Chapter 3
Jeremiah
Saturday mornings at Iron Temple Gym were my sanctuary. There were no packages to deliver, no tight schedules, no GPS telling me I’d missed a turn. It was just me, some weights, and blessed silence.
I’d been going there for years. It was one of those old-school places where the owner rarely spent a dime on paint or flooring, leaving the whole place looking like a ruined bomb shelter with bench presses and dumbbells.
Today was leg day.
I loved working out, but God, I hated leg day. What sane person didn’t?
An hour later, I was soaked through, my gray tank top clinging to my shoulders.
I grabbed my water bottle and checked my phone. There were two missed texts from my group chat with Sisi and Mateo.
Sisi: Still on for lunch? Mateo’s already complaining he’s starving.
Mateo: I’m not complaining, I’m DYING. Also, Jer better not be late again.
It would take me twenty minutes to get to the diner, and I looked like I’d just crawled out of a swamp.
Me: On my way. Give me five.
Sisi: You better not show up gross.
Mateo: Define gross. Normal human gross or full Jeremiah post-workout, nuclear-odor-bomb gross?
Me: You two are funny. See you soon.
I rolled my eyes and shoved my phone in my pocket, immediately regretting the now-sweat-coated screen.
Nearly a half hour later, I spotted them in our usual back booth, but something was off. Mateo was working through pancakes as usual, but Sisi sat across from him stirring her coffee without actually drinking it while staring blankly out the window.
“Jesus, Jer, you take slimy to a whole new level,” she said as I approached the table, but her heart wasn’t in her usual teasing. “You look like you just wrestled a bear.”
I studied her face. Sisi was never this quiet. Hell, she was never quiet at all.
“You okay? Do you need a hug?”
She recoiled like I’d offered her a live snake. “Ew, no. You’re disgusting.”
Before I could even look hurt, Mateo hopped up and threw his arms wide. “I’ll take it! Jeremiah hugs are the best.”
“Right?” I beamed and wrapped him in a quick, tight hug that probably squeezed half the air out of his lungs. Mateo made an exaggerated “oof” sound but was grinning when I let him go.
“There’s our hugger,” Sisi said, rolling her eyes but smiling for the first time since I’d sat down. “Big, scary delivery man with surprise cuddles.”
“It’s not scary if you warn people first,” I protested, running a hand through my damp hair. “And cuddles are different from hugs. They make me tingly inside.”
“Oh God,” Sisi groaned.
“It’s terrifying,” Mateo said cheerfully. “Like being attacked by a very affectionate bear.”
I glanced down at what remained of Mateo’s pancakes. “A six-stack of processed carbs? Really, dude?”
“Pancakes are fuel,” Mateo protested.
Our regular waitress, Dolores, appeared with coffee. “The usual, hon? Love the shoulders. You should go strapless more often.”
Sisi snickered from behind her mug. Mateo turned away.
“Please,” I said, holding out my cup.
She nodded and disappeared, leaving me with my two best friends. Sisi perked up a little, but there was still something calculating in her expression that made me nervous.
“So,” she said, her voice taking on that dangerous tone I knew meant trouble. “How was your week? Any interesting deliveries?”
Something in the way she emphasized the word “deliveries” made me suspicious. “Just the usual. Packages, wrong addresses, the occasional dog attack. Cuddles is evil.”
Mateo laughed again and shook his head. They’d both heard stories about my nemesis.
“Nothing else? No . . . literary encounters?” Sisi persisted.
“Why are you being weird?” I asked.
“I’m not being weird. You’re being weird,” the three-year-old girl seated across from me said.
Dolores returned with my breakfast. I took a bite, hoping the conversation would move elsewhere. It did not.
“So,” Sisi continued, leaning forward with renewed energy, “Elliot mentioned something interesting about our favorite delivery boy.”
I nearly choked. “Elliot?”
“Yeah, you remember him from Mrs. H’s house. He’s Mike’s man. The lineman?” She watched my face carefully.
Oh. Right. Lineman. Power poles. That guy.
“Okay?” I said cautiously.
“Well, Mike mentioned he’d spotted a certain hot delivery guy visiting the school library this week. He said the drop-off took a lot longer than it should have, and when he stuck his head in to check it out, he found said delivery guy on the floor with our resident librarian.”
Shit. I hadn’t seen Mike, but he’d obviously seen me and reported back to the mafia that was our little family of friends.
Heat crept up my neck.
“I deliver to lots of places. They added Mount Vernon to my route this week.”
“Uh-huh.” Sisi’s grin turned predatory. “And I’m betting you’d love to make a very special delivery to a certain librarian.”
Mateo snorted into his coffee.
“What are you talking about?” I said, but I could feel my face heating up.
Sisi looked toward Mateo and crooned, “From what I heard, our Jeremiah wants to check out more than books. I bet he wants to help the poor man organize his stacks.”
“His what?” I asked, confused.
“You know,” Sisi said with mock innocence, “help him with shoving tomes into all the right places. Maybe show him how to properly handle his rare manuscripts.”
Mateo’s eyes widened as he caught on, and he dissolved into laughter.
“Please stop,” I groaned, but I was fighting back a smile. “He’s a nice guy. We only—”
“I wonder if he’d let you access his restricted section,” Sisi continued mercilessly. “Or maybe you could help him with some late-night indexing.”
“Oh, my God. You’re terrible,” Mateo wheezed. “Besides, wouldn’t that be in-dick-sing?”
Sisi howled.
I covered my face with my napkin.
Dolores arrived, poured coffee, and scanned the table, searching for the troublemaker who had me blushing redder than her picnic cloth apron.
“You.” She pointed a gnarled finger at Sisi. “Be nice. This is a sweet boy.”
“What?” Sisi held up her hands in mock surrender. “I’m just saying our boy here clearly wants to leave butt prints on the checkout counter.”
Dolores shook her head, patted my shoulder, and vanished back into the kitchen.
I buried my face in my hands. “I hate both of you.”
“We’re your best friends,” Sisi corrected, looking pleased with herself. “And we want details. What’s he like?”
I peeked through my fingers.
There wasn’t much to tell, really. Just impressions. Fragments.
“His name is Theo,” I said finally. “He’s the librarian. He has this daughter or niece or goddaughter or random child—I’m not sure. Her name is Debbie. She looks around five. And . . . that’s basically all I know.”
“What does he look like?” Sisi pressed.
“Dark hair that sticks up everywhere. Glasses. Looks like he lives in cardigans.”
“Cute?” Mateo raised an eyebrow.
I felt my face heat up again. “Yeah. Really cute.”
“And?” they both said in unison.
I shrugged helplessly.
The truth was I’d been building up this whole fantasy in my head based on almost nothing. One embarrassing delivery mix-up and one brief conversation at the school. Maybe he was dating someone. Maybe he was straight. Maybe he was just being polite.
“I don’t even know if he’s gay,” I admitted. “I mean, he did kind of stutter when he accidentally complimented my arms and chest.”
Sisi shot Mateo the look one cop gives another when a perp confesses without realizing it.
“Well, there’s only one way to find out,” she said.
“By making a complete fool of myself again?”
“Again? Wait. Go back.” Mateo perked up. “How did you make a fool of yourself the first time?”
I groaned. “I kind of delivered a . . . personal item to his house. His five-year-old answered the door and opened it before I could stop her.”
“Oh my God,” Sisi gasped and leaned forward. “What kind of personal item?”
“The kind that requires batteries and is named after a rabbit.”
They both stared at me for a moment, blinking and processing.
“The kid opened the box while you were standing there?” Sisi asked.
I nodded.
Then Mateo asked the obvious question. “Did she know what it was?”
“No.” I buried my face in my hands again. “I told her it was a kitchen tool used to mix pasta.”
“A what?” Sisi’s voice leaped at least one octave, maybe two.
“She asked, and I panicked. The first thing that popped into my head was . . . kitchen equipment. I’d had spaghetti for lunch that day, and I guess it was still stuck to my brain. I told her the vibrations helped it stir noodles up with the sauce really well.”
Mateo’s mouth fell open.
Sisi’s eyes widened to cartoonish proportions.
“You told a five-year-old that a vibrator was a pasta maker.” Mateo summed up the situation in one pitiful sentence.
I nodded, face still hidden in calloused hands.
“Then she wanted to know what kind of pasta it made, so I said . . .” I took a deep breath. “Rotini.”
That was it.
Sisi completely lost it, doubling over sideways in the booth, tears streaming down her cheeks, making horrible wheezing sounds like she couldn’t breathe.
“ROTINI!” she finally managed to gasp out between fits of laughter. “Oh my God, ROTINI!”
Other customers were turning to stare, but Sisi was beyond caring. She was practically hyperventilating.
“The girl said she liked the twisty kind!” I muttered. “You know, like in fancy restaurants.”
Mateo wasn’t any better than Sisi, clutching his stomach as he laughed. “Dude, you told her a vibrator makes twisty pasta?”
“It might get worse,” I said miserably.
“Oh, fuck. Why aren’t we filming this?” Sisi wheezed.
Mateo fumbled for his phone, but I slapped his hand faster than a Catholic nun with a ruler.
Reluctantly, I looked back toward Sisi. “She wanted me to tell her dad to make pasta for dinner so she could watch the ‘Willie Wee’ work.”
Sisi made a sound like a dying seal and slid down in the booth, completely gone.
Mateo gasped for breath.