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That’s when I hear it—a noise.
I freeze and listen for it again.
It sounded like it came from inside my apartment, but no one else shouldbein my apartment.
I look around for Marie, but she must have already woken up and slunk out of the room. The door is cracked open enough for her to get out.
Maybe she’s getting into something in the kitchen. I better go check.
Carefully moving back the blankets, I slide my legs over the edge of the bed, but before my feet touch the ground, I hear another sound—it sounds like something opening and closing. A door?
Marie can’t open doors.
I tell myself it could be a neighbor. I hear neighbors getting home all the time.
The walls in this apartment building are thin, but that didn’t sound like it was coming from a neighbor’s apartment. It really sounded like it came from mine.
Is Calvin in my apartment?
I know he has a key, but I don’t want to go out there thinking it’s him and find out that—by some coincidence—I’m being robbed.
I look around my cramped room for something that could be used as a weapon, but there isn’t much. My writing table and chair, my dresser, Marie’s little lounging bed in the corner. Nothing hard, nothing that could hurt.
My gaze stops on the oscillating fan shoved in the corner. This apartment doesn’t have central air and I roast in the summer. The only thing that keeps me from dying of heat exhaustion is probably that fan.
Which happens to have a long metal bar I could use like a bat.
Decision made, I push off the bed and cross the room to dismantle my fan. I pop the bar out of the base and take off the motor and the blades. Once it’s just a metal bar, I practice holding it menacingly like a baseball bat, then ease my bedroom door open and creep out into the hall.
I hear more noise now including something that sounds like… a sizzle?
What is that amazing smell?
Confused, I round the corner to my kitchen, but just in case itissomeone dangerous, I prepare to swing the bat.
Chef Ryan is standing at my stove, cooking. He turns around, appears startled when he sees me wielding my makeshift weapon, then says cautiously, “Good morning.”
I sag, dropping my makeshift bat to my side and releasing a sigh of relief.
Seeming to realize I didn’t expect him to be here, he says, “Hollis let me in, said you were still asleep. I take it Calvin decided to surprise you.”
“Yes, he likes to do that,” I murmur, glancing at the grocery bags and kitchen accoutrements on my counter. A couple of things aren’t mine.
Chef Ryan gestures to the counter. “He left you a note, it’s in the gift bag.”
I leave my metal bar propped against the wall and walk over to grab the black envelope sticking out of the gold gift bag. It’s a high quality envelope, the fancy kind with rich gold lining like a wedding invitation, but it’s just a personal note card. In what I assume must be Calvin’s handwriting, it reads, “Good morning, sweetheart. I’m sorry I couldn’t be there when you woke up, but I have to work to pay for those lavish dates you so enjoy.”
I roll my eyes at his teasing, then read the rest.
“Chef Ryan is preparing you breakfast and lunch so you can concentrate on whatever else you have to do today. I know how much you dislike cooking.”
Reluctantly, my lips tug upward a bit. I’m glad he isn’t here to see it.
The last of it reads, “If you want dinner, you can come to my place and he’ll make it for both of us. I can send Hollis to pick you up.” Beneath that is a decisive dash and his name, as if this craziness could be from literally anyone else.
Lifting my gaze, I assure Chef Ryan, “You do not have to stay to make me lunch. I really appreciate you making me breakfast, but that’s absurd. He’s ridiculous.”
Chef Ryan smiles at me over his shoulder. “No worries, I don’t have to stay. I’ll prep you a nice salad while you eat breakfast, it can chill in the refrigerator until you’re ready to eat it, then you can just sprinkle on the almonds so they’re nice and crisp, drizzle the container of dresser I make to go with it, and voila. I have to stay anyway to clean up the mess.”
