5. Billy
FIVE
Billy
RESIDENTIAL EVIL
I’m striding through the shiny waiting area of some fancy-schmancy offices in a downtown skyscraper that I would one day like to rappel off.
After I won the lottery, it was important to me not to just spend or waste all that money. I mean, don’t get me wrong—I put it to good use for good times. But I wanted to do something productive with it as well. As part of my legacy, if you will. After consulting with my family, Declan and Nolan in particular, I founded a startup called the Locker Room.
It’s an escape room meets a fantasy sports camp. To move on from one locked room to the next, you have to score the winning basket or catch the winning touchdown or punch the puck through on a fast break. It’s the kind of place I would have spent all my time at when I was a kid, and it’s been a huge success right out of the gate. So we’re scaling rapidly and opening new locations all across New England. If all goes well, and there’s no reason it wouldn’t, we’ll be all over the East Coast by the second quarter next year. National by the end of next year.
Is it exciting? Sure. Am I nervous? Nah. Do I like making a shit ton of money? It doesn’t hurt. But I was happy before I was a millionaire, and I’m no more or less happy now.
I tip my hat to the receptionist and see myself into the boardroom. All of my executives are already seated. I remove my derby hat and drop it in front of me at the head of the long, impressive oak table. I’m still wearing the pastel pinstripe suit and suspenders I put on when I left my apartment last night. I never used to explain the why s and the what s and the how s of what I did and wore before I got rich. Now that I’m a boss I explain even less. It’s fucking awesome. But if anyone wants to know about the Boston derby I organized last night with a couple of my friends and about a hundred friendly strangers, I would be happy to tell them.
“Good morning, everyone,” I say as I take my seat.
“Good morning, Mr. O’Sullivan,” my team replies.
I lean back in my executive chair, stretching out and stacking my boots on the table. The boots are clean—I’m not a filthy animal. “What’s first up on the agenda today, ladies and gents?”
“We need to discuss the Make-A-Wish partnership,” my chief financial officer says.
I lower my feet and lean forward, resting my forearms on the table instead. “Shoot.”
“The foundation has the budget to pay travel and lodging fees as well as the going rate for the cost of the use of our facilities. But I was wondering if you?—”
I cut him off with a wave of my hand. “No, we pay for everything. They just tell us where and when and whatever they need—it’s on us.”
“That’s very generous and it’s what I figured you’d say, Mr. O’Sullivan. Thank you.”
“What else?” I look around the room. This meeting could have been an email, but I like the face-to-face aspect of it. “Whaddya got for me?”
“The promo event with Make-A-Wish…” says Grace, my chief marketing officer. Or my head of marketing. Or my VP of marketing. Whatever she is, she’s great.
“What about it? What can I do to make it awesome?”
“Will you be attending?”
“Of course.”
“Fantastic,” she says, holding up her iPad. “Will you be…bringing someone? A plus-one?”
I immediately think of Donna. Which is silly. Because Donna and I aren’t dating. But it just seems like the kind of event she’d enjoy if she actually had the night off.
But Grace is eyeing me, like she’s expecting me to bring someone in particular. I shift around in my seat. “Do you…think I should bring someone?”
She clears her throat, looking just as uncomfortable as I currently feel. “It’s entirely up to you, sir. It’s just…I need to know the…um, type of person you’re bringing so I can properly plan for…”
“Oh. Oooooohhhh. I hear ya. You’re concerned about Murph.”
Grace furtively glances around at her colleagues for support before saying, “Not concerned, exactly, no! Mr. Murphy brings a tremendous energy to any event he attends, but it can be?—”
Once again, I hold up my hand, silencing an employee. I’m sure she’s thinking of the last time I brought my boy Michael Murphy to a Locker Room event. He dressed as the mascot for our city’s occasionally great football franchise—a tomcat. There were a bunch of other mascots for other football teams at the event because we were hoping to expand beyond New England posthaste. But pictures turned up online of a big, furry, angry, man-sized cat wrestling with various other man-sized animals, and from certain angles it did look as though he was humping them. So we collectively decided to take a step back until those images are but a distant seventh or eighth page Google search result. And it was a good thing too—made more sense to get a foothold in New England before dominating the nation and then the world anyway.
Still, the last time I saw Murph, he was riding the winning horse, Jeepers Creepers, across the finish line at our impromptu midnight derby and then off into the sunrise, so…Grace is not wrong to have concerns. “I will not be bringing Murphy as my plus-one, Grace. I will be attending said event with a date. An unnamed female woman date of the highest order.”
“Wonderful!” she exclaims, typing something into her iPad. She seems very satisfied with my response, and the meeting continues without requiring my attention or input.
Myself, I am less than satisfied. I mean, I’d be happy to bring my ma, but it would be nice to have, like, one other option who’s not Murph. The girls I’ve hooked up with in the past have lived in the land between 10:00 p.m. and 4:00 a.m. Part of my epic, drunken adventures. My love life, if one could even call it that, is like a vampire. It’s a creature of the night, destroyed by sunlight.
I pull out my cell phone, thinking about finally downloading a dating app, but I find a text from Donna. A daytime text from Donna. What do ya know.
Red: Hi. I have the day off. What are you doing right now?
Me: Hey. That depends. What would you like me to be doing right now?
Red: I need you to meet me at the following address ASAP.
She sends an address in Middleborough, which is, like, a forty-five minute drive from here.
Me: Should I bring anything?
Red: Just come as fast as you can. Be Mark Wahlberg from the movie Fear. I’m a virgin and my parents are out of town. I am inviting you to come to my house. I will probably be lying in bed, virginally, waiting for you. Know what I mean?
Me: Fuck that guy. Fuck all the Wahlbergs. I’m cooler than all of them.
Red: face with rolling eyes emoji Just please get over here and take my virginity ASAP okay?!
I grab my jaunty hat and excuse myself from the unfinished meeting—another perk of being the boss. I do a quick change in my corner office. Various wardrobes are now kept in various locations, including the trunk of my car, mostly for Donna reasons. Because I never know who I’ll need to be at a moment’s notice.
Speaking of—I swipe a Sharpie pen from my desk. Gonna need that for later.
Within ten minutes of Donna’s last text I’m in my Volvo and on the road to Middleborough. Traffic thins out the farther I get from Boston. Buildings give way to clusters of trees. In no time my GPS tells me I’ve arrived, and boy, have I ever. This property is beautiful. The house is too. Well, the landscape is a little overgrown and the house is a little neglected. There’s some peeling paint, and I can tell those windows and doors need to be replaced. But this place has character out the ass. It’s a little rough around the edges, but it’s bursting with potential.
Like me.
Just waiting for the right person to see that potential and take it to the next level.
I really do feel at home in the world wherever I roam, but I have the strongest feeling that I could live here someday. I mean, not now. This place isn’t the party. It’s a vacation from the party. The quiet trip to the bathroom where the music is muted and you splash water onto your face and look at yourself in the mirror to ground yourself.
That’s this place—a place to ground yourself, so you can go back and face the party again .
When I get out of the car I see Donna watching me through a downstairs window as she paces back and forth. She looks anxious. Impatient. Hopefully she’s just super horny like I am since we didn’t get to finish what we started last night.
I take the Sharpie pen out of my pocket and turn around so Donna can’t see what I’m doing. I pull my shirt up so I can write on my stomach, using the car window as a mirror. When I yank my shirt back down and turn back to face her she looks confused. I wink at her. Her expression goes blank, and she acts like she hasn’t just seen me. Like she’s just an innocent, superhot, buxom teenager padding about the house, unaware that a virile, ripped young man who’s totally obsessed with her is about to break the door down and take her virginity. Or something.
I stalk up to the house in my super tight shirt and baggy jeans and bang on the door. “Let me in the house!”
Donna frowns at me through the window next to the front door. “What are you doing?! That’s from the wrong part of the movie!”
“You didn’t specify which part you wanted to play out!”
“I very specifically said in the text!”
“Well, it’s been a long time since I’ve seen the movie!” I’m still yelling like I’m obsessed with Donna the virgin. It’s not much of a stretch—the concept has me pretty worked up.
She rolls her eyes, and I can’t tell if she’s mad or amused by me. “Oh my God!”
“So do you want me to be all sweet now? Like how he was in the beginning?”
“No, this is hot! Keep going!”
“Damn right I’m gonna keep goin’!” I rip my shirt off over my head and reveal that I’ve written Donna4Eva on my abs in Sharpie. Her eyes go wide in a very satisfying way. “It’s me, Mahk Wahlberg, let me in the house! And say hi to your mothah for me, okay?” I do a pretty decent Wahlberg, even though I’m a way better dancer than that guy is and I would be way more famous than him if I gave a shit about any of that crap.
“Leave me alone!” Donna cries out, impressively quivering.
“I can’t. I’m obsessed with youse. I can’t stop thinking about youse. Open the door!”
I hear her unlock the dead bolt. “Just don’t break down the door,” she wails over-dramatically, clearly wanting me to “break down the door.”
I kick the door in. She gasps, one hand covering her mouth, the other hand dramatically clutching her ample bosom. She acts like a cornered animal, whimpers, turns, and runs up the stairs. I chase after her. I could overtake her, but I really enjoy watching her ass shift back and forth in those sweatpants as her legs pump their way up the steps.
I grab at her ass like I’m trying to stop her, but really I’m just grabbing at her glorious bottom. “You’re mine, Donna! Mine!”
“Her name’s Nicole!” she pants. “Yours is David!”
“Whatevah! That ass is mine, Nicole!”
She squeals, and just as she’s about to burst through what I imagine is the bedroom door, she comes to a sudden stop. I stop in my tracks right behind her. I turn her around, thinking that she’s making some interesting acting choices, when I recognize actual fear on her pretty face.
“What’s wrong?” I ask, no longer in character.
She shakes her head and steps aside, genuinely trembling. “You go in first. Okay?”
“Yeah, of course,” I say, a little confused. Is this a trap or something? Maybe her angry protective dad’s in there waiting for me.
Donna’s pressed up against my back, holding on to my bare shoulders.
I open the closed door, peering inside before stepping through the doorway. It is indeed a bedroom. Empty, so far as I can tell. Dusty and clearly not lived in for a long time, but it’s comfortable. There’s a four-poster bed and some tables and ornate lamps. A chandelier hanging from the center of the ceiling.
It doesn’t look strange. But it feels strange. The air is oddly heavy and stale. No, not stale. Like all the sound has been sucked out of it. That surreal, heavy thickness is pierced by scratching from behind another door in the room. My attention snaps to it. Just a normal, brown wooden door.
“Is that door the closet?” I ask Donna, my voice is not echoing like it should in a mostly empty room like this. Instead, all sound kind of drops and thuds into the walls and hardwood floor. I turn and discover that she didn’t follow me into the room. She’s standing at the threshold, holding her hands tightly in front of her chest.
“I think so,” she says meekly.
“Whose house is this?” I finally ask.
“ Mm-mmmine? ”
“Donna, what’s wrong?”
She squeezes her eyes shut and shakes her head, hugging herself.
I hear that scratching sound again and look to the door again.
Fuck this.
I stalk toward that door like I have Door4Eva written on my abs. I’m not afraid. I am Fear. Mark Fear. Or David Fear, or whatever the fuck Wahlberg’s name was in the movie.
I fling the door open. It’s so creaky, it practically screams.
I just see darkness in there. Emptiness. It’s somehow even creepier than seeing a monster.
And then there’s a frantic burst of movement. I duck down just in time. Donna screams.
There’s flapping. Feathers. Cooing. A mourning dove.
I run to the nearest window, open it, and then encourage the dove to fly out of it by blocking the door and waving my arms around. After a few false starts, the poor thing makes it out. I shut the window a bit too hard, adrenaline coursing through me.
The air doesn’t feel thick anymore. Maybe because Donna and I are heaving so much of it into our lungs.
“How did it get in here? I couldn’t open that window the last time I was here,” she murmurs. She’s talking to herself, not me. She looks so flustered and confused.
“Are you okay?”
“That’s what the moaning and whispering sounds were,” she says, still lost in thought.
“Yeah, it was just a—” My mouth snaps shut when Donna locks her wild green eyes with mine.
Suddenly they aren’t crazed with fear, they’re burning hot with desire. She jumps up on me, wrapping her arms around my shoulders and her legs around my waist. She makes high-pitched noises like a starving girl as she kisses me frantically, deeply. The momentum of everything she’s doing to me pushes me back against the wall. I give those round, bountiful ass cheeks a firm squeeze. I did not have creepy old bird-infested house on my sex bingo card, but this is doing it for both of us.
I break the kiss even though she doesn’t make it easy. “I don’t remember Reese Witherspoon being this forward in the movie.”
“Just go with it, David,” she says in a voice that probably wasn’t meant to sound so husky and womanly, but I’m digging it.
“Yes, and …” I improvise, kissing her again and carrying her over to the bed. “I’m gonna take your sweet virginity so fucking beautifully you’re gonna remember it forever, Nicole.”
“Hard—take it hard!”
“I’m gonna take your sweet fuckin’ v-card so fuckin’ hard you’re gonna feel my rock-hard cock pounding your hot, wet pussy for the rest of your life, you naughty girl.”
We fall onto the mattress, but she’s so full of energy she flips over on top of me. “I’m so nervous and scared but also so curious!” she says, all breathless, straddling me and caressing the words I scrawled across my abs just for her.
I reach for her top to remove it, but she bats my hands away and takes it off herself. Donna with her hair up in a ponytail, dressed in a flimsy old T-shirt is the present you’ve been asking for all year. It’s wicked hot when the Christmas present aggressively unwraps itself. She stares down at me as she tosses that shirt away. Daylight floods the room through dusty windows, and it is so fucking magnificent to see her like this. It’s usually nighttime, dimly lit when we’re together. Her pale skin is dazzling. Flushed with pink, and even though it’s warm to the touch, she has goose bumps all over.
She dips down and kisses me hungrily again. Her tits press against my chest, and we both work to unhook her bra. When we do she lets that bra drop. I break the kiss again to get a good look at her gorgeous naked torso when she sits upright. She’s breathing so hard and rocking back and forth on my johnson. Bouncing and jiggling and so fucking hot I might pass out because all the blood in my body is rushing to the part of me that’s dying to be inside her right now. “Jesus fuck, you are so beautiful, Donna.”
“Nicole.”
I reach for her, but she wrestles with me, pinning my arms down over my head as she lowers one breast to my mouth. I accept it hungrily. Sucking and swirling my tongue. I do feel like a teenager. I am so lost in lust for her I have no idea who I’m supposed to be—I just know that I have never wanted to fuck anyone so bad in my life.
“It feels so good, David!”
“You are so fuckin’ hot, baby. I wanna kiss you all ovah. ”
“Yeah, I want that.”
“You want that?” I flip her onto her back so fast and rough, she gasps. Then I nip at the flesh of her waist and lick all the way up and around those mounds of heaven, flicking at her hard pink nipples with my tongue. “You like that, little virgin, huh?”
“Yeah, don’t stop.”
“I ain’t evah gonna stop, baby girl.” I kiss my way down her belly and then yank her sweatpants down, pressing my lips against her warm, wet cotton panties. “Let me in the panties!” We both laugh but quickly get serious again when I lap up the elixir at the sweet, hot center of her. “You taste so good, Donna—Nicole—baby.”
She whimpers and trembles, but in a totally different way from how she was trembling and whimpering a few minutes ago. “No one ever gets me this wet, Billy—I mean, David—only you.”
“Huh? I thought you’re a virgin.” Fuck it, who cares who we are. “I’m gonna eat you out until you beg me to stop.”
“Yes! Tell me what you’re gonna do!”
“I’m gonna fuck your angel pussy with my tongue, and you’re gonna scream my name and oh God so many times you’ll think I’m God.”
“Yeah! Do it!” Then she groans. “Wait. Shit. Wait, stop. I have to finish cleaning the house before the sun goes down.”
“Huh? Your parents makin’ you do chores while they’re out of town?”
“What?” She wriggles around, freeing herself from her pants and panties. “Just take my virginity now—hurry up.” She repositions herself so her head rests on a pillow, clasping her hands over her chest. “But take me however you want me.”
“Yep, that also works.” I pop up, pull a condom packet from my pocket, and then let my jeans and my Calvin Klein boxer briefs—that look ten times hotter on me than they ever did on Marky Mark—drop to the floor. Donna watches me roll the condom on, biting her swollen lower lip and then swallowing hard because her mouth is watering for my cock. “Your mouth is watering for my cock, isn’t it?”
She nods.
“You ready for it?”
She nods, shyly.
“Get on your hands and knees and face the headboard.”
She does.
I nearly choke on my tongue, staring at that beautiful naked ass.
On her hands and knees, she glances over her shoulder at me and bats her eyelashes all innocently.
I tease her entrance, and it’s killing me.
“Hold on to the headboard. Hold on tight.”
She does. When I see that she has a good grip on it, I ram into her. She cries out, but there’s so much pleasure in that sound.
“Good?”
“Yeah. More.”
I give her more. I give her everything I’ve got. Gripping her waist as hard as she’s gripping the edge of the headboard. The posts beat against the wall with a staccato rhythm. The crystal beads of the chandelier above us rattle and clink against each other, but it’s not to the same tempo as my thrusts. I’m aware of that thing that’s pulsing overhead like there’s an earthquake, but the house could split in two and it wouldn’t stop me from fucking this woman.
Her head’s swaying like she’s in ecstasy, but when I grab her ponytail and arch her neck back, that’s when she shudders and screams my name and then spasms around my cock. My name. Billy. I work so hard to keep from coming until after the tornado of an orgasm has ripped through her. I keep going and going and going, sweat dripping into my eyes, until she goes limp for a few seconds.
Then she braces herself again and tells me, her voice hoarse and just above a whisper, that she wants to come again, with me. I give her ass a smack and pull out of her, moving fast, because out is the opposite direction from where I want to be when it comes to her. But we’ve had sex so many times I know she likes to ride me, so I get onto my back and let her climb on top of me. Watching her grip the base of my erection. Watching her lower herself down onto it. Watching her play with her tits as she rocks her hips back and forth and then round and round, slow at first. My eyelids are so heavy and my vision is so blurry, but I force myself to see as much as I can.
Resting my hands on her thighs, I have to squeeze my eyes shut for a minute because everything about this is so fucking good I’m torn—completely torn between the desire to make this last forever and the need to explode and disappear into this wild, furious madness I feel for her today. I don’t know what’s gotten into her, but it’s in me too. I feel her pressing down on my chest. Bearing down on me. Arching her back, her neck. She’s ramping things up.
I spank her ass, real quick, and the surprise sends an intense shudder through her. She clamps around my cock, and there she goes again. With a gentle massage of my chest, she wordlessly signals to me that I can surrender to the storm I’ve been quelling.
I do.
With a howl, I let it tear through me. I’m aware of her leaning back as I empty myself, hot and heavy, inside of her, into the condom, so much that it spills out. I’m aware that the bedposts are still banging against the wall, the chandelier is still rattling. But I can’t hear anything except the muted echo of my roar, like I’m driving through a tunnel in slow motion. This orgasm seems to last forever.
It seamlessly leads me into a deep sleep, I guess. I have a bizarre, vivid dream about the house we’re currently in. A woman lives here in the dream. But Donna and I also live here. And not as roommates. As something more. Way more. But it’s not scary in the dream. Neither is the house. We’re not trapped in it. We’re protected by it.
“It was waiting for you,” the woman says. Her voice echoes in a strange way, the opposite of the thudding in this room.
“For us?” I ask. Donna is next to me, but I can’t see her. Only feel her.
The woman nods and looks past me. I look over my shoulder, but everything slows down. I hear the patter of feet behind. Small feet. And giggles. Kid giggles. I can’t turn enough to see them. Everything is too slow, and then darkness.
When I wake up, Donna’s lying on top of me. We’re both slick with sweat. The room is still filled with soft golden daylight. The chandelier is so still I might have imagined it shaking before.
Now there’s a gentle, quiet stillness that’s so peaceful it’s kind of weird.
For a few seconds, I panic because it feels like something’s holding me down. Not Donna’s body, but some force is keeping me on this bed. I try to move my fingers, but I can’t.
Am I still dreaming?
Donna twitches and then inhales, slowly rolling off me.
I’m able to breathe again. I’m able to move my fingers. “Seriously, what is this place?” I mumble when I finally remember how to talk.
Donna clears her throat. “I inherited it. I mean, it was left to me. By a patient of mine who passed away a few months ago.”
“So you actually own this house?”
“Yup.”
“Oh. Does that mean you’re gonna move here?” As much as I felt some kind of connection to this place when I drove up, I hate the thought of Donna not being my neighbor anymore.
She sighs. “I don’t know. Not any time soon.” She tries to sit up but plops back down. “So that was good, huh?”
“Yeah.” I chuckle. “Pretty good. Bathroom?”
Donna points to an open door next to the closet. I kiss her on the forehead and climb off the bed to clean myself up. The door to the en suite bathroom is already open. It’s huge and in better shape than it has any right to be. I’m starting to see the house a little differently now that I know it’s hers. It’s somewhere between a playground, a project, and a threat.
“So. Big night last night?” Donna asks from the other room.
“Always.” I pop my head out of the bathroom and give her an eyebrow waggle.
She walks over to me, wearing only her T-shirt and panties. Her hair’s so chaotic, and she literally can’t walk straight.
I’m very proud.
“Did you have a hot date?” She leans against the door frame, sounding pretty casual, as if it’s normal for us to be chatting about this kind of thing, which it isn’t—but there’s something strange in her voice.
“Nah, not like that. You know I don’t date.”
“Oh yeah, of course, I was joking.” Great actress, terrible liar.
“Although I do need a date pretty soon. I mean, first there’s my granny’s birthday party and then there’s a PR thing for work.”
“Oh yeah?” She doesn’t ask what work is for me, but I’m pretty sure she still has no idea.
“Yeah. I realized I don’t know how normal people do it. How do you just ask a girl to a thing like that? Like, when you’re both sober? Do you know how to date?”
Donna laughs. A beautiful, joyful sound. “Of course I know how. For me not dating is a choice.”
“I thought it was for me too, but now I’m seeing it’s my only option at the moment.” Why don’t you come with me? is on the tip of my tongue. I almost say it. After all, I’m the guy who says whatever’s on his mind.
But I don’t.
Because if I even ask her out as a joke she could end this.
I turn on the faucet. Nothing happens at first, which shouldn’t surprise me. Water to the house might not even be on. Then the pipes behind the wall start to rattle. Not I’m trying to get going after some years kind of rattle but an I’m angry you’re trying to do this rattle. There’s a whine. No, a moan. That’s the only way I can describe it. A moan coming from behind the wall.
“Whoa,” I mutter. “Have you used the water here before?”
Donna shakes her head. “Not up here.”
All of sudden, liquid starts pouring from the faucet.
But it’s not clear. I don’t even think it’s water.
It’s a deep, purplish red. Holy shit.
It’s blood.
“What the hell!?” I yell.
Donna screams and covers her mouth.
I don’t know why, maybe to confirm what I’m seeing, I turn on the faucet to the bathtub. Blood pours out of it as well, pooling at the bottom of the white porcelain like it’s a scene out of Psycho .
“Billy…” Donna moans, terror gripping her.
I grab her hand, ready to pull her out of there. “Donna, let’s… Hang on.” I sniff the air. “Wait a minute,” I murmur. I get in close to the blood that’s still pouring out of the tap and sniff again. Now I’m sure.
I let go of Donna’s hand and cup a handful of the “blood” to drink it down.
“Billy! What are you doing!” Donna screams.
I smile and smack my lips, calmly turning off both faucets.
“Are you a vampire or something?” she asks earnestly. Not like our role-play but like she’s sure that I am and she’s just crossing her t’s and dotting her i’s before I suck her tits like a creature of the night.
“Donna, is there a cranberry bog around here?”
“Yeah it… Wait. Cranberry juice?”
I nod.
“How on earth would cranberries get into the plumbing system?”
I shrug. “Weird shit happens with old houses, Fischer.”
Donna groans. “No kidding. There’s a lot of weird shit going on here. This place has so much potential, but it needs so much work. And I don’t have the time. Or the money. I mean, I have savings, but I’d have to get a loan.”
I have time and money is what I want to tell her. That gives me an idea. “Let me help you fix this place up.”
“I can’t ask you to do that.”
“You’re not askin’, I’m offerin’. And this is a better place to role-play than your apartment. We can be as loud as we want out here.”
“Yeah, no one can hear you scream,” she says wryly, folding her arms in front of herself.
“But also, no one can hear me make you scream,” I say suggestively. I place my hand over her folded arms. “I vant to fix up your house,” I say in my best sexy vampire accent.
She laughs but doesn’t look convinced. “It’s a very sweet offer, Billy. But it’s way too much to take on.”
A house is nothing . I’d take on the world for you. It’s a silly thought. I don’t know where it comes from, and I don’t voice it. Instead I say, “How’s about we make a deal. You teach me how to date, and I help you with your house. You fix me up; I fix this place up.”
She studies my face, and I watch her consider this proposal from all angles. I love watching her think. “Okay,” she finally says. “Deal.”
“Deal.” I offer my hand, and we shake on it.
This is good. Everyone wins. Donna gets her house fixed; I get tips on modern, normal-person dating.
And if I get to spend more time with Donna, that doesn’t seem so bad.
If Donna maybe gets a little bit jealous thinking about the other women she’s teaching me to be with?
That’s not the worst thing in the world either.