“I can get you one.”
“To putwhere, exactly? Did you miss the part about me having atinyliving room? It only has a sofa, a TV, and a coffee table. There’s a bookshelf in the corner, too, I guess, but that’s about it, and I’m not putting an air hockey table in my bedroom, which is also tiny.”
“Right,” Cameron replied. “Sorry. I got a little ahead of myself there.” She set everything down and looked around the room. “Something to drink?”
“You really would have bought me an air hockey table, wouldn’t you?”
“Yeah. Why not?”
“Well, not all of us can afford to just impulsively buy an air hockey table.”
“Are we about to argue about money?” Cameron asked, squinting at her.
“No.”
“Because I don’t spend wildly or anything. Believe it or not, I actually have an IRA and other investment accounts, and I have a house.”
“Well, I’d hope you have a house.”
“No, I meant I own another house. I rent it out. It’s an investment that I own through my company, which I set up so that no one would know I own it.”
“We’re not fighting about money, Cam,” Lacey replied. “You can do whatever you want with yours, including buying your very own air hockey table.”
“Where would I put it?”
“Assuming my entire apartment fits inside your likely giant living room, I’d say somewhere inside your house.”
“An air hockey table doesn’t exactly go with the aesthetic of the living room in my house.”
“I’m sure you have other rooms.”
“All of them are used for other things.”
“And you can’t redecorate any of them? Make it your space?”
“Myspace?”
“Call me crazy here, but I’m guessing Kennedy was in charge of decorating everything, having a lot of opinions about what should go where in your house.”
Cameron laughed and said, “You’d be right about that. I didn’t fight her on it. Sometimes, it’s easier to give in.”
“Yeah, I get that,” Lacey replied. “River’s apartment isn’t impeccably decorated or anything – it’s smaller than mine and above her shop – but it’s definitelyherspace. I’ve left things there from time to time, but she always puts whatever it is in a certain spot off to the side of everything else, as if to say, ‘That’s where this goes,’ because it doesn’t go with her stuff. She has more stuff at my place, and she can put it anywhere she wants, you know? It doesn’t bother me if it gets mixed in with mine. It can make you feel like you’re theotherand not part of it with them in the spaces you’re supposed to share. River’s apartment is technically hers, so I can’t say much, but you and Kennedy own your house together, I assume, and you’ve lived there together for years, so I imagine it’s worse for you.”
“Wow,” Cameron said, moving to lean back against the wet bar behind her.
“Wow, what? Did I say something wrong?”
“No. I just never realized it before.”
“Which part?”
“How bad it was.”
“Bad?” Lacey asked.
“When we bought the place, she decorated it herself, even though we were going to do that together. I wasn’t happy about it, but it was done, and I didn’t mind it. We were working so much anyway – I wasn’t home, really; except to sleep. She does like things a certain way, and that’s not always my way, but that’s a relationship and compromise, right? We have a ton of space, and I probably could’ve turned a room into something just for me. It’s not like we ever have guests. Her parents live about twenty minutes away. Mine aren’t that far now. I bought them a house in Palos Verdes, so they’re only staying the night if they don’t want to deal with driving home after dinner, and I think that’s happened maybe once. We don’t need all those guest rooms. I could’ve used one for something I wanted.”
“Yeah, you could have,” Lacey said before she walked over to the wet bar and leaned against it next to her. “Did you ask?”
