I sit, astonished. And now, slightly freaked.
Kind of…
His reply pops up before my pulse has had a chance to slow down.
That’s okay. Have fun.
Have—oh. Shit. He thinks I’m going out with Bernard. Who’d DNF’d in the first Qualifying session today, not that it matters.
I will!! I’m planning your pole position look for tomorrow
Why am I explaining what I’m doing to him? He didn’t ask. Though I don’t want him to think I’m skipping whatever celebrations he had up his sleeve to eat fugu with Bernard; I’d suggested a ramen date before I left town, but he’d gone straight for the previously toxic, very expensive puffer fish.
Biting my lip, I wait for Faust to reply.
Can I help? With the clothing stuff.
Faust.
Yes?
When have you ever wanted to help with “clothing stuff”
quickly
I set my phone down. Drum my fingers on my knees. This is getting dangerously close to territory I don’t really like—though Mei had said it herself. I’ve had an impact on him. And he hasn’t replied yet, so there goes my theory that he’s trying to trick me into spending time with him.
Sorry. I uhhh
My rules haven’t changed.
That was overkill. A nuclear bomb at a knife fight. I quickly add a smiling emoji and a cat emoji and a gray heart emoji, and I don’t know what any of it means, so I hope it confuses him just as much and he forgets what I said.
He doesn’t.
All of them?
Yes.
Another reply lights up my screen.
Thank you for letting me know. I worded that wrong anyway. Do you want my help?
And before I can say I don’t need it, and wouldn’t want someoneelse in my creative bubble until tomorrow morning, anyway, Faust sends one more text—
Don’t lie. :)
“I’m only doing this because it’s objectively interesting to discuss fashion with men,” I tell him when he opens his hotel room door the next day. “Not because I need your help or think you should be using your brain for this the morning of a race.”
Faust smirks, holding out a coffee and protein bar to me. I take the coffee, disregarding the déjà vu. “I have twenty minutes to spare,” he says.
“Twenty! What the—”
He slips the protein bar into my pocket. “Do you take cream?”
I narrow my eyes. “Yes.”
“Good.”
