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“I’ll be down in a few minutes, is that okay?” I ask.
“No problem. See you soon.”
I throw on my shoes and rush down.
“Here you go, sir,” she says, smiling and handing over a white envelope as soon as I reach reception. That was quick. Good thing, too, because the next part is going to take a bit longer.
The closest store with a giant duck is about fifteen minutes away by foot. The inflatable I found isn’t like the one I had in college. That one was the size of a raft that could hold six. This one is one of those single ride-on yellow duck inflatables for the lake or pool. It will be perfect.
I pick up a pump, too, and rush back to the hotel to start on my plan.
First, I grab Ian’s suitcase and flip it open. While I’ve been doing everything I can to get rid of the ones in my bag, he’s been fucking stashing the shit ton of ducks he’s found.
One at a time, I sit them up on the bed to create a giant heart and then inflate the giant duck and put him in the middle. It looks cheesy as hell, but I love it.
From there I work backward, creating a trail from the heart to the end of the bed, but it doesn’t look as good to have the next ones on the floor, so I grab the sewing kit from the bathroom drawer. Ten minutes later and three needle stab wounds on my thumb, six ducks are loosely stitched to the quilt hanging over the end of the bed. It totally looks like they’re climbing up the bed to the heart.
I continue my trail out the bedroom door to the living space, and as easy as it would be to go right to the main door, that’s not me. So I create a path around the living space, use some clear tape to hold some going up the chair leg and down the dining table to the floor, and now I’m out of his ducks and need to grab some from what’s left of my stash. By the time I’m done, there’s a full follow-the-leader line of ducks around the room, starting with a tiny duck on the door handle.
HARRISON: On our way back, sorry, couldn’t stall any longer.
Shit. I grab the envelope and a pen. I rake through my brain, trying to think of something to write.Hey, here’s a job offer, just doesn’t have a good ring to it. Then the perfect thing comes to mind. I quickly writeI’m ducked without youon the front of the envelope, prop it in front of the giant duck on the bed, and then hide in the wardrobe, keeping the door open just a crack so I can watch his reaction.
The hotel room door opens, and he’s already laughing.
“What have you done?” he asks before the door clicks closed. “Is this how you got kicked out of your dorm?” His voice is growing louder. He has to be getting close. “Because I gotta say, this is totally…adorable,” he says, stepping into the doorway ofthe bedroom and pausing to stare down the giant duck. “Are you even sick?”
“Nope,” I say, leaping out of the wardrobe.
He jumps back a step and then lifts one hand, holding a plastic bag with a tub inside.
“Well, I guess you don’t need soup then.”
“You got me soup?” I ask, reaching for the bag. No one has ever gotten me soup before. I mean, my mum did growing up, but none of my exes ever did. I go to grab it, but he pulls it behind his back.
“You aren’t sick, you don’t need it.”
“Aww,” I whine, pouting and fluttering my eyelashes. “If it makes you feel better, when I did this in college, my roommates called me sick.”
He shakes his head. “I stand by my initial assessment. This is totally adorable.”
“So I can have the soup?”
“Here,” he says, handing it over.
It smells amazing, and for a second, I forget that the envelope is the real surprise here, not the hundreds of ducks leading him to our bed. Though, I guess on any other day, that would be the entire point of the plan.
“I have a bigger surprise,” I say, reaching for the envelope. “Open it.”
He turns it over and pulls out the contract. His eyes widen.
“What is this?”
“I’m staying on the team, soUnlacedhas a position open.”
“You are? That’s amazing, congratulations. Wait, are you for real? This is for your job?”
“Three-month trial to start, but you’re amazing, so it’s going to be longer, but yeah. If you want it. My job is yours. Yarro is expecting your call.”
