AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Okay, that was like the best thing I’ve ever had in my life,” I told him, leaning back in my chair, wincing when just moving lit my ass up again. Damn, it hurt, but I was feeling warm and good everywhere.
He grinned, that awkward way that made me think I needed to write myself some lines reminding me to give him more compliments. “Yeah?”
“Fuck yeah. You’re a great cook. I could eat that every night.”
“Thanks. I never cook for anyone but myself. It’s nice to have someone appreciate my kitchen skills. It’s nice to see you enjoy something,” he said after a pause like he wasn’t sure he should say it.
“I enjoy things,” I told him, although I wasn’t sure how true that actually was, so I named some off just to prove it. “Football. Blow jobs. Getting my ass beat.”
He smirked. “Yeah, okay.”
“Whatever. Enjoying things is…”
“What? Not cool?”
I shrugged. “It’s not… worth it. It’s a waste of time.”
He was quiet and picked up like a tenth piece of garlic bread, tearing pieces off with his fingers while his brain picked that apart, looking for trauma probably and yeah, didn’t take a fucking guidance counselor to see a kid who had his toys torn up and taken away because he’d enjoyed shit too much.
So much subconscious shit people wanted you to think was tricky and buried was right there on the surface, no secret at all. Didn’t mean you could do much about it but just look at it though. Wishing it was different, that was a waste of time too.
“I like study hall,” I told him, surprising us both I think, maybe not with the realization, but that I’d say it. “I like playing those games. With you.”
He nodded. “I do too.”
“I like not eating alone,” I said, and that was as far as I was going, kind of wished I hadn’t gone that far because it sounded pathetic and frankly if I kept coming up with new stuff to list, it was going to get more and more obvious that most of the things I enjoyed had one ten-foot-tall thing in common.
He nodded again. “Yeah. It’s a lot better with you here.”
God, he just didn’t keep anything in reserve, and I blushed like tomato sauce was splashing up my cheeks.
“Where’d you learn to cook like that?” I asked him, changing the subject but also… fuck. Curious. “With garlic and stuff?”
“When I first moved in here I used to order these meal boxes. You know, where they deliver the ingredients and the recipe, and you put it together.”
I vaguely knew what he was talking about from all the shady free trial coupons that always showed up in the mailbox.
“Why? If I moved out when I was sixteen I’d just eat fucking donuts all the time.”
“You like donuts?”
I rolled my eyes. “Shut up.”
He grinned and shrugged. “There were a lot of conditions for me moving out. I had to have a job, I had to stay in school, like I had to really have my shit together all the time. So I always kind of…” He waved his hand around. “I put on this act. Not really an act, I guess, more like… I just… changed things. I really didn’t want to fuck this up, and the more adult-looking stuff I had, or the more adult skills I learned, the safer I felt. If that makes sense. The more convincing it seemed that I was actually an adult, you know? Learning how to cook seemed like an adult thing. Plus neither of my parents cook. I like being better at things than they are.”
Kind of funny to hear him be the spiteful one. Not that I didn’t get it. I learned way early on to never be better at my mom at things out loud, but secretly, you bet I kept score. Blurring my life out like wet paint with a few pills every day would have been a way less painful way to live, but the fact that staying sober was basically a bigfuck you, look what I can do with one arm tied behind my backmade it way more appealing than it would have been otherwise. A lot more twisted and ugly than his thing, I guess, but I got it.
“Is that why you wear all those sweaters?” I asked him. “So you’d look like a grownup?”
I kind of meant it as a joke, but he bit his lip and twisted his mouth to the side and suddenly I felt like a dick.
“Yeah, partly.”
“Fuck, seriously?”
He shrugged. “Plus shopping sucks. Finding clothes that fit is hard. So when I find something I just buy a bunch of it. I’m not great at dressing myself.”
“I think you look alright,” I told him, and I couldn’t help smiling about it.
