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“What?” I stare at them. “Is that even legal?”
“No.”
I blink. “What the hell? Why haven’t you reported them? Do you just not—”
“Oh, I know,” Maria says, waving a hand in my direction. “My grandmother is a lawyer for the City Attorney of San Francisco. I know how this works way better than you ever will. We’d report them. Then the city would decide that this does not pass inspection on about fifty different counts. And then we would have to find somewhere else to live, and nowhere that actually meets housing code will charge us only eight hundred bucks a month. The whole thing is totally illegal. But on the bright side, it makes breaking leases infinitely easier.”
Fine. If they’ve put up with this, I can, too.
“Besides,” Maria says, “it’s the Bay Area, not Wisconsin. It’s not like it ever really gets that cold.”
“Outside,” Tina says. “Sometimes, in the morning, it’s kind of bad. Try and get out early; it’s better that way.”
“Yeah,” Maria says. “But you don’t need our advice. You’re a big, macho man. You eat cold for breakfast.”
I’m pretty sure she’s making fun of me, so I refuse to rise to the bait. “Nope,” I say. “What kind of idiot doesn’t want advice?”
They exchange glances yet again.
Maria sighs. “Should we tell him about the space heater?”
“Honestly, he’s better off not knowing.”
“Come on,” I say. “No holding out on me.”
“Fine. But remember, you asked for it.” Tina rummages around between one of the beds and the dresser and comes up with a black, plastic thing that looks like a fan. “But, um, maybe… There is something we should mention.”
Maria elbows her, but Tina shakes her head.
While they’re talking, I plug the heater into the power strip, turn the dial all the way up, and flip the power switch. The fan starts to whir; the elements inside turn orange. No heat, yet, but—
“You see, it’s not that easy. If you—”
There’s a loud click and the power shuts off. We’re plunged into darkness.
“As I was saying,” Tina says dryly into the darkness, “the wiring in the garage is ancient. So if you use the heater on anything but the lowest setting, you’re kind of screwed.”
“Yeah,” Maria says. “Don’t use it if you’re running anything that draws power. Like a hair dryer.”
“Or the microwave,” Tina adds in.
“Or if the refrigerator turns on.”
“Pretty much don’t use it with anything on at all. And sometimes even then, it’s too much.”
Their voices are flat, but I can tell they’re trying not to laugh at me.
Fine. Whatever. It’s just a little inconvenience, right? I can take it.
I sigh. “So where’s the fuse box again?”
A minute later, I’ve reset the fuse and we have light—crappy, overhead fluorescent light—again.
“Here’s my computer.” Tina gestures to a laptop on the desk. One hinge has been mended with the same blue duct tape that’s been used to block the drafts.
She hands it over, and I take a look at it.
She must have got this used. As a freshman. It’s an old-model laptop, boxy and heavy. I open it; the lid swings at an odd angle, so I have to stop and coax the poor thing into the semblance of an open position.
I turn it on.
It takes forever to boot.
Okay, the cold is one thing. The fuse box is another. Those things amount to roughing it. But when it comes to computer gadgetry, I am downright spoiled. I haven’t gotten a logon screen after a full minute and a half. And it’s been so long since I’ve used a non-Cyclone computer that I have no idea what to do with this beast.
“Also,” Tina says, “about the bank account. As per our agreement, I’ve deposited a check with my entire net worth as of yesterday into your account.” She hands me a deposit slip. “Congratulations. You have $15.22. There’s also about nine pounds of rice left.” She looks at me. “If you need recipes…”
“That’s what Google is for,” I tell her flatly.
This…sucks. I stand up and look around. No heat. No money. Objectively, it sucks. So why do I feel a sense of excitement, like I’m a kid at Christmas? This is exactly what I’ve wanted.
The laptop finally boots, and then, because that was apparently too much work for it, the fan turns on with a loud whir. Across the room, the fridge starts up with a hum. That thing must be decades old. I can practically smell the Freon leaking from it. And then—I should have known this was coming—the fuse pops with a loud snap and the lights go off again.
“Goddammit,” I swear.
“I’m going to wait in the car,” Maria says.
I don’t blame her. I hear, rather than watch, Tina flip the fuse. Light returns.
“Probably not a good idea to run the fridge and the laptop at the same time,” she tells me.
This is…fucked up. On the other hand, even if I suspected shenanigans, I can’t figure out how they could actually have arranged to make this happen.
“Because I’m nice,” Tina says, “I’ll tell you what it took us two months to figure out. Just don’t use the fridge. Not for anything. You’re a block from a grocery store. If you don’t store perishables, you don’t need the fridge.” She takes a deep breath. “Also, save anything on the laptop before you use the microwave.”
“Don’t tell me.” I eye the blue-hinged beast before me. “The battery doesn’t work.”
“Not really.” She sighs. “It’s like having all the detriments of a laptop with none of the portability.”
I shake my head at her. “Why do I get the impression that you’re enjoying this?”
Her smile is just a little shaky. “You seem to be under the impression that my life is some back-to-nature serenity camp. It’s going to be amusing watching you realize that it’s not simple. It’s not a tourism home stay. You’re going to crash and burn.”
I let out a breath. She stands in place, her hands in fists.
And that’s what it is. I want. For me, it’s simple. For her…she hasn’t had time for bullshit. I know she’s attracted to me, at least a little bit. I also know she doesn’t want to be.
I want her.
But you know what
I want most? I don’t want her to break down and quash her reluctance. I don’t want her to surrender to me. I want her to want to want me, not to want me grudgingly against her will.
“You’re right,” I say. “I’m full of shit. I have no idea what I’m doing. This is going to be hard, and maybe I’m going to fail and fail and fail again.”
Her eyes widen.
“But you know what? There’s one thing I’m not going to do. I promised you when we started that you were important. So I’m not going to call your life a back-to-nature serenity camp or a tourism home stay. I may be clueless. I may be taken aback. It may be that I have no idea what to do with $15.22 because I have never even gone grocery shopping before. But this is your life. It matters.”
She inhales sharply. “Fine.” And then she turns to leave.
“One other thing.”
She turns back to me slowly. She doesn’t say anything.
“It’s okay to like me,” I tell her. “Eventually, just about everyone does.”
TINA
My hands are shaking by the time I go to his car.
It’s okay to like me.
Too late; that seed was planted weeks ago. I’m a shitty enough liar that Blake’s already seen everything I wanted to keep hidden. This isn’t going to work.
A voice in the back of my mind stirs—my mother’s voice, dimly remembered. Xingjuan, you have to be careful.
Ha. As if my mother was ever careful about anything. I yank the door handle—it still freaks me out that the handle comes out of the car for me as I approach—and, once I’m in, slam the door.
Maria is waiting for me in the passenger seat. She doesn’t say anything. She doesn’t point out that my hands are shaking. She knows I’ll say something about it as soon as I’m ready.
This isn’t some beat-up, decades-old Camry like my parents drive. Blake gave me a brief explanation on the way over. This is a completely electric vehicle, something so new and space-age shiny I wasn’t even aware that it existed. It has a thousand features I didn’t even know cars could have. This car, with its dark leather and sleek electronic displays, probably cost him more than four years of my college tuition.
