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I was still scolding myself slightly for sleeping with him, something that I very much should not have done, but at least I got two incredibly nice meals out of it -even if I couldn’t eat one of them at the moment.
Not to mention that he was giving me a ride to all of the apartments we were going to see today. I had spent the morning calling around to the ones I had bookmarked in my phone and managed to get four of them that were willing to meet us.
That in and itself was amazing, considering it was last minute on a weekend, but I was dreading it slightly. Apartment hunting always made me nervous, and this time was no different.
The waitress swung by and James asked for the check and for her to pack up my meal to go. I was confused as she took my plate away, but my brain belatedly supplied that this was one of those fancy places that made your to go box for you.
Crazy, I thought that was just a thing in movies, and yet there it was right before me. I had a feeling that was going to happen a lot if I continued to interact with James. He really came from a different world from me, didn’t he?
Granted, I was still leery of his help. It would be so easy for him to troll along with me, saying he’d do this and that, only to disappear in a flash. That was the nature of people after all, always looking out for themselves first. Not that I could cast stones, considering that I had run out of an entire city and given up on contacting him to protect my own interests
“You ready to go?” He asked once the waitress returned with my food, packed all nice and neat in a box.
“Yeah,” I answered softly, trying to hide how my hands were shaking slightly as I grabbed the box and slid out of the booth.
Thankfully I wasn’t entirely to the waddling part of pregnancy yet, so I was able to walk somewhat normally as I followed along behind the towering James. I wondered if he would be around to see me get to that point or would duck out the first time I puked.
I didn’t know, so I supposed I would have to wait to find out.
Shrugging to myself, I hopped into his car. This time it was me who punched the address in and we were on to our first location.
“So, what made you pick this apartment?” He asked as we drove along, brick building after brick building whirring by. Apparently, St. Louis was the brick capitol of the world, or at least that’s what people told me. It wasn’t like I had researched that myself. “Is it near your work? Does it have a view?”
How did I explain ‘it was fricking cheap’? I had a feeling that someone like James wouldn’t really understand, so I baked up a reason that sounded at least demi-possible.
“It had utilities included and enough room for the baby.”
“Sounds reasonable enough.”
“Uh-huh. That’s me. Reasonable.”
He laughed at my little mini joke and I could only hope that his sense of humor kept on once we saw the place. I had never realized that hanging around a wealthy person could stress me out so much even when I enjoyed his company. I just found myself wondering if the things I liked or was used to would be irritating or unacceptable to him.
I should have never agreed to this, but it wasn’t like I could backflip out of his car and alley-oop into the atmosphere. So, I kept my nerves down until we reached our first stop.
“Is… Is this it?” James asked, sounding genuinely surprised as we pulled up to a tall but very skinny apartment building that looked like it once might have been popping in its hay day, but the ruthless progression of time had long worn at its edifice.
“Yup,” I said, forcing my voice to be arch and bright as I slid from his car, which -by the way- was possibly the nicest car in the entire neighborhood. “We should make it quick though. You don’t want to leave a ride like that alone for too long around here.”
He just raised his eyebrows, so I hurried to the door before he could think of how to phrase the question that was probably cooking in his mind.
I reached the front door and pulled out my track phone, half hoping that the man I was supposed to meet wouldn’t show up, but sure enough, he answered after one and a half rings.
“Y’ello?”
“Hi, it’s Nicole. I’m here for one of your apartments.”
“Ah sure! I’ll come down. I’m down in the basement working on the washing machine.”
“Oh, there are washing machines on site? That’s cool.”
