And then he was gone, standing up outside the car and holding his hand out to help me out.
Holy crap.
I pulled in a deep breath through my nose and reached out to take his hand as I got out of the car on wobbly legs. Jeez.
“Zeke, Ryker and I live here,” he explained with a grin, still holding my hand as we went up the walk. “Loch still lives at home with Mom and Dad, but he hangs out here a lot.”
Oh, great. A house where three grown men lived. I braced myself for a blast of yucky man-smell and what would surely be a mess when we got to the door, but once inside, it surprisingly smelled like someone had made cookies and the whole place was rather neat. I looked up at him in what I know was surprise.
“Mom comes by on the weekends and puts us to work cleaning,” he explained, knowing exactly what my look was for.
Right off the bat I saw that the living room housed a huge TV that was currently airing a football game and there was a sofa and two recliners facing it, each of which was currently occupied by huge bodies that were watching the game.
“What’s up?” a guy in one of the recliners, straining his head back, asked, and, good God, he appeared to be an older, slightly larger version of Gable, meaning he too was hot. He wore jeans, a black Bulldogs sweatshirt and running shoes, his long legs stretched out, feet crossed at the ankle on the leg rest.
“Hangover,” Gable replied, still holding my hand and nodding toward me, which made my cheeks flush in embarrassment. “That’s my older brother Zeke.” I waved lamely at him as he gave me a chin raise. “That’s Ryker,” he said, nodding to the muscular, silent guy, another Gable clone, lying on his back on the couch wearing a gray sweat suit and socks. He nodded at me as I did the lame wave again. Ugh. “And that’s Loch.” He nodded at the other recliner where a younger Gable look-alike sat, who was dressed similarly to Gable, and who was now smiling at me. “This is Scout Patterson,” Gable told them all.
“Hi,” I mumbled, waving again like a dork.
“I think you’re in my biology class,” the youngest one, Loch, said, narrowing his eyes at me looking just as Gable had the first day of psych when he was trying to place where he’d seen me.
I raised my eyebrows at him. “Yeah?”
“Yeah. You sit in the second row, third seat, middle section, right?”
“Uh…”
“Loch’s like an idiot savant, noticing stupid shit like that,” Gable informed me with a chuckle.
“Fuck off,” Loch retorted good naturedly, flipping him the bird.
Gable let my hand go and walked to where Loch was sitting. “Fuck off?
Fuck off?”
he asked. “You kiss your mother with that mouth?” he added then grabbed his little brother in a headlock and proceeded to scrub his fisted knuckles over his head.
“Dude! The hair!” Loch cried, wrestling himself away from Gable, then frowning went to the mirror that hung by the door to do damage control on his hair as Gable laughed at him and called him a pussy which made him frown even more.
“You get that belt Dad told you to pick up?” the guy lying on the couch asked. Ryker, that was his name.
“Yeah. It’s in the car. We can work on the Mustang tonight if you want,” Gable told him.
“Gotta meet.”
Ah, Ryker was the wrestler.
“I’ll fix it myself then,” Gable said shrugging his shoulders. “Gotta work at six, though.” He turned back to me and smiled, taking my hand once again and leading me into the kitchen. At the bar, he pulled a stool out for me. “Have a seat and I’ll fix you up.”
The throb in my head had downgraded to a dull thump and I watched as he opened a cabinet under the counter and pulled out a blender then moved to the fridge to get some things out. While he did this, I looked around the place to see that the beige wall in the living room that I could see had a couple pictures of what I assumed was Seattle at night and a few framed photo collages of the brothers. Looking back at the kitchen I saw a big, round clock hanging over the rectangular table and some kind of hotrod pinup calendar was magneted to the freezer door of the refrigerator with a bikini-clad woman on it lying across the hood of a silver Camaro. The walls in the kitchen were robin’s egg blue and the cabinets were a light oak. I could tell it was a nice house and had been well taken care of.
“Okay, might wanna cover your ears,” Gable said.
I looked at him and he nodded at the blender. Oh. I put my hands over ears right before he pressed a button on it then grinned at me before turning to watch whatever he’d put in it mixing around. A moment later he glanced back at me and nodded. I took my hands away from my ears and smiled in gratitude at him. He pulled a glass out of a cabinet near the sink then took the jar out of the base of the blender and poured a semi-thick, reddish concoction into the glass.
Walking over to me, he placed the glass on the bar in front of me. “Works every time.”
I eyed the glass then gave him a semi-skeptical look.
“Seriously. Drink up,” he said, pushing the glass closer to me.
I hesitated for a second, now questioning if this really was a good idea as my stomach churned. He pushed it even closer, so I picked it up and took a sniff of it first then took a tentative sip. When I didn’t puke immediately, I went ahead and took a careful drink. Hm. Not bad.
“Gatorade, vanilla ice cream and two bananas,” he said proudly.
That made sense. The drink was loaded with potassium and electrolytes, well, except for the ice cream, and since it didn’t sound or taste too bad, I drank the rest of it down as he cleaned up. “Thank you,” I said when I finished and noticed that I was already feeling a little better, probably because I hadn’t eaten anything that morning and now had something in my belly. “Your recipe?”
“An old family one,” he said with a chuckle as he put the blender jar in the fridge and the base away back under the cabinet. “Better?”
I nodded. “Yeah, I think so.” I smiled.
“Good.” He walked over and leaned down on his forearms on the bar looking at me like a doctor assessing a patient. “Need more?”
“No, I think this’ll do it. Thanks.” And as my head started clearing, I realized how strange this whole thing was. Gable had brought me to his house, he’d introduced me to his brothers and he’d made me a hangover cure and he hadn’t even been rude to me. Crazy.
Speaking of rude, I remembered something. “Hey, what happened to your friend who was in psych the first day?” I asked.
“Justin? Dropped out.”
He now glanced at the clock above the table. “Well, I’ve got a class at ten, so I need to get back.”
“Yeah, me too. French. It’s going to kick my ass.” I chuckled.
I watched as he turned his head slightly to the side as he studied me, eyes narrowing. Oh, shit. I’d talked about French in my emails. I’d said almost the same exact thing in my email. Ack! I held my breath and kept my face as innocent as I could until he finally replied, still looking at me pensively, “Calculus will probably do that to mine. Ready?”
Okay. I knew this entire thing was stupid. I mean, why didn’t I just tell him we were writing to each other instead of acting like it was a case of national security? But I think maybe the reason I didn’t tell him was that it’d gone on for so long now and he’d been so nice in his emails that I think I just wanted that part of him to myself, and that the intrigue he felt toward his unknown pen pal was flattering and I sort of loved the attention from him even though it really wasn’t me he was writing to. Yeah, I know. Confusing. And dumb.
So instead of confessing, I nodded and took the hand that he offered and stepped down from the barstool immediately noticing that my headache was gone. “You’re a miracle worker.” I playfully knocked my shoulder into his arm.
He was still looking at me speculatively, but he didn’t say anything as he walked us back through the living room. “We’re out,” he told his brothers.
“It was nice meeting you all,” I said shyly and heard their mumbled replies as they nodded cursorily at me before their attention went back to the TV which I could’ve taken as being rude, but then I realized that they were probably used to Gable bringing multiple girls home, so it wasn’t like I was anything special. To them, they probably thought I was just another chick he was going to bang. And wasn’t that humbling.
He walked me out to the car, opened my door for me, leaned in and put my seatbelt on but didn’t say a word or even give me a look. After closing my door, he went around, got in and drove me back to campus in complete silence. When we got back on campus, he drove into the same parking lot since the liberal arts building was near Old North where our psych class was, but he pulled up to the curb so I wouldn’t have to step in any of the puddles. “My class is across campus,” he said, as he reached over to undo my seatbelt, and I found I was disappointed that he’d passed on coming around to lean over me to do it. When I got out, I bent down to look at him, seeing that he was still watching me closely.
“Thanks again,” I muttered and at his troubled nod, I closed the door then watched him drive away.
Yep. Pretty sure he’d figured it out.
______________________________________
From:
9565876
Subject:
Hi =)
Date:
October 7, 8:16 a.m.
To:
9543254
Four,
Just wanted to tell you to have a great week!
See ya!
Six
xo
~*~*~*~
Gable didn’t write back that week. He didn’t talk to me in class. He didn’t do anything. I saw him all three days and he acted as if I didn’t exist. I worked two nights and he filled my orders with no smartass comebacks or reckless flirting. Nothing.
And this really got to me.
“He’s got to know I’m his pen pal. I mean, he’s stopped talking to me both in real life and through email,” I said to Bodhi Friday at lunch in the student center.
He finished his first grilled cheese in two bites and picked up his second one. “Sounds like it.”
“I mean, why else would he be ignoring me?”
“Maybe he has issues with girls.”
I huffed out a humorless laugh. “I don’t think that’s his problem.”
“I mean, yeah, he’s pretty hot and the girls flock to him, but what I’m saying is maybe his issues are that he’s afraid of getting
close
to girls. Perhaps he felt he was getting too close to you.” He shrugged. “Could’ve had a bad breakup or something,” he said as an afterthought.
I tapped my pencil against my lips. “You’re probably right. We were emailing about exes a while back and he didn’t want to talk about his. That’s gotta be it.” I now chewed on the eraser of my pencil. Then it hit me. “So you’re saying the reason he’s avoiding me is because he started getting close to me and it scared him off?”
Bodhi held a finger up while chewing on a mouthful of fries. When he swallowed he grabbed his bottle of water and took a big drink. “You’re a sharp one, Scout.”
I frowned at his sarcasm. “Are you sure? Why would he suddenly become afraid that we were getting too close?” I looked off in the distance as I mulled that over before looking back at him. “Unless he knows I’m his pen pal. So it’s not that we were getting too close in real life, it’s just that if he knows we’re writing to each other too, that made him back off. God, this is so confusing.” I shook my head. “I should’ve just told him.”
“It
is
confusing.” He shoved more fries in his mouth. “And, yeah, maybe you should’ve told him, but look, if I had to guess, from what you told me, I’d say he’s definitely suspicious about it which may have scared him away. But it still sounds as if he’s interested since he said you’re his type.” He thought about this for a few seconds as he took a drink. “But I guess that was to pen pal you.” He frowned. “But I still think he likes real life you but he’s staying away since he suspects you’re also his pen pal.”
Wow. This was so totally confusing.
“And he’s pissed because he opened up to me through email?” I said.
“I don’t know. It’s easier to hide behind the Internet and talk to someone because you can always disappear at any time.” He took a big bite of his brownie then with his mouth still full said, “Bottom line is, he’s shared some personal things with you in his emails and if he thinks you’re his pen pal that might be a little threatening to him because he doesn’t want to get close to real life you.”
I took a deep breath and let it out in a big sigh. “This is ridiculous. I hate this assignment.” I reached over and tore a piece of his brownie off which got me a hand slap. After throwing the piece in my mouth I said somewhat deflated, “I told him in my email that he was my type too.” I shook my head at my stupidity.
Bodhi gave a half shrug. “Nothing wrong with that. You’re attracted to him. I get it. The heart wants what the heart wants.”
And that made me feel not so stupid. “God, I love you.” I leaned over and kissed his cheek. “You always make me feel better about being an idiot.”
He grinned as he downed the rest of his brownie.
“But do you think what I’ve done is deceitful? Knowing who he is and all? Would you be mad?” I asked.
“You figured it out to begin with, right? Your friend at the paper just validated your suspicions. Nah, I wouldn’t be mad, I don’t think. I think I’d actually use it to my advantage and fuck with you some.”
“You think he’s gonna fuck with me?” I was trying not to think about him fucking with me in any way because it was very distracting when my phone dinged that I had an email. I pulled it out of my jacket pocket and almost fell out of my chair. “It’s him!” I whispered, peering up at Bodhi, kind of scared shitless for some reason.
“What’d he say?”
“He said again that he wants to meet. But that’s against the rules! What do I do?”
Bodhi laughed. “Answer him, dork. Why’re you freaking out?”
“We can’t meet! If he knows it’s me and he knows that I knew it was him, he’ll know I knew and I know he
will
be mad and he’ll never talk to me again. But that might be a good thing because nothing’s ever going to happen with us anyway because in real life I don’t think he’s really interested in me.” My eyes started filling with tears as I refuted everything Bodhi’d just said. “Oh, God.” I grabbed a napkin and dabbed at my eyes. How ridiculous was I? “I guess I didn’t think he’d talk to me again. What’s wrong with me?”
Bodhi shook his head then reached over and took my phone. “You’re PMSing.”
My head shot up and I scowled at him. “What? How’d you know?”
“Amy is too. She was particularly mean last night, so I thought that must be it. You two are probably synced now since you live together.”
I blinked at him. Then I blinked again. “Uh. Kinda creepy, Bode. And how the hell do you know this stuff?”
He gave me a “get real” look. “I lived with my sister and mom. Believe me, Dad and I always made ourselves scarce when they were both hormonal.” He started typing something into my phone.
“Bodhi! What are you writing?” I shrieked trying to grab my phone from him.
He held it away from me as he typed then finally handed it back while I had a mini panic attack. “Gotta get to class. I’ll see you this weekend sometime, ‘kay?”
I nodded absentmindedly, poking around on my phone trying to see what he’d written, barely noticing it when he bent and kissed my forehead before he left.
______________________________________
From:
9565876
Subject:
Rendezvous
Date:
October 11, 12:33 p.m.
To:
9543254
We have to follow the rules. If we didn’t have rules, the world would be a messy place
Oh, good one, Bodhi. I looked up to see him dumping the contents of his tray into a trashcan near the door, and when he twisted his head to look back at me, I gave him a big smile and a thumbs up which made him grin and shake his head before he turned and left the student center.
Then my phone dinged again.
______________________________________
From:
9543254
Subject:
Again with the rules
Date:
October 11, 12:36 p.m.
To:
9565876
Rules were meant to be broken
I didn’t realize how much I’d missed talking to Gable and I closed my eyes in relief that the stalemate had ended. And, damn it, I wasn’t going to be a coward any longer. If he was avoiding me because he felt he was getting too close then he’d just have to get over it. I was interested in him, as in, I really liked him, and he’d said pen pal me was his type, even if he didn’t really mean it about real life me, but maybe if I kept things light, he’d get past the not wanting to get closer part and move forward with this which could continue over to our real lives.
Ugh. I’ll take a shot of baffling with a side of befuddlement, please.
I rolled my eyes at how ridiculous I’d let things get as I typed a message back.
______________________________________
From:
9565876
Subject:
Cliché
Date:
October 11, 12:38 p.m.
To:
9543254
Said every cliché user ever
______________________________________
From:
9543254
Subject:
Cliché
Date:
October 11, 12:41 p.m.
To:
9565876
That’s me, a walking cliché
______________________________________
From:
9565876
Subject:
Doubtful
Date:
October 11, 12:43 p.m.
To:
9543254
I highly doubt that. So where’ve you been?
______________________________________
From:
9543254
Subject:
Doubtful
Date:
October 11, 12:43 p.m.
To:
9565876
Had some shit to sort out
______________________________________
From:
9565876
Subject:
Doubtful
Date:
October 11, 12:44 p.m.
To:
9543254
Yeah? Care to share?
______________________________________
From:
9543254
Subject:
Doubtful
Date:
October 11, 12:44 p.m.
To:
9565876
Just some personal stuff
______________________________________
From:
9565876
Subject:
Doubtful
Date:
October 11, 12:44 p.m.
To:
9543254
Oh, okay
______________________________________
From:
9543254
Subject:
Curious
Date:
October 11, 12:45 p.m.
To:
9565876
So what’re you doing?
______________________________________
From:
9565876
Subject:
Curious
Date:
October 11, 12:45 p.m.
To:
9543254
Eating lunch in the student center
______________________________________
From:
9543254
Subject:
Still curious
Date:
October 11, 12:45 p.m.
To:
9565876
What’re you having?
______________________________________
From:
9565876
Subject:
Still curious
Date:
October 11, 12:45 p.m.
To:
9543254
Burrito surprise o_O
______________________________________
From:
9543254
Subject:
Still curious
Date:
October 11, 12:46 p.m.
To:
9565876
My favorite ;)
______________________________________
From:
9565876
Subject:
Um
Date:
October 11, 12:46 p.m.
To:
9543254
Uh. You do know what the surprise is, right?
______________________________________
From:
9543254
Subject:
Um