Werewolf Wedding(50)
*
A few minutes of measured breathing had me feeling more like myself when I heard footsteps coming toward the door.
“Will this work?”
Jake strode into the room and into my field of vision just in time for me to catch a glimpse of his sweaty and shirtless torso. He must’ve been in quite a hurry.
“You got back here quick,” George said. Then, she started snickering as she nestled the blankets around me. “Checking yourself out in the mirrors down there?”
Jake shook his head, obviously not understanding. “You told me to hurry, so I hurried. She needs the warmth. Also, I told the guy at the front desk whose name I forgot not because I’m an * but because of the current stressful situation, to turn the heater up. And also I got this.”
A space heater hummed to life. The coils already going red, this thing must have been some kind of industrial strength wonder, because not thirty seconds after he plugged it in and hit the power button, I already felt some warmth returning to my toes and fingertips. It all tingled, like I’d just gotten up out of an uncomfortable chair after way too much time parked on my ass. Every nerve apparently wanted to make sure I knew it was there. The pinprick feeling crept up the bottom of my feet, along the sides of my calves and then to my thighs.
As blood flowed back into me, and my brain started to de-fuzz, I realized what George was still laughing at. Jake was fiddling around, adjusting the blankets, turning the heater up and then down, opening the blinds then closing them. “Did anybody say anything to you?” I asked, sitting up for the first time without a head rush.
“Me?” Jake asked. “No, I don’t think so. Why?”
He was still breathing a little heavy, his muscled chest rising and falling as air filled and escaped his lungs. Balled up fists went into his hips, like he did when he was getting impatient or not quite sure what was going on around him.
“Well,” George said, looking down at me and smiling. “You’re missing something.”
“Missing... Oh!” Jake looked for all the world like he’d just realized the secret to the universe. "Right!” he said. “Sorry, can’t believe I went all that way and forgot. Be right back!”
And he was off again. Still shirtless – and neither of us had the first clue what he had forgotten – except his shirt. We didn’t have to wait long though. A few seconds later, he strolled back through the massive oak door of his office pushing a cart.
“Here we are,” he announced, his voice swelling with pride. “Lunch is served!”
I couldn’t help it. I went from pinpricks and needles making every inch of my body uncomfortable to laughing harder than I ever have, maybe in my life. I knew at least it was harder than I’d laughed since I last watched Fast Times at Ridgemont High about two weeks before.
“That’s my Jake,” George said, since I was too busy turning purple and choking on my own glee to say much of anything. “Runs through his entire office building half naked, terrifying everyone to death. But, he’s got the presence of mind to bring back a damn lunch cart.”
“Oh shit,” Jake said, disbelief in his voice. “I’m not wearing a shirt, am I?”
After making sure I wasn’t going to collapse back into unconsciousness the second she got up, George stood up, patted Jake on the shoulder and wiped her sweaty hand on his jeans before she turned her attention to the lunch cart, which was far more interesting than Jake being shirtless. “Did you get any with mayo?” She pulled a foil-wrapped sandwich off the cart, grabbed a soda and then inspected the sandwich. “You know I need mayo.”
“I honestly don’t have a clue,” Jake admitted. “I just took the whole thing. There are gonna be some irritated workers come noon, but they’ll live.”
“Yeah,” she said, taking a big bite and smiling at the mayo. “They’ll live because you’re gonna take this back down there. It’s bad enough to take someone’s lunch out of the community fridge. Stealing everyone’s? Come on now.”
Jake arched his eyebrows and frowned deeply. “Why can’t they get their own lunch? It isn’t like I don’t pay them.”
“Uh, Jake?” it was my turn to scold him for being comically inhumane. “You do realize that the people in your office do all your work for you, right? And that if they’re happy, they do a better job?”
His frown deepened. “Fine,” he said. “They get their damn sandwiches back on top of getting free health insurance and a retirement plan. Happy now?”
“Yes!” I said. “Any of those tuna salad?”
*
“Weird” is such a limp word. It has no power behind it, no oomph, no meaning. Something can be weird because it’s good, weird because it’s bad or funny or anything else. Just the fact that a thing is slightly abnormal makes it weird. That’s why I feel bad describing the mood between Jake, George and I in that office as “weird” but, what the hell, nothing else fits.
We ate our sandwiches, my strength finally came back enough that I could stand up without fear of toppling over, and Jake even seemed to get less pissy as time went by. I knew what I needed to do – convince him that abandoning the pack and his life wasn’t going to make anything better – but I’ll be damned if I had the first clue how I was going to do that. Oh, and I had to remember that Dane expected me to do exactly the opposite.