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“You need to get over your embarrassment. People get drunk and do stupid shit all the time.”
I know she’s right. I’m going to have to face him at some point. I’d just like more time to get over my embarrassment first. Three years or so should do it.
“It’s not like he hasn’t been avoiding me too,” I remind her, walking over to the metal shelf and grabbing an old hair dryer off it that’s covered in paint. “His extra fridge is out here that holds all of his gross, flavored sparkling water he drinks every day.”
It’s totally fine I’ve seen empty cans in the trash when I’ve snuck back into the house, knowing he’s getting his fix somewhere else, just to avoid coming out here.
“Your music is always at full volume when you paint, and you listen to a lot of angry songs. He’s probably afraid you’ll stab him in the throat with a paint brush if he even thinks about opening that door.”
The first morning I skipped out on my coffee run and chat with Melanie, she showed up here to Ryan’s house on her lunch break and was knocking on the side garage door for a full five minutes before I heard her.
The problem is, I don’t listen to angry music when I’m actually painting. It’s too distracting. Melanie just happened to show up when I was sitting on the floor sketching and was too busy to switch over from my anger management playlist that was still pulled up from the night before. When I’m actively painting, I listen to slower music with a heavy, erotic beat that calms, centers, and helps me focus more. And sometimes turns me on. But hey, it fuels my creativity fire, and that’s what masturbation is for.
“Aren’t you supposed to be charming customers with your sparkling personality?” I question her as I walk the hair dryer back to the table, knowing Melanie doesn’t usually get off until six, and it’s only five.
Which reminds me I only have another hour left until Ryan gets home from bowling practice, if I want to sneak into the house and grab a snack. Since it’s his night to cook, and he’s left my food on the stove just like I’ve been doing for him, I won’t eat until at least after midnight when he goes to bed.
God, I really suck.
“I got a job working nights at the concession stand at Wavy Lanes. You should come up and see me Friday night! Now we’ll get to hang out even more when you start painting that mural.”
“Did you quit The Barge?” I ask in shock, plugging the hair dryer into the outlet next to the table I’m working on.
“Oh God, no.” She laughs. “You’ll still be able to come up for our morning coffee chats once you stop being an asshole. I just changed my hours. We’re both poor; I’m justextrapoor.”
If she knew about the size of the trust fund I walked away from, she would probably hate me and not want to be my friend anymore.
“No more changing the subject,” Melanie scolds as she continues. “When are you going to stop avoiding Ryan?”
Quickly flipping the power switch on the hair dryer, I shout into the phone over the noise, “What? I can’t hear you!”
I hear Melanie shout, calling me an asshole again, and I shout back that I need to get back to work and will call her later, before quickly ending the call. Turning up the volume a little bit on the side of my phone, I push that conversation out of my mind, and I let the sounds of Santigold’s “My Superman” playing through the Bluetooth speaker help me get my mind back on work.
Setting my phone down on the table next to me, I spend a few minutes carefully aiming the hair dryer at the canvas, moving around all the paint I poured. I smile down at my work as my body starts moving along with the beat of the song, happy at how this is turning out, knowing it’s going to be the perfect colorful background for this current website order.
Out the corner of my eye, I see the dark screen of my phone come to life, and I quickly glance over at it, expecting to see a text from Melanie calling me another name again for hanging up on her.
Ryan:Hi.
My heart starts pounding, and my hand wrapped around the hair dryer gets sweaty as I slowly stand back up from being bent over the table and stare at my phone. My quickly beating heart cracks right in half when another text immediately flashes across my screen.
Ryan:Please don’t be mad at me anymore.
Swiftly turning off the hair dryer and setting it down on the table, I swipe my phone up from the table, feeling like the asshole Melanie called me that Ryan thinks I’ve been hiding out in here because I’m still mad at him. I stopped being mad at him the minute I walked out the door the other night and slammed it behind me.
Me:I’m not mad.
Ryan:Can I come in? Please?
My phone slips right out of my hand and clatters to the ground, the music instantly cutting off when it lands, as my head whips up to the door that leads from the garage into the house.
Is he home early? Why is it suddenly a hundred degrees in this fucking garage?
Looking down the front of me at my paint-covered overalls—with just a white bandeau bra under them that is also smudged with paint—I panic, wishing I would have at least gotten to take a shower and look halfway decent before I had to face him again. My hair is up in a messy bun with a red bandana tied up around it to keep most of the paint out of my hair, but I can feel smudges of stupid paint on my face, and it’s on my arms, and—Oh my God, I look like shit!
Smoothing my sweaty hands down the front of me, I take a deep, calming breath that does nothing to actually calm me. Letting it out slowly while I shake out my hands, I give myself a pep talk to stop being a child and start behaving like an adult. And then I quickly race over to the door, not wanting to make Ryan wait any longer. Grabbing the door handle and flinging it open, fully prepared to go racing into the house in search of him, my feet immediately stutter to a stop.
Ryan scrambles up from the floor that leads into the kitchen, where he was sitting right outside the door with his back resting against the wall and his phone in his hands. He abandons his cell on the floor by his feet, and he greets me with a shy smile when he’s standing up.
