11. Jason
11
Jason
Jason’s alarm rang at six o’clock, just as it always did. But unlike other nights, Jason hadn’t slept a wink. He’d been awake as Hannah had moved around her house the night before, cleaning and getting ready for bed. When she woke up, he heard her in the kitchen making breakfast, shushing her bird every time it squawked, and then closing the front door.
Only then had he closed his eyes and slept a total of thirty-four minutes. He sighed and pulled himself from bed. He’d have to fit in a nap sometime within the day, maybe when he checked into the hotel. For now, there was work to do.
Rueben gave him the day off when he explained the situation. When his grandpa finally announced his retirement, Jason wouldn’t have as much leeway. The other tasks on his list would take more time and more energy.
With the sewage smell still in his memory, he dragged himself to the kitchen to see what he could force himself to eat. With the small townhouse lit up with sunshine, he noticed more of Hannah’s eclectic nature. The sink was full of breakfast dishes and every bit of the counter was full of baking supplies, craft supplies, and... a jump rope. He shook his head and ran a hand through his hair.
He turned and saw a table behind him. Thankfully, it was clean and there was a plate of something covered with plastic wrap with a little note and a key to the house.
He turned the note over and read it.
Thought a little comfort food would start your day off right. We’ll get through this. I’ll be back after my two jobs are done. Make yourself at home.
PS— I made all the citrus-flavored macarons I had ingredients for. Hope you like them.
He lifted the little note and stared at the plate of lemon, lime, and orange macarons.
Despite the mess he was in, he smiled and tried one of the orange-flavored cookies.
“Oh, that’s good,” he moaned, stuffing the rest of the cookie into his mouth. There was a dozen more, and before he could second-guess himself, he sat down and ate them all for breakfast.
Even though it didn’t solve any problem but his hunger, he was satisfied enough to do the hard things—make calls, go back to his house and take pictures, and meet the disaster-cleanup company.
After a long shower, he dressed and walked home.
The cleanup company showed up at eight and started right away. Just as he ordered to have happen, the house was attacked by an army of men. Some tore up the carpet, others cut the drywall up to the sewage line and everything was brought out to his lawn so he could take pictures. When he had done his part, they gave him an estimated completion date, and he headed back to Hannah’s to wait it out.
He tried to take a nap, but his mind buzzed with what still needed to happen next in his unexpected renovation. He paced around the house, making a mental checklist of all he needed to do. Or he tried. The clutter was more than distracting. His mind had blocked it out the night before, not caring about much except a place to hide. But now... it was a mess. So many things on the counter. He opened the cabinets, and everything was just thrown in. There was plenty of space, it just needed to be organized. He opened the fridge and sighed. How had she lived like this for so long? He would’ve gone crazy, and he would go crazy. Before he left, he was going to do his part to help out. Organization was his superpower.
If he couldn’t fix one problem, he’d fix another. He started on the biggest cabinet and worked his way through the kitchen, organizing it how he would have at home. He decluttered the counters once there was space in the cabinets, then wiped down surfaces. He unloaded the dishwasher, loaded it again, and started it.
He saw Hannah’s personality everywhere he cleaned, and it successfully calmed him. He imagined her baking cookies, spilling flour here and there, and not even bothering to stop to clean. She was a bit one-track-minded. He thought about how she’d somehow kept her desk clean at work, but when he had opened her drawer to find a stapler in a hurry, he’d been shocked with how disorganized it was. She had basically swept everything on top of her desk into a drawer to keep the top clean. It hadn’t bothered him at the time, but he now realized that method was her cleaning tactic. Hide messes, shove things into a drawer, and leave out what she needed most.
He took breaks to check the progress on his house, and was amazed to see how quickly the crews worked. When their huge vacs had sucked out all the mess, they power washed the floors and walls with cleanser. When they finished their part, the cleanup company threw his ruined things into a big dumpster and hauled everything away.
His insurance company assured him they were on his case. Those things would take time, and meanwhile, he had central air and heating to replace, construction bids to get, and cleanup to do. He could only imagine the mess the water left behind.
When the insurmountable things he needed to do made him too anxious, he returned to Hannah’s to clean some more.
Just as he opened the fridge a few hours later, to assess the damage, the front door opened.
“Honey, I’m home,” Hannah sang, then giggled. “Sorry, I just had to.”
She came into the kitchen and dropped a few grocery bags and her purse on the table. “What the—” Looking around, she held a hand to her face.
“I... clean when I’m upset. Surprisingly, I actually like the touch of cleansers and rags.” He swallowed down the tight feeling growing in his throat. He could see it in her face. He had done something wrong, and now she was upset. He blazed on, feeling more nervous with each silent reaction. He cleared his throat. “I tried to organize things the way they were, but I probably didn’t do it exactly how you like it. I didn’t check into the hotel yet because I wanted to be nearby the house in case they needed me, but I can go if you’re mad.”
“No,” she said softly. She clapped her hands together. “I actually hate cleaning. I just... I haven’t seen it this clean for a while, and it’s a little shocking.”
He relaxed his sore shoulders and chuckled. “I think you’d get tired of me really fast. I’m glad you’re not upset. ”
“Nah, if I were, it wouldn’t take long for me to mess it up again.”
He raised an eyebrow and shook his head. He looked at the bags she’d dropped on the table. “What are those?”
She picked one of them up and pulled out some bananas. “Groceries. It’s been a while since I’ve gone shopping.”
He had noticed. His stomach growled as she pulled out the food. “Well, I was about to clean your fridge, but maybe I should go check into my hotel.”
“Will you have to do more at your house tomorrow?”
He blew out a slow breath. “Afraid so. I have a few companies giving me bids on tearing out the old drywall and repairing the walls. I hope to pick one tomorrow so they can get started soon. I already took off the next two days.”
“The closest hotel is ten minutes away. Just... stay here until you can go home. It’ll be easier that way.”
“I can’t do that.” He looked around. Her house had been a strange kind of haven over the last few hours, but it could be days before his was livable again.
“Yes, you can. I’m hardly ever home, anyway, and if it helps you to clean and organize, then you’d be helping me too.”
“I don’t know. If people find out . . .”
“Then what? They’ll definitely think I kidnapped you .” She laughed with him. “It’s just for a few days anyway.”
“You promise I’m not putting you out?”
“Not at all. I’m going to cook and then crash.”
“Fine, if you’re making dinner, I’ll keep cleaning. What did you have planned?”
“Hamburgers. I make a mean one, and I make homemade fries.” She looked around. “Although, you might need to tell me where things are.”
He gave her a wide grin. “Will do.”
The two of them moved around each other in the small kitchen, but it was nearly impossible to work in such a tight space without bumping. So instead, he brought things from the fridge to the table, wiped down shelves, and threw things out—though there was a ton of things she refused to let him throw away.
While they worked, he updated her on the progress of his home and she talked about work.
“It was weird without you there. The office was too quiet.”
His hands stilled on a mustard bottle. “Are you saying you missed me?”
There was a long pause. “Sure, I mean I had to eat in the staff room. It was just weird.”
She was hidden behind the fridge door, but he was sure she was blushing.
Did she have feelings for him? Surely, she knew he wasn’t capable of a real relationship.
“Anyway, I feel like Brandy has really gotten interested in the two of us.”
He closed the fridge door so he could see her. “How so?’
“I don’t know. She is just... friendly with me all of a sudden. And she always wants to know how we’re doing.”
He frowned and remembered he hadn’t told her. “I think just as Grandpa wants me settled in my career, she wants me settled in a relationship, specifically with you.”
Her hands stilled on a potato. “Ah, I see.” When he didn’t say anything, she said, “And?”
He grinned and threw an empty container in the sink that needed to be cleaned. “And what?”
She pointed the potato peeler at him. “And... what did you say?”
“Seems like you’re very interested in my love life.” He had said it as a joke, but her cheeks reddened, and she turned away.
“Fine, don’t tell me. What do I care? ”
Frowning, he washed his hands in the sink and got closer. Maybe four steps away, but it didn’t feel close enough, so he took two more steps.
Her eyes widened. “It’s okay, you don’t have to tell me. It’s your life.”
His eyes flickered from her face to her hands and back to her eyes again. “I told her I’m in no condition to have a relationship with anyone. I can barely touch someone.”
The urge was too strong, and he grabbed her hand at her side and held it with both of his. Her skin was rough and grainy from the potato peelings, but it didn’t bother him.
She visibly swallowed. “What about me?”
“What about you?” He stared at her tiny fingers and turned them over in his hands.
“You’re holding onto me .”
He met her nervous gaze. His heart fluttered, and he knew. He liked Hannah. All of her disorganization and crazy schedule and eccentric lifestyle, he liked everything about her. And he especially liked holding her hand. Until he had met her, he had thought he was incapable of holding a woman. His throat tightened with emotion. Already she had helped him through so many physical barriers. “You’re different.”
He tightened his grip around her fingers and stepped closer. It was as if a mental chain connected the two of them, pulling them closer together. Before he knew what he was doing, he’d taken the last two steps, touching the tips of her shoes and making his toes tingle.
Suddenly, the kitchen felt small.
Even though he liked her, he wasn’t sure he could go beyond hand-holding and linking arms. He hadn’t hugged a person in years. Someone’s arms around him felt like needles constantly poking him, and the sensation lasted for hours .
And ultimately, he knew she deserved someone who could give her everything, a life without boundaries.
Just as she covered his hand with her free one, he pulled away, breaking the tension and the physical contact. Needing a distraction, he headed to the fridge and stood in the cool air for a long minute. Then he grabbed something he had been avoiding. It looked like a furry brown three-fingered hand. He picked it up with two fingers and held it out to her in disgust. Luckily it didn’t have a smell.
“Trash can?” he asked.
Her cheeks were still as flushed as his. “Uh, no. That’s ginger, and I use it all the time.”
“But can’t you get some in a spice bottle?”
She shook her head. “It’s better fresh. If you don’t want to see it in the fridge, just stuff it in the vegetable drawer.”
The vegetable drawer had been full of half-eaten things that had gone bad. Despite his aversion to touching things, cleaning up messes was different. In his mind, he was conquering the problem. He sighed and hid the ginger in the back of the empty vegetable drawer.
Cleaning was distracting enough, and using his fingers to clean helped him forget the tingling her skin had brought on. Almost.
By the time everything was cleaned out, her fridge was practically empty, but clean. He wiped down the table just in time for her to bring plates and food. He looked back at the sink and counters and shook his head.
A few messes had returned. Peelings from the potatoes, small piles of flour, and containers open and out on the counter. “We’re going to have to teach you how to clean as you cook.”
She looked behind him and shrugged. “My food might not taste as good if I did that. I can only focus on one thing at a time. ”
He’d noticed. Despite the mess, the air smelled amazing, and he was starving.
“Well,” he said. “Let’s see how good your cooking is. If it’s anything like your baking, I might never move out.” He sat at the table and picked up his hamburger.
She watched him anxiously as he took his first bite.
The meat was tender, juicy, and flavorful. “Wow, that’s good.”
“Right? I cooked a lot when I lived with my parents. It’s the one thing they encouraged me to do, and since my mom liked to clean, it worked out great. It’s practically the only way we connected.”
He raised an eyebrow. Kind of like the two of them, although they shared more connections.
They ate in contented silence for a few minutes. With any other person, it would have been uncomfortable, but with her... he was just happy to be near her.
She was the first to break the silence. “Can I ask you something?”
“Aren’t you already?”
She grinned. “I guess.” She paused. “Do you think you’d ever want to overcome your sensory issues?”
He leaned back in his chair and took his time chewing his homemade fry. “My parents tried. They forced me into things, like soccer. That was a disaster. I refused to come out of my room for days.”
Hannah clucked her tongue. “How sad.”
“But, yes, I’ve thought about it. And I do want to overcome it. I definitely don’t want to be alone forever.”
Her eyes twinkled as she studied him. She stretched her hand across the table, palm up. Slowly, he took it, staring at their fingers.
“I’ve been thinking,” she said slowly, “you’ve made a lot of progress throughout your life. You said it yourself. You wear jeans and other things that made you uncomfortable when you were younger.”
He looked down at his pants. They were soft, stretchy jeans, but they counted.
“And you’re doing better about letting people into your personal space,” she continued.
“Shaking anyone’s hand is still painful.” Her eyebrows shot up, and he clarified, “Except with you, the painful sensations are not there anymore.”
“Ah, but they were at one time, right?”
He thought about the first time he’d met her outside his office. She’d tried to hold his arm, and he’d snatched it away as if he were burned. “Yes, in the beginning, it was similar. It wasn’t until after you burned your hand and I wanted to be there for you that things felt different.”
She squeezed his fingers, startling him. “Remember what the doctor said? Our sensory issues could be neurological. Once we break through the barrier, reverse our thinking, we change how we feel about things. It’s something we’ll always struggle with, but I just keep thinking—you want a chance at a relationship, and you should have whatever you want.”
Their eyes connected again, and the tension returned, even more so when her thumb passed over his skin. He shivered and pulled his hands back to his lap.
“So, what were you thinking?” he asked.
“Something that will pull you out of your comfort zone completely. A few experiments, if you will.”
He swallowed the hard knot of worry gathering in his throat. “And what experiments do you have in mind?”
“Do you trust me?”
He nodded slowly. Yes, actually, he did trust her.
“Well, then, starting Monday morning, we’ll begin. You just have to promise you won’t give up.”
He thought of the possibility of being in a relationship with Hannah. A shiver rolled through him. He wanted that more than almost anything. For her sake, he would never give up. “Okay, I’ll do it.”
She clapped her hands together and cheered. “All right! Be prepared to be very uncomfortable.”