light — to mate, to capture their prey, whatever.”

Mallory bit back a smirk, shrugging and putting her hands up. “Hey, I didn’t say a word.”

“You were thinking of some, I’m sure.”

“No, seriously. Zero judgment. If anything, I’m excited to see you so excited about something.” She tilted her head. “So, you get off on biology, huh?”

I shrugged. “I guess. I just love learning, in general. That’s why I like to read — to learn something new that I didn’t know before. And I love watching documentaries, mostly because there’s no acting or anything fake about it. There are so many fascinating stories that are true, that have real footage. It’s incredible.” I laughed through my nose. “Plus, I’ve lived in the same town my entire life and never traveled out of the state. It’s nice to go places — to learn about other people, other cultures, other ways of life.”

Mallory watched me for a long time without saying anything — so long that I peered down at her, and another shade of embarrassment tinged my cheeks when I found curiosity dancing in those blue eyes of hers.

“What?”

She shook her head. “Nothing. You just surprise me, that’s all.”

“Because I’m a nerd who listens to rock music?”

“No,” she said easily. “Because you’re smarter than you let on. And you’re cool.”

I snorted, deciding to make a joke rather than admit what her words did to my stomach. “If me geeking out over glowing fish is cool, don’t get me started about my love for space.”