Jealous for Orion

1. Orion

Orion

Awaft of citrus, spice, and freshly showered skin blows into the room, trickling into my olfactory region and activating base parts of my brain.

I keep my eyes fixed on my phone screen and don’t look up.

Familiar footsteps approach, bare feet padding on timber, coming to a stop near where I’m sprawled on the couch.

“How do I look?”

There’s a smile in his voice. The burned paper of smiles.

Slow, with singed edges that ripple to create something quirky and way more attractive than it should be.

A smile I know so well that I don’t need to look up to see it.

It exists in my mind as a permanent fixture, no matter how many times I’ve tried to erase it.

I let my gaze drift from his feet to his collarbones before dropping it to my phone again.

“Depends,” I say, sniffing dismissively. “What are you going for?”

Burned paper crackles and chars. If I had a better sense of self-preservation, I wouldn’t ask questions like this.

I’d say, “Fine,” and that would be that.

The problem is, I love how he answers my dumb questions way too much to miss out, even though I made a firm decision to stop doing that shit a while back.

He raises a shoulder and shows me the broad palm of one hand. A microscopic flicker of mischief sparks and reflects like a disco ball in his eyes. “How long have you known me, O?”

“Long time,” I concede with a vague clearing of my throat.

“How long?” he demands.

He likes doing things like this. Quizzing me, making me prove that I remember every detail about our friendship like it’s an anniversary or something momentous. I like pretending that I don’t.

“I dunno. I guess it’s been like four or five years now?” We met when we were fourteen and we’re sophomores in college now. I know exactly how long it’s been since we met, almost down to the day, but I don’t want to give him the satisfaction of admitting that.

He plants a hand firmly on his hip and raises the other to point a no-nonsense finger at me. “You know damn well it’s six years, Orion…and you also know that you don’t need to ask what look I’m going for. It’s always straight-up-slut-show, baby.”

Because God hates me, Jordan Slater doesn’t mess around with standard gray sweatpants when he dresses to host a hookup. Nah. My guy doesn’t stoop to the basic bitches of slut gear. There are no shapeless garments made of bulky knit fabric in this home.

Jordan’s sweatpants are made in Japan. The fabric is butter soft and falls like a dream.

The drawstrings are intricately woven and a little thicker than those you typically find in the US.

His pants taper at his ankles and hang low on his waist. Like really, sadistically low.

So low that every time he moves, or keeps still, or breathes in or out, my heart slams in anticipation that this is it.

This is the time his sweats slide down his hips, land in a puddle on the floor, and blow up my whole life.

I give him an unenthusiastic thumbs-up. For good measure, I pair the gesture with a subtle twist of my mouth that makes me look nonchalant. I know it does because I’ve practiced the expression in the mirror to be sure. “In that case, you look fine.”

It’s true. Jordan does look fine. He looks more than fine.

He looks pretty close to perfect, actually.

He isn’t perfect, but he looks it. I’ve known him long enough to know for sure that he isn’t without flaws.

He’s human and messy and fallible like everyone else.

He’s impulsive and too loud in the mornings.

He hardly ever knows where his car keys are, and to the world at large, he’s a fuckboy extraordinaire.

I’m not saying he’s not a fuckboy. He is.

But there’s more to him than that. He has strong opinions about the world and the changes needed to make it a better place.

He can’t be made to conform, and he doesn’t follow the crowd no matter how great the pressure to do so.

He’s capable of delivering bruising insights and bursts of such astonishing emotional intelligence that it can be jarring.

I guess you could say he’s an evolved fuckboy.

“What time is she coming over?”

I don’t bother to ask her name. I used to. I used to keep track of things like that and torture myself with details. I don’t do it anymore because I’m almost completely over my little fixation with Jordan.

I am.

I’m on the road to recovery, and I’m doing well.

“She’ll be here in a few minutes.”

I haul myself off the couch, throwing my legs off the seat and pulling myself up with a grunt.

“O.”

When I don’t answer quickly enough for his liking, Jordan repeats himself several times, his voice growing more guttural each time he says it. “O. Oh. Oh!”

“Don’t call me O like that, dipshit.” I glare at him in mock annoyance. “How many times do I have to tell you that it makes you sound like you’re about to nut?”

He raises a smug brow and throws me a look that reminds me that he is, in fact, about to nut. Just not with me.

I lose my train of thought briefly but quickly recover.

His chest rises and falls with thinly veiled exasperation. “It’s been six years, Orion.”

“Huh?”

Some of his cockiness dissolves, stretching the curve of his smile into a long line, though enough remains for his expression to stay perfectly on brand. Cocky and smug enough that it makes it almost impossible for me not to smile too.

“We were fourteen when we met, and we’re twenty now. It’s been six years.” The pointed finger is aimed at me again. “And don’t you go forgetting shit like that.”

The doorbell rings before I have time to reply, and Jordan heads down the hall to answer it. I scoop up my phone and laptop, scoffing quietly to myself at the irony of how wildly impossible it would be for me to forget meeting him.