Chapter Nine
I might not bring shoulders to the function, but I do bring carrot cake.
Mars
Afternoon pushups.
My arms shake as I struggle to complete a fifth push up in the center of my bedroom floor. Eye twitching, I strain, and fight, and lose.
Stupid pushups.
Stupid shoulders.
Why couldn’t they have emerged from the womb fully bulked like Jovey’s?
Even his baby pictures are jacked. While mine are…
perfectly acceptable. Adorable, even. Not exactly male lead material , to be sure.
But, well, no baby is meant to be male lead material.
Unless you’re my big brother, clearly. He popped right out a Fabio, ready to pose for historical romance cover art.
This is an injustice. A genetic malfunction. An affront against me, personally.
Why couldn’t Ceres be a leg girl? I never skip leg day.
I bike everywhere and am fully confident in my thighs.
These noodle arms, however? They do naught but rest against my desk as I edit and maintain the Rouge Empire’s online presence via marketing.
The most vigorous exercise they see is on the days when my delusion suggests I should hand-whip the buttercream frosting for my carrot cakes.
And, even then, I squarely give up roughly two minutes in, wonder what in the world I was thinking, and bring out Old Reliable—my electric hand mixer.
Flopped on the wood floor as I presently am, I understand why Ceres—and book girlies everywhere—wants a guy with shoulders. This…this is pathetic. I cannot princess carry a tall queen like Ceres with these puny limbs.
Puffing hair from my face, I pull myself to my feet, melt into my desk chair, and bring up what I hope will lift my spirits.
As my monitors fill with security footage, I free a tight breath.
“Ceres, Ceres, Ceres,” I mumble, “you have not moved a muscle, have you?”
She remains exactly where she was a few hours ago when I went through my Sunday morning routine—wake up, morning pushups, check on my little goddess, answer emails, respond to social media comments.
Whenever Ceres has a meal, she brings her dishes to her desk and leaves them there for a minimum of five hours. Presently, there are no dirty dishes to be found, which means she has not eaten today, and I’m almost positive all she ate yesterday was her frozen hot chocolate.
“We have got to do something about your self-care priorities, beautiful. You’re worrying your future husband…
” Glancing at my own desk, I find the dirty dish leftover from what was meant to be Jove’s carrot cake yesterday and recognize I haven’t eaten anything since, either.
I clear my throat. “Okay, so we were made for each other, but I need to do better for the both of us.”
With a sigh, I stand, cut my fingers through my hair, and march the stupid plate to the dishwasher.
Upon the counter, untouched, sits the remainder of yesterday’s carrot cake.
Since carrot cake always tastes best fresh, I make a point of only making small cakes.
And I make those small cakes a perfectly reasonable number of times.
Which equates to roughly one cake every other day.
I have been doing this for years.
And, for years, Jovey has his slice with his milk while I have my slice with my chocolate milk.
“What in the world did you do to the poor guy, Ly-Ly?” I murmur, clear my throat, and call, “Babe?”
No response.
“Babe, do you want to have carrot cake breakfast together?” At half-past two….but ignore that.
Silence.
I cock a hip against the marble counter and fold my arms. “I know it’s a super, super rare event, us having carrot cake breakfast together.
” Still nothing. Although this time it makes sense, seeing as we have carrot cake breakfast together so often it’s ridiculous to reply to my suggestion of otherwise.
“Maybe we can shake things up, though?” Maybe I’ll even have normal milk.
Maybe my tendency to never, ever, drink normal milk is why my shoulders did not grow properly. Chocolate milk stunts them.
What an absolutely reasonable and logical thought to have. I’m certain scientific studies have been done that would back my hypothesis tenfold.
Pity that normal milk is disgusting.
Despondent and neglected, I jut my lip, cast off my reasons for not being clingy and bothering Ceres three days in a row, then pack up the remaining cake before grabbing my half-full carton of chocolate milk and heading next door.
Ceres, intelligent as ever, moved her spare house key from the potted plant to a more secure location after I invaded the other day.
Pity for her, I watched her do it. It was so cute, I even replayed the footage about seventeen times.
And I absolutely wasn’t having a breakdown while I studied her expression, searching for any sign that it was a joke, either. What gives you that idea?
Swinging her front door open, I drawl, “Honey, I’m home.”
A sweet little cuss explodes from the living room, and Ceres wheels her chair back so she can look down the long, straight hall toward where I’m standing in her foyer.
Her brows knit. Her gaze cuts toward her kitchen.
I wonder, absently, if she’s considering offering me lemonade again, so I lift my chocolate milk carton. “I brought my own drink this time.”
Her attention fits itself back on me. “Oh.” She blinks. “That’s…great.”
I stalk up the hall, plop the carrot cake onto her coffee table, and fall into her sofa.
It’s the kind of sofa that swallows you up and makes you never want to leave.
Perfectly cozy and warm, her sofa is the shade of damp earth, which ties her home’s main area together and complements the many plants she has swarming among her bookshelves.
Blooming ivies crawl along the back, washing over the armrest on my left in a lush waterfall as I twist off the cap of my chocolate milk.
Ceres looks at the document on her computer, then at me. “It’s Sunday, isn’t it?”
“It is.”
“I thought we started working together tomorrow.”
“We do.”
Two priceless moments pass, then Ceres—my dear, dear Ceres—pushes back a perfect lock of her red hair and scoots back into her desk. “Thank goodness. I’m not done with this yet.”
She then proceeds to ignore me. For fifteen minutes.
I play several games of Solitaire with one of the decks I keep on my person at all times and soak in the peace.
This could be my life.
I could live in this fantasy garden with my beloved Ceres, next door to my dear Jovey and his darling Ly-Ly.
My sweet wife and I could work together until a timer reminds us that food is mildly important for survival, then we could go next door to have family carrot cake time.
It could be just this peaceful and wonderful, always.
Or at least until boredom swallows me whole, and sandpaper scrapes against my brain, whittling it down into a pile of sawdust that urges me to get up, get going, and do something nuts .
Thankfully—since arson is a lovely cure for boredom—Ceres is pro world burning. I’m sure she’d support my efforts to keep wildfires in check with controlled burns.
I might be insane, but at least I’m not stupid.
“Ceres,” I say, and her back goes straight, because she absolutely forgot I was here.
Turning, she finds me, recalls my existence, and ponders again why it’s persisting so close to her. All the pondering results in a guarded, “Yes?”
“I brought carrot cake.”
Her gaze skates from my cards on the couch cushion in front of me toward the plate before she says, “And…?”
Violently, my heart twists in my chest because it occurs to me I do not know whether or not Ceres likes carrot cake, and if she doesn’t? If she doesn’t…what am I going to do with myself?
“I don’t like—” she begins.
My heart stops.
“—cream cheese frosting.”
I’m sure my pupils dilate. “N-neither do I. I use buttercream.” Made for each other. We are made for each other .
Her head tilts until the balance tips and it falls toward her shoulder. “Really?”
I might flush. A little. “Yes. I make it fresh, too, as of yesterday.”
“Huh.” She rubs one shoulder while her head remains off-kilter and stretched away from it. “You’re very good at piping.”
“I’m well-practiced.”
She stares at me for so long I’m sure I’m flushing by the time I manage a very manly , and not at all squeaky, “What?”
“Nothing…just… Picturing you in the kitchen, practicing making tiny carrots out of frosting is…something.”
Good something?
Bad something?
On a scale of attractive male lead material to pathetic slob , please define this “something.” I’ll be in the corner attempting to calm my rejection sensitive dysphoria while you do, thanks.
Helping my anxiety by about negative twelve percent, Ceres’s phone rings, interrupting her ability to answer my unspoken questions as she decides instead to answer it. “Hel—”
A long, high-pitched squeal erupts, forcing Ceres to pull her phone away from her ear. None other than Amelia Christmas screams, “Did you see! DID YOU SEE?”
Ceres’s eyes narrow on the offensive device. “Thankfully, I can still see. Hearing, however, is now lost to me.” Rubbing her temple, Ceres sighs, sets her phone down on her desk, and says, “You’re on speaker.”
“Oops. Sorry. I’m just so excited! Brian has blessed us again! I have a new wallpaper!” Excitement bubbles from the phone. “No, I can’t look at it for longer than three seconds at a time, but that’s not important. Not important at all . Brian is helping me lower my screen time! What an angel.”
“Do I want to know what scandalous images Brian has posted online this time?”
Maniacal giggling rises.
I smile as my anxiety tames. Amelia’s a peach.
“Check your messages,” she says, or demands rather. But in that sweet, graceful, surely not-at-all-demanding Amelia way.
In mere moments, Ceres has pulled up an image on her large desktop monitor of Brian Single wearing a suit and tugging a pink tie loose. Unimpressed, she asks, “Is that a Nerf arrow he’s holding to his lips?”
“Yes!” Amelia squeals.