The Hating Game(54)
“June twentieth.”
“What star sign are you? Cancer?”
“Gemini.”
“And why wouldn’t you eat it straightaway, exactly?” Wow, I sure know how to make things sound filthy.
He strokes my hair away from my shoulder. “It made Patrick sweat. He’d go into my room and obsess over it. He’d ask me every day if I’d eaten it. It drove him insane. It drove my parents goddamn insane. Even they’d beg me to eat it. When I finally did, it tasted better, knowing how bad someone else wanted it.”
He slides the shoulder of my red dress a half inch to the right and looks down at the skin, before leaning down and breathing me in. I feel the tickling suck of his inhale and feel a deep stab of empathy for the heavenly torture his Easter eggs suffered.
“It’s perverted to be turned on by a childhood story about two brothers, isn’t it?”
He presses his mouth to my shoulder and laughs. It vibrates through my entire body. I look over at his beautiful bedroom, all lit up with the light still burning. Blue and white, like a gorgeous Tiffany box. A gift with a ribbon. A room I want to spend days in. A room I’ll probably never want to come out of.
“Did you eat it a bite at a time, or did you snap one day and gorge on it?”
“I guess you’ll find out. Eventually.”
He picks up his keys and stands jingling them while I put my coat on. We don’t touch in the elevator. He walks me outside in silence, over to my car.
“Bye. Thanks for the tea.” Embarrassment has caught up with me. I’ve acted like a total nut tonight. Why is it I can act like a normal human with a guy like Danny, but with Josh I end up dorking out? Something is sharp in my hand and I look down. Oh shit, I’m still holding the matchbox car.
“I’m a freak.” I put my face in my hands and tiny wheels roll across my cheek.
“Yes.” He is gently amused.
“Sorry.”
“Keep it, it’s a present.”
The first thing he’s ever given me aside from the roses. I’m honored beyond words and study it afresh. It has the initials JT scratched onto the bottom.
“Is it a childhood treasure? It looks old.” I don’t think I’d give it back, even if he changed his mind.
“Maybe it’s the start of your new collection. I think we’ve done something kind of monumental for us. We had a ceasefire. For the full length of a TV episode.”
“You sure are good at holding hands.”
“I’m probably not good at a lot of things, but I will try to be,” he tells me. It’s the strangest thing to say and I feel another crack forming in the wall between us.
“Well, thanks. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“No you won’t. I’ve got a day off.” He never, ever takes a day off.
“Doing anything special?” I look up at the apartments above and a wave of loneliness hits me.
“I have an appointment.”
Just when I think I’ve got a handle on this kaleidoscope of weird feelings, it twists and something new surprises me. I feel like I’ve been told Christmas is canceled. No Josh, sitting across from me like always? I have to bite my lip to silence myself.
Please, I beg myself. Please hate Josh again. This is too hard.
“You’re not going to miss me, are you? You can manage one little Tuesday on your own.” He touches the little toy car in my hand and spins the wheels a little.
I try to be nonchalant, but he probably sees through it.
“Miss you? I’ll miss looking at your pretty face, but that’s about it.”
I hope it landed somewhere in the vicinity of faint sarcasm. I haul my quivering body into my car. He taps the window to make me lock the door. It takes me several attempts to get the key into the ignition.
Josh stands motionless in my rearview mirror until he’s a speck, one person among billions, but I cannot tear my eyes away until he disappears altogether.
When I get home, I still have the Matchbox car in my hand.
Chapter 15
I’m sitting at my desk, eyelids dry and tight, and I’m staring at Josh’s empty seat. The office is cold. Quiet. A professional haven. Any of the cubicle inmates downstairs would kill for this kind of silence.
Josh is supposed to be sitting across from me in an off-white striped shirt. He should be holding a calculator, tapping, frowning, tapping again.
If he were here, he’d look at me, and when our eyes connected a flashbulb of energy would pop inside me. I’d label it annoyance, or dislike. I’d take the little flash and call it something I don’t think it is.
I look at the clock. I wait for a small eternity, and a minute ticks by. To amuse myself, I roll my new Matchbox car back and forth across my mouse pad, then take out the florist card from underneath.
You’re always beautiful.
I look at my reflection in the ridiculous prism of glass surrounding me. I look at the wall, the ceiling, analyzing my appearance from different angles. Those three words now aren’t enough to sate me. He’s created a monster.
I turn the florist’s card over and notice the address. I have the best idea and cackle out loud. Grabbing my purse, I walk down to the corner to the exact same florist. Before I lose my nerve, I arrange to have a bunch of off-white roses sent to him with a card. I barely know what I’m going to write, until my hand writes out the following for me: