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A Few Strange Words
Tyler
Seattle, Washington
Chloe stepped into my dining room at eighteen and a half weeks pregnant, wearing an untied dressing gown that exposed her growing baby bump.
It showed through all her clothes now, and all her coworkers were organizing an office baby shower for someday in December.
I’m fine being uninvited to that one…
“I can’t sleep,” she said, walking over to me.
“Me either.” I gently rubbed her stomach a few times before pulling a chair back from the table. “Are you tired?”
“Exhausted.”
I pulled up our schedule, noticing that she hadn’t worked less than fourteen hours a day since her promotion.
“I think you need to take a few days off,” I said. “You also need to start coming home at a decent hour.”
“I’ll be fine.” She shrugged. “It’s just rush reason.”
“I’m not asking you, Chloe,” I said. “I’m telling you. Stay at home for a few days, and after that, come home by six.”
“I’ll consider it,” was her strange way of agreeing.
“Are you in the mood for some short fiction?”
“Depends on the trope.”
“A fake relationship to hide a real one.”
“My favorite kind.”
I set down a copy of US Weekly magazine.
Hazel and I were posted on the cover—again—walking through Pike Place Market with Starbucks coffee in hand. The headline read, “The Heiress & The Prince: A Budding Romance.”
“She looked a lot sexier on the other covers,” Chloe said, pulling copies of The New York Post & Seattle Gossip from our collection. The headlines on those, ‘Falling in Love with the Prince’ and ‘How an American Heiress Tamed the Bad Boy Prince’ were pulled from the same bin of cliches.
“See?” Chloe traced Hazel’s eyebrows. “The dreamy look in her eyes in this one says she might really like you.”
“She probably does.”
“Are you interested?”
“She’d have to grow a brain for that to be remotely possible.” I kissed her forehead, and she blushed. “Let me know if the writing is any good whenever you get around to reading it. In the meantime, can you please explain something to me?”
“Sure. What is it?”
“Quite a few things, actually.” I tapped the note app on my phone, opening the file I updated whenever Americans said or did something that confused me. “Let’s start with why the interns keep bringing me these odd crusty bread things whenever I request a biscuit with my tea. I’ve described what I’m looking for plenty of times.”
She smiled. “You could easily Google why that keeps happening. It’s a really simple fix.”
“I’d rather hear it from you.” I ran my fingers through her hair. “You’ll be far more condescending than a search bar, and I get to fuck you afterwards.”
“I’m not sure I want to sleep with someone who doesn’t appreciate the brilliance of Twinkies.”
“Don’t ever bring one of those into this house again.” I shook my head. “The few I’ve attempted to eat are enough.”
“You didn’t feel that way when we were high on our first date.”
“Because that’s the only circumstance when they actually taste good.”
