Mister O(23)

Well, duh. She earns a living with them.

My eyes widen as she makes a move for the jeans pocket. But it was a fake play. She laughs and holds up her palms in surrender. “I was just teasing. I would never try to sneak a peek at your show ideas,” she says, grabbing the seat across for me at the spot we picked for her date download. “But I do want to watch when it’s on. I’ve seen every episode.”

I tilt my head. “You have?”

She nods and smacks her lips. “Seen every episode, loved every episode.”

Warmth spreads in my chest, and it has nothing to do with desire for her this time but everything to do with pride for a job well done. “That’s awesome. I love hearing that.”

She moves her chair closer, and I steel myself to hear all the details of how Jason is wooing her. Instead, she points to the sketchpad. “What was the first comic you loved?”

I answer immediately. “Get Fuzzy. I love that strip. That cat killed me.”

“I love that one, too.” She flashes a smile. “What else?” she asks, parking her elbow on the table, resting her chin in her palm, and just looking relaxed and happy as we chat. “In all the years I’ve known you, I’ve never seen you read a comic book like Superman or Spiderman. You’re all about the cartoons and comic strips instead, right?”

I nod. “Superheroes weren’t my thing. But I was always into the drawing and the comedy. These days it’s Family Guy and American Dad for humor. And when I was younger, I devoured every Far Side and Calvin and Hobbes.”

“Is that why you have a tiger on your chest? For Hobbes?”

I cock my head, curious. “How did you know about the tiger?”

“I might have noticed it,” she says, with a cute little shrug of her shoulder. She grabs her phone, clicks open her gallery, and scrolls through some photos. She holds up the screen and shows me one from the summer in Central Park. I remember her snapping pics of me that day when we pranked her brother.

“I zoomed in on it that night,” she says, then stops, shakes her head, and tries to laugh it off. “That sounds really pervy doesn’t it?”

I’m so damn tempted to say, you don’t know what pervy is ’til you hear about the things you do in my shower. You have no idea how flexible you are some nights. You have no clue how dirty you get in my head when you bend over the edge of my bed and beckon me to your perfect naked body.

Still, I can’t resist the volley. “It only sounds pervy in the best possible way.”

A splash of red races across her cheeks, but she doesn’t hide her face or look away. Instead, she says, “I was curious, so I looked closer. That’s when I noticed the ink on your chest.”

Fighting back a grin has never been harder in my life—because she saved my picture. Her admission flips a switch in me, and the light blinks now with possibility. “Hobbes is kind of my inspiration,” I say, but now I’m the curious one. She has no visible ink, but what if she had a tattoo someplace hidden? Someplace intimate? “Do you have any ink?”

She shakes her head, and her eyes widen with worry. “I’d love one, but no way.”

“Why do you say it like that?”

“You’re going to laugh, but I’m a complete pansy when it comes to needles.” She shudders. “I’m terrified of them. I hated shots when I was a kid, and I really have to grin and bear it when I donate blood every eight weeks.”

“You hate needles, and you still give blood?”

“Until they can find another way to get it out of me, I just sit back and think about the Oreos I’ll get at the end,” she says. I’m impressed she does that regularly, especially when she’s afraid of it. “But you know what I’m not afraid of?”

I take the bait. “What?”

“Pens. Want to draw Bucky the cat on me?”

I wiggle an eyebrow. “On your chest? Right now? Yeah, just take off your shirt.”

She flashes me a saucy grin. “How about my arm instead?”

“That works, too.”

I pull her chair closer as she pushes up the sleeve on a soft red-and-blue plaid shirt and extends her arm. Our knees nearly touch when I hold her forearm as a canvas in the coffee shop. An espresso machine hisses from the counter, and “No One’s Gonna Love You” by Band of Horses plays overhead.

“I love this song,” she says softly.

“Me, too.”

I lower my gaze to her arm, starting with the cat’s body. She speaks first, asking a question. “What would you do if you couldn’t draw?”

I stop, shudder, and meet her eyes. I press my finger to her lips. “Shh. Never say something that awful again.”

“No, I mean it,” she says, insistent, as I return to her arm.

“I don’t know, Harper. That sounds like the definition of hell. I’d rather die.” I begin to sketch the tail. “What about you? What would you do if you didn’t know magic?”

I look up briefly. She screws up her lips. “The same,” she says with a nod, and I love that we don’t have to explain more about why we feel this way. We’re in sync when it comes to the fire in the belly that drives us both.

“How did you know you wanted to be a magician?” I ask while I add in messy bursts of hair on the cat’s belly as she answers.