AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“You scream like a legit girl,” Selena tells me.
“What did you expect? You were screaming at me like I was an ax murderer. I thought maybe there was one standing behind me or something!”
We both laugh some more. It’s true, though—whenever I legitimately scream, it tends to get a little high-pitched. I don’t know how it happens, and I have no way of controlling it. It’s actually pretty embarrassing. But at least I’m making Selena laugh. That’s important.
“I’m sorry. I just wasn’t expecting you home already,” she says.
“Yeah… Well, work didn’t exactly take long. Seeing as Derek is pretty much impossible to get in contact with.” Not that I really want to get in contact with him right now. Not when I’m withholding his wife in my house. Already, I feel bad about even bringing it up.
Selena gets an uncomfortable look in her eye, and she turns away from me. I didn’t mean to talk about it. I know she doesn’t want to talk about him.
So, I change the subject, even though we can’t avoid the topic of Derek in our conversation forever. He is the reason she’s staying in my rental, after all. He is the reason I’m here in the first place. I keep my voice light. “Did you use up all the hot water? Because I was just about to hop in.”
She turns back around to me and cringes.
“Oh, great, your guilty expression isreallyreassuring,” I say. But I know she can see the twinkle in my eye.
“Why don’t you get in, and I will boil a pot of water and toss it in as soon as it’s ready? Does that work?” she teases back.
“You just want to get me to scream like that again,” I banter.
She giggles and heads into the second bedroom to get changed. I’ve had to go out and buy her new clothes and toiletries because she doesn’t want to be seen in public right now. I think I did a good job, but only because she was very specific with her shopping list.
I resume picking up my towel in my bedroom, along with a change of clothes, then I head to the bathroom. As soon as I close the door and lock it, she knocks on it.
“Yeah?” I call, my shirt already half off.
“Hey, is it okay if I make us dinner tonight? I noticed that you have some pasta noodles and sauce in your pantry.”
I honestly don’t member the last time somebody has cooked me anything. Spaghetti and marinara isn’t the most difficult thing in the world to make, but it sounds ten times better when I don’t have to be the one preparing it. I may not be thrilled to have Selena staying here with me right now, but at least I have a personal chef.
I think, for the briefest of moments, that I might really enjoy having Selena here. That this is the start of a long-lasting friendship. I haven’t had too many of those in my life. But Selena and I have been brought together in the wildest of ways. Surely, it means the base of a solid foundation for our relationship.Platonicrelationship.
“Go crazy,” I tell her.
* * *
When I getout of the shower, I open the door in my towel, and I am greeted by the heavenly scent of the warmed-up pasta sauce. I get those eight-dollar jars at the grocery store, none of that simple canned stuff.
Then I remember that I’m in my towel, even though I brought my clothes into the bathroom to get changed, so I quickly re-close the door before Selena sees me like this. Then I put my t-shirt and joggers on and walk out, barefoot, into the kitchen.
“How is the water?” she asks me right away.
Her back is to me, and she is dumping the pasta into the strainer in the sink. She hadn’t bothered to blow dry her hair, so it’s stringy and dangling above her shoulders. It’s weird to see her in such a natural state like this. Had I never discovered Derek abusing her, I wouldn’t have ever gotten to know her this closely. This quickly, either.But I like it.
She finally turns to me, and I get a good look at her black eye now that she doesn’t have any makeup covering it. It’s still really bad, but it’s definitely healing. Every time I look at it, I get this twisting feeling in my stomach like I just want to run out of this house, find where Derek lives, and bash his brains in with a bat. How can any man think it’s okay to put their hand on a woman? Especially one they claim to love.
“Can you not, like, stare at it?” she asks me, catching me in the act. I quickly cover my eyes with both hands like I’ve just seen her naked.
“Oh, God, I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to! This is so embarrassing!” I stumble around the kitchen, pretending to bump into things, but then I accidentally do ram my hip into the edge of the counter really hard. I double over and cry out in pain, and it makes her laugh.That was the goal. Keeping a smile on Selena’s face has quickly become one of my favorite hobbies.
“No, I’m actually being serious,” I tell her, gasping. “I didn’t mean to do that.”
She walks over to me, still laughing. “I know! That’s what makes it even funnier!” She puts her hands on my shoulders and steadies me, and I’m allowed to remove my hands from my eyes now, I think.
I lift the hem of my shirt up, and we look at my side together—it’s already red and puffy, definitely going to bruise. She frowns at it and crosses her arms. “Want me to get you a baggie of ice?”
In my head, I begin replaying the scene of the night she ended up at my doorstep, when I had been the one getting her ice for her wound. I don’t like thinking about it.
