Chapter 11
Lennon
“So that’s pretty much it,” Connor says once he’s shown me the living room, kitchen, bathroom, and the bedroom that’s on offer.
For good measure, he shows me his bedroom too.
He goes into his room. I don’t. I stand in the doorway and crane my neck as I give it a once-over.
I’m not sure why he’s showing me his room, but I suspect it’s an attempt to sell me on the apartment.
An attempt to show me what can be done with four walls, a ceiling, and a little imagination.
The apartment is small and boxy. The rooms are exactly as big as they need to be to fit the necessary furniture and not an inch bigger.
The space has been designed to be functional above all else.
It should be entirely lacking in character, but it isn’t.
There’s a ton of art on the walls, and the shelves dotted here and there are all groaning with things.
Small things, big things, interesting things that don’t go together but somehow still manage to look curated.
Antique trinkets and vintage objects that tell a story.
It’s nothing like what I was expecting.
I expected bland. Beige, with a family or team photo here or there.
Photos in those basic black frames you get in bargain bins or reject stores.
I expected a jock-approved blue quilt on his bed.
Maybe blue tartan, or a broad stripe, at a push.
Instead, I’m faced with this: a nice rug on the floor, a jewel-toned kantha on the bed, and a large, sensual painting hanging over it.
The painting is good, and that upsets me.
He isn’t supposed to have good taste.
The whole apartment is such a stark contrast to what I imagined that it throws me completely. I have less of a clue now about what to say or how to behave than I did when I arrived, and that’s saying something.
I sure as shit didn’t know what to say or how to behave when I got here.
I follow him back down the hall to the kitchen, taking care not to get too close to him.
The kitchen is a small room that looks more or less like it should, except for the charm lent to it by jars of spices and preserves arranged on an open shelf and the large container with an assortment of wooden spoons and spatulas.
He offers me a soda, and I take it, mainly to stop myself from asking where he keeps his fabric softener.
He smells nothing like powder. Nothing like lavender.
That throws me too.
When he’s cracked open a soda for me and poured a glass of water for himself, he leads me to the living room. An L-shaped sofa has been pushed into the corner and a low-hanging pendant casts a soft glow over the coffee table. It makes the space feel slightly crowded. Slightly too intimate.
He sinks into the sofa, angling his body so he’s leaning against the arm and giving me his undivided attention.
I take a seat as far away from him as possible.
He’s wearing a gray T-shirt today. It’s the kind of shirt that should be fitted.
The sleeves should be snug on his biceps and chest, but they aren’t.
They’re loose. His hair is neater than I’ve ever seen it.
If I had to guess, I’d say he ran his fingers through it a few minutes before I arrived.
“Tell me about yourself,” he says.
It takes a moment for me to decipher the question and remember that I’m here under the guise of becoming his roommate. It isn’t an odd question. It’s perfectly normal given the circumstances.
“Uh, not much to tell. I’m from around here, and I work at the university.”
“Wait, so you don’t go to school here?”
“No. I’m twenty-four.” I say it like a kid who’s six and proud of it. Fuck alone knows what’s going on with me. “Student services. I work in the housing department.”
To my credit, I manage not to sound proud of that at all.
His brow creases. He looks perplexed but mildly interested. “Huh. What’s that like?”
“It’s…” I search my mind for a word to describe it, and eventually land on, “Interesting.”
He laughs, a laid-back, throaty sound with a husk in it. “That’s a funny way of saying you hate your job.”
“It’s…yeah. No. It’s not great.” His lips turn down in a frown and his eyes fill with so much compassion, I can’t stand it. “It’s fine though. It’s not forever. It’s just for now.”
His head bobs thoughtfully. Supportively. I’m not sure which. “What do you want to do instead?”
He’s a nosy shit, overly concerned about everything and everyone, and that annoys me. But given how much I know about him, it seems only fair to give him something. “Can I let you know when I figure it out?”
It’s not a great answer, and if he were more discerning, he’d have follow-up questions.
He isn’t, so instead, he says, “Sure. I’d like that,” and looks at me exactly the same way I’ve seen him looking at the barista at Crema.
The same way he looks at the jock and the redhead.
The same way he looks at everyone.
I consider telling him he’s wasting his time trying to make me feel important because I’m immune to that kind of crap, but it seems like the sort of thing that might alarm him, so I don’t.
“I’m from here too. We moved here when I was eight and…” His voice drifts and fades to nothing. He sits forward in his seat. His eyes go strangely unfocused and his head tilts slightly to one side. “Holy shit, you’re good-looking.”
What?
My jaw drops, and I don’t move. Neither does he. I flick my eyes around the room, checking to see if anyone else is here, and I’m being pranked. I spot nothing out of the ordinary.
Seconds tick by, and he doesn’t say anything to retract the statement or qualify it. He just sits there, calm as you fucking please, as he lets his words settle.
It’s too much. Too weird. I can’t take it. My heart’s been pounding since I got here, and now my palms are sweaty as fuck too. This guy is nothing like he’s supposed to be, and it’s pissing me off.
“Did you mean to say that aloud?” I ask, a little louder than intended.
Laughter bubbles out of him in soft, gentle ripples. Tiny blasts that make light bounce off his teeth and his cheeks. His eyes slide closed for a moment, and when he opens them, I expect to see embarrassment, or an apology, or an explanation at least.
“No. Not really,” he says with an easy shrug, “but it’s true, so I’m not mad about it.”
I blink furiously and eye the door.
“Are you homophobic, Lennon?” he asks mildly. “Because if you are, this roommate thing is a nonstarter.”
Annoyance flares, ripping the seam of the thin facade currently holding me together. “No! Of course not. Havi’s gay. Of course I’m not homophobic.”
“Who’s Havi?”
“My best friend.”
“Huh,” he says. “Good to know.”
The way he says it irritates me. Like he’s not sure if I’m telling the truth.
“I’m not homophobic,” I say again, with meaning.
This time, he nods and gives me a fractional smile. “D’you have a girlfriend?”
“No.”
“Boyfriend?”
“No,” I reply, a little quicker.
“Okay,” he says quietly. “Well, I don’t mind if you bring people home, as long as they’re not here all the time. A couple of nights a week is fine, but space is a little tight for more than two people to be here on an ongoing basis.”
“Girls,” I correct, and to be on the safe side, I add, “You can have whoever you like over. Doesn’t bother me.”
“Gee, thanks.” He says it as though he’s sincerely grateful, but a thread of amusement in his voice takes the piss out of me.
He raises his chin slightly and considers me.
I still can’t tell if he believes me about not being a homophobe, and that, along with the smile, bugs the shit out of me.
“I have a few questions for you. Is that okay?”
Good. Great. Yes. Good idea. Let’s change the subject and work through his ridiculous list of prospective roommate questions. Then let’s get me the fuck out of here and as far away from him as possible. “Shoot.”
“Are you always this”—he waves a hand in a circular motion in my direction—“intense?”
I’m not expecting the question, and it gives me pause initially, but I quickly realize that I like it.
I love it. I recognize it in a strange, distant way that makes me think that maybe this is it.
This is what I need from him, this is what I’ve been looking for.
I need him to know I exist, that I’m out here, living my life as he lives his.
I want him to know that, and be uncomfortable about it. I hope I unnerve him, and I hope my existence makes him as uncomfortable as his makes me. I’m glad he finds me intense. I hope he finds me intense as fuck. It gratifies me in an awful, pathetic, deep-seated way I can’t explain or control.
“Why?” I ask, matching his smile and adding a hard twist of my own. “Do you find me intimidating?”
He leans back on the sofa, legs spread casually, posture morphing—disappointingly—into the posture of a man who isn’t intimidated by me, and who likely won’t be at any point in the future.
My heart sinks.
“Lennon,” he says quietly and not unkindly, “I looked death in the face and lived.” His expression is calm and nonthreatening. Honest and open. My blood runs cold and starts to curdle. “Hate to break it to you, bud, but it would take a lot more than you to make me blink.”
From there, something like peace, or defeat, washes over me. I slowly come to accept that whatever it is I want from him, it isn’t something I’m going to get. What I want isn’t possible because it doesn’t exist.
I let him tell me about himself and only half-listen.
He tells me he used to play football, and that he’s an only child.
He tells me he wants to be an antique dealer after college, and that he’s planning on working at his dad’s store.
I know about the football, and his family, obviously, and I know his dad owns an antique store, but I didn’t know he wants to work there.
He says he likes early nights and staying home. That doesn’t surprise me a bit.