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Secondly, because it feels weird that she chose my bar. I mean, my bar is banging, don’t get me wrong, but it feels…overly coincidental.
Also, why would she bringDannythere? Doesn’t she know him at all?
Glitterati is my favorite place on earth, but I’ve designed it, purposefully, to be loud and bold and colorful—an assault on the senses.
Maybe she’s testing him. If so, it’s kind of a shitty test, which suggests she’s a shitty person. Danny deserves better than to settle for someone like that.
Or do you just want to believe that because he made you come with his hand and then sucked his fingers?
I swallow hard. “Looks like you’re all set up for a reunion, Romeo. There’s nothing professional about meeting at a bar. She wants to scope you out.”
He shrugs it away. “I’m guessing she wants to clear the air, make sure the meeting goes well.”
I doubt it. But I give him a sunny smile. “I’m going to get you some new shirts too. What size are you?”
“I can do my own shopping, Mira.”
“You like going to stores?” Because I can’t imagine he would, what with the snapping fluorescents and strangers pushing each other for prime placement in line.
“That’s what the internet’s for.”
“I want to do it. Call it a Housewarming present. And I might as well tell you right now that I’m going to keep insisting until you cave.” I wave to the pink record table and all the little things he put out for me to help it feel like home. My throat feels slightly clogged as I add, “You gave me something.”
He studies me for a second and then gives a decisive nod. “I don’t like buttoned shirts. I’m Large.”
My mind is a gutter. I choke on my own spit, and he pushes the drink toward me. I probably shouldn’t be drinking alcohol at 11:30 am either, but my thoughts are driving me to it. I take a shallow sip.
Huh. Itispretty bland.
“I can do better than this. I’m off my game.”
“We’ll try again later.” He grabs a massive water bottle from the counter behind him, fills it up, then lifts it to me as if in a cheers.
“Wait,” I say, suddenly desperate, although I have no idea for what.
He pauses. My eyes take in the long line of him, the slight curl of the longer hair at the top of his head and where it’s grown out a little at the nape of his neck.
“You’re going to call the super?”
“I said I would,” he tells me, some grumpiness creeping back into his voice. It must be perversion that makes me want to smile.
“Any other podcasts I should listen to in addition to the murdering neighbor one?”
He lists off a few, then says, “Is there something you need? Something that would make you more comfortable?”
“Do you have any books?”
He looks taken aback by this. “You want to read my books?”
Yes. I want to understand more about how his mind works. He’s interesting and inaccessible to me. Like Wordle. I try it every damn morning, and I only crack it once a week. But that feeling of cracking it, boy—it’s like finding someone’s signature drink on the first go-round.
“Sure. I mean, I’m not so good at keeping still, but I guess I don’t have a choice, huh?”
“There’s always a choice,” he tells me. “It’s just that one of them might end with you having a limp. So at least you know you’re making the good one.” He shrugs. “That’s what I tell myself when I’m feeling that way, anyway. It’s always better to feel like there are options.”
I wonder why he feels trapped, but I don’t ask.
It feels like anything I ask will only wind us closer, and it’s already been such a strange morning.
