“Oh, good,” David said mildly. “I’m pleased to hear from you. I was worried you would not want to return after our first session.”
“It wasn’tthatbad,” Felix argued. “We washed the chemicals out of your eye! No one got hurt!”
Felix had been expecting David to back out of their next lesson, despite David assuring him he wouldn’t. David seemed genuinely happy to teach someone how to clean, even though Felix was by no means a promising student. Felix got the feeling that the guy didn’t have many people to talk to. But he also got the feeling that it didn’t bother David, so he didn’t know why David didn’t throw him out after their disastrous first session.
“It was a good lesson on the dangers of chemicals,” David said in a wry tone that almost sounded like a joke. “Thursday afternoon works well for me. How about four p.m.?”
“Four works great,” Felix said. “Are you seriously going to dirty up your kitchen for me? Sounds intense.”
“I won’t ‘dirty it up,’” David said. “I just won’t clean it for a week. It will be up to you to identify what needs to be done.”
Felix’s stomach grumbled again. He ignored it, gritting his teeth. Why the hell did he agree to this? He wasn’t just doing some random guy’s chores, he waspayingthe guy to let him.
“Awesome,” Felix said. “Can’t wait. See you Thursday.”
He hung up, already wondering what cleaning shit he would miss when he observed David’s kitchen.
A voice behind him said, “What’s on Thursday?”
Felix spun to face Jacob, who was munching on a plain paper-wrapped donut. “What? Nothing. Your mom.”
“Ha ha,” Jacob said, giving him a suspicious look as he sidled up next to him. “Seriously, who calls anymore? Was that the nurse? Were those test results?”
“I already told you I’m clean,” Felix said, and paused.
Jacob didn’t just haveonedonut. He had two. One plain, because Jacob had boring food tastes. And one dripping with powdered sugar. Even if Jacob developed a proper sweet tooth, he never ate messy food.
Felix gasped. “Jacob! Is this forme?”
“No,” Jacob said, already handing it over.
Felix took it, grinning. He couldn’t show Jacob how touched he was, obviously. But if he laid it onreallythick, Jacob would think he was joking. He rocked sideways, jostling his shoulders.
“All for lil’ ol’ me,” he simpered, fluttering his eyelashes. “Next you’ll be buying me flowers!”
“Don’t count on it,” Jacob said, scratching his mouth to hide a smile.
Felix’s empty stomach filled with butterflies. For all Jacob pretended to be a logical pragmatist, he had such a soft side. It made Felix wonder how Jacob would be in a real relationship. He wouldn’t know. Jacob had never dated anybody.
Then again, neither had Felix. A fact that everyone forgot with Felix’s slutty nature. It always felt weird to accept a real date when he was so hung up on his best friend.
Felix took a bite of his donut, smearing icing sugar all over his mouth in an attempt to distract himself from his useless love. “Mmm. Not as good as your mom’s carrot cake, but pretty damn good.”
“You don’t even like carrot cake,” Jacob said. “That’smyfavorite. Stop pretending to like my mom’s carrot cake ‘for the bit,’ she hates that.”
Felix ignored him and made a mental note to get Jack to teach him how to bake cakes. Carrot cake was kind of gross, but he was doing this whole thing to impress Jacob, hence: carrot cake.
“So, did you come up with somethingexcitingfor us to do next?” Felix asked, mouth full of donut. “Don’t say go-karts again. I think they’ll ban us if we get too close.”
Jacob laughed. “But we were so good at it!”
“Toogood,” Felix agreed. “It hadnothingto do with you threatening to get out of your kart to fight that middle schooler.”
“I was joking,” Jacob said quickly. “I wouldn't have done it.”
“I know,” Felix lied. He took another bite of donut, trying not to be too delighted by the gift. It didn’t mean anything. They were best friends, of course Jacob would do this stuff for him sometimes.
Jacob stuffed his hands into his pockets. “I actually did get us tickets. To something… I don’t know if it’sexciting. But it’s definitely outside my comfort zone, so.”
