“What kind of man doesn’t want to date a beautiful woman?”
There are more cracks in the bubble. She’s clenching her jaw. I can’t stop staring at her pursed mouth, the tired eyes, the way she licks the coffee off her lips while the charms clink noisily against the plastic handle of her cup. She zips and unzips all the stupid little pouches multiplying on her cup, looking for God knows what.
“Why do you have to have all that shit on your cup?” I finally ask, thundering at her.
She flinches.
Before I can stop it, I sweep the binder off the desk to crash to the floor, papers flying everywhere.
Truman, balancing on top of the antique globe one of my brothers dumped in my house as a prank, barks once.
“Stop acting like that, like prey, like you’re weak. It’s”—I run a hand through my hair—“aggravating.”
She’s clutching that cup like she might a child’s toy. When I try to snatch it from her, she jerks back. I grab her arm and wrest the cup from her.
“That’s mine!”
Holding the cup above my head while Jenna jumps around, I fish out the box I’d bought yesterday on a whim.
“You can’t just take things that aren’t yours.”
“Just like you can’t move into other people’s vehicles uninvited?”
She steps back, a pout on her mouth like I’d just kicked her dog.
“I’ll move out.”
“You won’t.”
“I will.”
“I won’t allow it.” I dump the contents of the box on my desk, pick up the leather bag, and pull all the stuffing out.
“Hey!” Jenna complains when I start prying off all the shit she has on that cup and dumping it into the bag. “I have all that carefully organized.”
“It’s insane, and it’s driving me crazy. You can’t go through life with all your worldly possessions attached to a plastic cup. You have your credit cards and your ID on here, for God’s sake. I see you leave this cup all over the place.”
“I have a system.”
“You don’t have a system, Cupcake. Your life is a fucking disaster—it’s stressful and disorganized. Wait?” I unzip one of the many pouches. “Is this food in here?”
“Ooh! I thought I had more lifesavers left.”
Jenna pops the mildly lint-covered Lifesaver into her mouth.
“Revolting. You’re just acting like this”—I lower my voice—“because neither Nathan nor any of the other losers you decided to chain yourself to financially ever did anything nice for you. I can’t even stand you, and I’ve been a better boyfriend than them.”
“Don’t call yourself my boyfriend.” She glares. The bubbly mask is completely gone.
“Hit a nerve? You’re sleeping in my car, you let yourself into my house uninvited, at this point I’m the only one feeding your dog…”
“I’ll get out of your hair, buddy, if you just pick a date.” She dumps the binder back on my desk.
“Fine. Which one has the nicest tits?”
Jenna glares at me.
“I want one who will put out if I have to go through this. The curvy ones have low self-esteem. Got any of those?”
