7. Lizzy
“So this iswhat the inside of a dude’s bedroom looks like.”
He gives me an odd look before rolling his eyes. “Like you haven’t seen the inside of a dude’s bedroom before.”
I shrug noncommittally.
I’m the first person to admit that I haven’t dated much. Ergo, I haven’t had the opportunity to get inside a guy”s room, let alone his house. Who wants to?
Boys are gross.
I did my best not to stare when Brodie walked through the downstairs of his house, but seriously—shit is scattered everywhere. Not literal shit, obviously, but their things are lying around: clothes.
Bags.
Hockey sticks.
Soda cans.
Plates on the coffee table. Mugs.
Shoes—lots of shoes and boots. A pair of what look like football cleats?
Other sports gear, like the baseball bat leaning next to the front door.
An umbrella? That’s…unexpected. Even we don’t have umbrellas at our place, but now that I’m thinking about it, maybe we should? I hate walking in the rain.
The downstairs of the boys’ house is cluttered—like they have one too many people living here, and I wonder for a second if there are actually five bedrooms or if they’re sharing. Five hockey guys in bunk beds would be hilarious. Crap. What if Brodie’s room is as bad as their shared living space is, and I have to spend the next…I don’t know, twelve hours here?
The horror.
All the bedroom doors on the second story are closed so I cannot verify how messy those are, but I breathe a sigh of relief when Brodie opens his door, and I get my first glimpse inside. Pleasantly surprised, I step through the threshold.
“Oh thank god you’re not a slob,” I remark as Brodie tosses my cute overnight bag on the floor next to the couch, and I don’t take a seat because what I want to do is immediately snoop.
I know, I know. It’s rude to blurt out whatever pops into my brain, but if we’re going to be roomies for the night, I need the lay of the land and to know if anything is lurking. I’m not sure how exciting I find this misadventure, being here with him. Little bit of the unknown mixed in with a bit of spontaneity—the jury is still out how this evening will go.
“Thanks for not thinking I’m a slob?” his low voice growls and he continues to stand near the bed, and if he thinks I didn’t notice him kicking a pair of sneakers under there, he’s wrong.
Ha.
I begin a slow walk around the bedroom as if I were the first detective on a crime scene. Most of his clothes are hanging in the closet—more than a few hoodies are hanging haphazardly off the hangers, threatening to fall to the ground. A round white laundry basket on the floor, filled. Beside it, a few pairs of sneakers.
Brodie watches as I snoop.
Television on the wall adjacent from the bed and at the foot of the bed, a loveseat. He can’t just sit on the bed and watch TV, he has to have a couch in his room?
Guys, man.
There is no dresser but then again, it doesn’t look like he needs one.
His bed is mostly made, the dark navy quilt is pulled mostly over the pillows.
Twopillows, not four, like I have on my bed.
Brodie is a minimalist which doesn’t surprise me as he seems to be a guy of few words, speaking only when he has something to say. If the roles were reversed and he was skulking around my bedroom, I’d be nervously rambling nonstop to fill the silence. I know myself. That’s totally what I’d do.
Desk. Lamp.
Computer chair.
It’s all very basic and what one would expect. Therefore I’m bored and plop myself on the loveseat, which is a small version of a couch with room for two and not much else.
Brodie stands rooted to the same spot he’s occupied on the floor since I marched through his door, near the closet, watching me as if I’m so out of place in his bedroom he doesn’t know what to do with himself. Or like I’m an accident he’s just driven past that he can’t take his eyes off.
Either way, he looks uncomfortable.
I look down.
Still in my robe. “Shit. I should change, eh?”
He nods robotically.
I raise my brows. “Do you mind if I change in here?” I have no way of knowing how gross or clean their bathroom is but I’ll go out on a limb and guess that it’s disgusting. There’s probably pee on the toilet seat.
“In here? Yeah, no problem.” He continues to stand there immobile, not moving.
I stare.
Is he going to leave or am I going to have to ask him?
“Alone?”
“Oh shit. Right. Sorry.” He shakes himself out of his stupor. “Right. Sure I’ll wait outside or whatever.”
God this is awkward.
This was probably a bad idea but it’s almost too late now although he’d probably be hella relieved if I left and went back to my house.
Brodie leaves the room, leaving me alone and I go to my bag. Unzip it. Riffle through and find the shorts and tank I brought since it’s cool but not cold—warmer still in this bedroom—and undo the sash on my robe, slipping out of it in a hurry.
Not that I think he’s going to come busting back in without knocking but you never know. I don’t know this dude or if he’s in the hall standing guard or in the bathroom or kitchen and I have no idea if one of his roommates is going to bust in.
I pull the white tank top over my head, pull on the shorts. Rooting around in the bag I find my brush and go to work on my hair, brushing my long brown hair into a straight sheet. It’s still damp but not uncomfortably so and once I’m done I give my roommate a call.
I hit Video, and it begins to ring.
Might as well do this now since I have a moment of privacy.
“Jeez, finally,” is the first thing I say when Bethany answers her phone. “Took you long enough—I could have been dead in a ditch somewhere.”
“Sorry, Jon and I ended up going to the movies. He hates when I’m on my phone.”
I roll my eyes at that but get it; I get annoyed with people who have their phones out in the dark theater, especially if they’re within my view and I can see the screen glowing the entire time.
“Has Mark called you back?” I want to know as I pull on a pair of fuzzy socks, then step into a pair of pink slides. I’m not taking any chances walking on this floor barefooted.
Ew.
“Of course not, he’s an asshole and he doesn’t give a shit whether we live or die.” She laughs. Then she squints at the phone. “Wait. Where the hell are you?”
“At the neighbors.”
She scrunches up her face. “Which neighbors?”
“I don’t know. The yellow house—Jill dated one of these guys for a minute.” I take a lock of my hair and begin twisting it around my index finger as I explain. “I’m with some guy named Brodie; he’s letting me chill in his bedroom.”
I cringe at my choice of words. Some guy?
Another rude comment.
“Brodie?” Bethany emphasizes his name as if trying to place him. “Who’s Brodie?”
“He lives here.” I shrug. “He was on the porch when I came outside after the squirrel came through my wall.”
“Wait. What?” Bethany shouts. “The squirrel came through your WHAT?”
I click the volume button on the side of my phone and lower the volume. “The wall. It came through my wall. I literally texted you all this. It was an SOS, everyone was wayyy too busy to help.”
“Go back to the part where a fucking squirrel busted through your wall,” my roommate demands.
“I was laying on the bed in my freaking robe with a towel on my head and I heard scratching and then I went to look for where the sound was coming from and pushed back my clothes and he was looking at me and I was looking at him and then I lost my shit.”
“Oh. My. GOD!” she shouts again. “I told you! I told you so.”
“So humble,” I murmur sarcastically. “I love the fact that you’re never going to let me live this down.”
“I told you this would happen,” she says again for the third time. “I just didn’t think it would happen to you.” She takes a breath. “This is your karma.”
“My karma?” I shout back. “This is not karma.”
“It is,” she tells me indignantly, the know-it-all. “You didn’t believe me and you wouldn’t listen and now you’re out on your ass running for your life.”
Running for my life.
So dramatic—she should get with Brodie and together they can form a band.
“I don’t even believe this. Hey Jon, guess what?” Her voice gets muffled when she turns her head to call out to her boyfriend. “Lizzy has a squirrel in her room.”
“Stop it. She does not,” I hear him say from somewhere in the background.
“Oh she sure does.” Bethany looks back at the phone. “Did you get any pictures?”
“No I didn’t get any pictures!” How would I? Also, I’m not crazy.
“How funny would it be if you took a selfie with the squirrel in the background?” My roommate laughs, not even the least bit sympathetic. “Or like, made a TikTok.”
I chuckle at the thought. “Okay that would be kind of funny.”
“Oh my god, like, if he was on the dresser ready to pounce and you took a selfie where your eyes are like, wide open and he’s in the background like AHHH!” Bethany makes an AHHH face, mouth open, eyes wide—pantomiming what could only be the actions of a cartoon squirrel. “Hilarious.”
“Staging a photo might be going overboard.” We’ve gotten so off track. “I need you to send Mark an SOS, not that he’s going to rush over but it would be nice not to have to move into the house next door.”
Bethany pulls a face. “Don’t they have like, six guys living there?”
“Five.”
“Still. That’s a lot. Is it messy?”
“The downstairs kind of is.” I shrug. “Brodie’s room isn’t bad considering he wasn’t expecting guests.”
I go to his desk and look around the surface, at the hockey schedules he has printed out and pinned to the corkboard—the pens he uses. A sci-fi paperback with a bookmark sticking out halfway through.
“So this dude was outside when you went over and he did what? Helped get rid of the squirrel?”
“No. He started screaming like a girl and came flying out of the room; we ended up opening the window from the outside and now we’re just waiting for it to jump out if Mark can’t get here first with his pest control guy.”
“How did you get the window open from outside? Isn’t your window like, ten feet up?”
Not really. “More like five but still too high for me to reach. He had to boost me up.”
“Boost you up?” Her brows raise. “How?”
“With his hands?”
“On your ass?” she drawls. “Kinky!”
I roll my eyes. “There was nothing kinky about it. He was lifting me because he’s strong, and we don’t have a ladder.”
Honestly, she can turn something innocent into something sexual. She’s worse than a teenage boy.
“But you said you were in a robe. Or were you not in a robe?”
“I was definitely in my robe.” And well aware of my nakedness while he was boosting me up, but I don’t mention that to her. The last thing I need is filling her head with ideas. She’s already a pervert.
“So your ass was in his face and he lifted you up so you could prop your window open and the squirrel’s buddies can come join the party.”
Basically.
“My ass was not in his face.”
“Do you think he would have told you if it was? No. He would stay silent so he could stare up your crack and your vag the same way we would do if a man was wearing a kilt.”
That makes no sense.
None.
“And now the house is wide open, and anything could climb in for the party of the year.”
Party of the year? “Why do you have to go and say shit like that? No other animals are going to get in the house.”
“Duh. Because they’re already living in the walls.” She pauses. “We should sue.”
Did I mention Bethany is pre-law and loves talking about torts and laws and the injustices of the world, of which there are far too many to list?
“You would want to sue the landlord.”
“Have you never read the renter”s rights?” She’s laughing, and I see Jon in the background, and it looks like he’s slurping noodles from a large, white bowl. Ramen?
“Who the hell reads renter’s righ—” A knock on the door interrupts me. “Yeah?”
“Is that him?” Bethany whispers loudly as Brodie’s bedroom door cracks open and his face appears through a three inch gap.
“Uh.” Pause. “Is, um, everything okay in here?”
“Yeah.” I feel myself frown. “Why wouldn’t it be?”
“Uh.” He clears his throat. “Because it’s been like fifteen minutes and I wouldn’t mind changing into pajama pants.”
Has he never heard of a six-step skin care routine?
Sheesh.
Then again, this is his room not mine and he’s doing me a favor, so I have no cause to be salty or high-maintenance.
“Is that him?” Bethany asks, interrupting us. “He has the best voice, have him say something else,” my roommate croons as if he’s not standing four feet away listening to our every word. “Deep voices are my weakness.”
I hope her boyfriend isn’t listening too because Jon most certainly does not have a deep voice, the poor fella.
“Hi, Brodie!” Bethany begins yelling through the phone, directing her comment to Brodie, trying to get his attention. She’s even flailing one of her arms as if he can see her. “Hey, neighbor! I’m Bethany!”
Oh jeez.
I put my hand up to stop Brodie from stepping any closer, and avert my phone so she can’t see him. The last thing I need is her getting romanticizing the situation and I can one-hundred percent hear her telling him we should hook up while we’re holed up—it’s something she would do and I don’t need it said out loud in front of the poor guy.
“I’m hanging up.”
“But I want?—”
“Bye!”
I cut her off—then end the call—text her almost immediately, in all caps: TEXT THAT BASTARD MARK AND TELL HIM WE HAVE A SQUIRREL TRAPPED INSIDE THE HOUSE.
Her: You asshole, you hung up on me!
Me: I didn’t need you trying to chum up with Brodie. He’s shy.
Her: You’ve known him 2 minutes, how do you know he’s shy.
I just do.
But I don’t argue. I just need her to text and call our landlord because he’s not responding to me.
Me: Sorry what I meant was I DIDN’T NEED YOU TO SAY ANYTHING EMBARASSING
Her: Puh-leez when am I ever embarrassing?
Me: Literally all the time.
Her: It’s good for you to have me around. Live a little.
Me: CALL THE LANDLORD
I throw my phone onto Brodie’s blue bedspread so I’m spared the rest of any conversations with my roommate and glance up at the guy who unwittingly found himself helping me.
“That was my roommate,” I explain. “I was checking in with an update.”
He nods, stepping into the room, hands in his pockets the same way they’d been outside when we were discussing our options.
“What did she say?”
Good question. I can’t exactly tell him she wanted to know if he was staring up into my ass or my cooch and she loves the sound of his voice (though he likely heard that), shamed me for not reading our state’s renter’s rights, or that she brought up suing our landlord for…what, I don’t know.
“She’s going to keep calling our landlord and see if she can get ahold of him.” I’m not sure how to make myself at home here; where to stand or sit now that he’s back in the bedroom, hogging up all the space with his size.
Brodie crosses the room and goes to his closet, my eyes trailing along after him, watching when he pulls a pair of blue and white check pajama bottoms off a hanger, then a tee shirt. Then he turns toward me.
Oh.
Ohhh. “Should I leave?”
“I can go do my thing in the bathroom.”
“You shouldn’t have to go a different room to change because I’m here. I’ll go to the bathroom,” I reason. “Plus I have to pee.”
I groan inwardly. I have to pee?
WHY AM I TELLING HIM THIS? Who tells a guy they have to PEE?
Me.
I say that. And it’s not like I’m trying to get Brodie to like me or anything; and I’m not trying to impress him. And I sure as hell am not flirting.
“I’ll um, go to the bathroom and let you do your thing,” I say, already halfway out the door. “Uh—which way is it?”
“Next door on the left.”
“Got it.” I give him a thumbs-up, my awkward meter shooting up to an all-time high. I need to be stopped before I say or do anything stupider! Thank god for small favors.
Sticking my head out of the bedroom door, I glance to the left, then to the right, checking for roommates or boys or whomever might be lurking, though I hadn’t heard any other voices while I’ve been here so the coast is clear.
The bathroom is exactly as one would expect in a houseful of dudes, not tidy, not clean, not organized.
I shudder, glad I’m wearing both socks and slides, and search around for cleaning solution before I sit my ass on the toilet, and find a bottle beneath the sink. The boys have no paper towels around so when I spray the toilet seat, I have to use toilet paper to wipe it off, particles of it sticking to the bowl and surrounding area—not that I care.
This is the cleanest that this toilet has undoubtedly been since they moved in!
I avert my eyes while I pee, not wanting to look into the tub—or at the floor in front of the toilet where the laminated tiles are surely covered in urine.
Gross.
Not that girls are any better; the bathroom my roommates share upstairs has so much hair, hairspray, and dust that you could draw on the countertops with the tip of your finger and leave a message. And the sink is always clogged.
But the urine on the floor? I can live without it.
I finish, wipe, flush, and wash my hands, fluffing my hair while staring at my reflection in their dirty mirror, splash drips from the faucet streaking the glass. Then my gaze grazes the shelf under the mirror and I can’t help noticing one…
Two.
Three retainer cases.
“Don’t do it,” I mutter to myself as I eyeball the hot pink one. “Don’t touch it, that’s gross. And it’s none of your business.”
Plus it’s gross and the containers themselves probably have a shit ton of germs on them, and DNA, and I don’t have to add my fingerprints or my DNA to them, too.
But why are there three of them?
Are they retainers or mouth guards?
Wait. Don’t hockey players get their teeth knocked out a lot? Could that be what’s inside these containers? Dentures?
Ew, what if it is!
Brodie has all his teeth—at least it looks like he does—not that he’s smiled at me once, which is weird, right? That he hasn’t smiled? He’s been so broody.
I muse about it as I open the medicine cabinet in his bathroom and peer inside, curiously looking at the items on the shelves. Pain reliever, hot cold patches, Band-Aids. Floss. An empty toothpaste tube.
One gold hoop earring. A floral scrunchie.
A tampon.
“Interesting,” I muse, closing the cupboard, done with my snooping.
Don’t bother looking left and right in the hallway, assuming it was empty, which is my mistake because the second I swing open the door, I’m greeted by a surprised face.
A big, strapping guy lingering in the hallway. He’s not as big as Brodie, but it’s close, and he is shirtless, and I don’t know where to look. Where do I put my eyes?
Not down.
Not at his chest.
“Who the hell are you?” he blurts out, straightening his posture and visibly shocked to see me walk out of the bathroom. “Sorry. I’m working on my manners. What I meant was—hey. Who are you?”
I don’t think now is the time to be confrontational, considering this guy most likely lives here and looks like he’s probably planning to take a shower—but his abrupt question is kind of rude.
“I’m Lizzy. Your neighbor.”
His brows go up. “Lizzy, our neighbor?” He looks me up and down, then around me as if he’s half expecting someone else to emerge. “Not to be rude, but… who let you in?” He clears his throat. “I mean—did you let yourself in the house or did you knock?”
When he moves his arm up to scratch the back of his head, I can’t help noticing that he’s flexing. His bicep flexes once. Twice—and if I’m not mistaken, he’s doing it on purpose.
Do guys actually think we’re dumb enough to fall for that?
What a goof.
I avert my eyes, staring down the hall to break his intense stare.
Who is this guy?
“We have an infestation,” I announce with no hesitation, which sounds better than “we havea squirrel loose inside our house, and it has made itself at home in my bedroom.”
My bedroom.
A horrible thought. He’s back at my place doing god-knows-what, and I’m stuck here with these guys I’ve only just met. A whole house full of them, though I’ve only met two so far.
“You have a roach infestation?” He pulls a face, disgusted at the idea of a roach infestation, and I have to correct him. “That’s fucking disgusting.”
That would be fucking disgusting if that were the case.
“No, no.” I shake my head emphatically, swishing my hands back and forth through the air. “Not roaches. God no. We have a squirrel inside our house, and I didn’t want to be there alone with it.”
“A squirrel? You have got to be shitting me. Those bastards are everywhere.” He says it like no big deal as if it were normal to have one inside a house, or maybe he’s just a chill dude all the time. “My theory is that they’re gunning for world domination starting on college campuses.”
“That’s my theory, too! And Brodie’s.” I laugh and watch as his eyes go from my face, down to my chest—then back up again, making me hyper aware that I’m standing here in a white tank top, no bra, and sleep shorts.
What the hell was I thinking? I could have at least put my robe back on…
But I didn’t.
“Were you wanting to use the bathroom?” I ask, pointing out the obvious since he was obviously about to enter before I came bursting out of it.
“Yeah. But I’m in no hurry.” He leans against the wall behind him, crossing his arms and legs—in no rush.
He’s in the mood to chat. “Who actually let you in to the house?”
That answer is easy. “Brodie.”
His eyes go wide. “Brodie?” He says it like Bro Dee, annunciating each syllable of his roommate’s name. “Brodie let you in?”
“Yeah. Why do you sound so surprised?” I nod. “Is Brodie normally a prick?”
“Compared to me? Naw, he’s a decent dude mostly.” He pauses. “He doesn’t bring chicks home though. Ever.”
“Ever?”
“No. They’re distracting.”
“Distracting?”
“Are you going to repeat everything I say like a parrot?” He laughs. “He thinks girls are a distraction.”
Oh.
“Why?”
The guy shrugs. “Beats the hell out of me.”
I adjust my stance, shifting on the balls of my feet.
“Well. To be clear, he didn’t bring me home. I begged him to let me in.” I laugh, explaining how everything went down. “When I ran out of the house, I saw him on the porch; he was standing outside eating—poor dude was the first person I saw, so he became my target.” I laugh again, thinking this guy might laugh along with me…but he doesn’t.
“Huh. That was nice of him.”
“It really was. Considering he doesn’t know me and we’d never met before today.” I pause. “My name is Lizzy, by the way. Lizzy Campbell.”
His head goes up and down in a slow nod, causing that smooth collarbone of his to do tingly things to my girl parts.
“I’m Sully.”
Sully? “Is that short for something?”
“Sullivan.”
Ah. “My mom has a friend with a kid named Sullivan.”
“No shit?” He scratches his head again, and there go my eyes, tracking the movement of his muscles.
“Yeah—no shit.”
Sully laughs, bringing his arm down. “So you and Brodie aren’t, like, fucking?”
“Are we what?”
“Fucking.” His expression is neutral, so I can’t decide if he’s serious because who the hell asks a question like that to someone they just met? In the hallway of their own house, no less.
“Wow. This conversation escalated quickly—why would your brain go there?” Honestly, how many times has this guy been hit in the head with a hockey stick? Does he have no filter? No sense of boundaries? Lord. “Brodie and I are neighbors—we are not dating, and we’re not having sex.”
“So what if you’re neighbors,” he says nonchalantly. “Charlie was fucking one of your roommates, now that I think about it.”
My mouth gapes open.
He’s so casual about it! As if it were any of his business.
“Well…” My voice trails off as silence fills the hallway. “It was good to meet you, Sully.” I shuffle my bare feet. “Best get back to the room.”
“What’s the rush?” He tilts his head. “You just gonna hole yourself up in there the way he does? Why don’t you come down and watch a movie with us?”
Watch a movie with a bunch of random dudes in their living room, wearing a tank top and sleep shorts? I don’t think so.
“Thanks for the offer, but I think I’ll hang out in there with him.” I point at Brodie’s bedroom door. “Less awkward.”
Sully studies me. “If you change your mind, you know where to find me.”
I actually don’t know where to find him, but I get what he means. It’s not a large house—he’d be easy to hunt down.
Sully smiles, revealing a perfect row of teeth and instantly my mind goes to the collection of colorful plastic retainer containers on the bathroom counter and I wonder if one of them belongs to him.
“Oh I’m sure you’ll make yourself known,” I tease him. “You don’t strike me as the quiet type.”
He grins wider. “I’m not.”
Wiggles his brows.
I roll my eyes. “Oh brother.”
That makes him laugh. “God, you’re cute.” He hesitates. “Are you sure you don’t want to hang out with us downstairs? It would be way more fun.”
“I have no doubt about that, but I’m good. Thanks.”
He’s still in no rush to go inside the bathroom, tapping on the doorframe twice as he slowly walks through it.
“Okay then.” He sure is darn cute. “Catch you around, Lizzy neighbor girl.”
The way he says, ‘Lizzy neighbor girl,’ almost causes me to shiver because when is the last time a guy like this paid any attention to me? Don’t get me wrong; I get asked out all the time. Just not by…big, tall, athletic types who could probably fuck for days without breaking a sweat.
The door begins to close, and he catches my eye one last time before shutting it all the way.
Reluctantly.
I let my back hit the wall. “Oh lord.”
I”m in big trouble if there are more guys like Sully in this house.