Chapter 15
“Do it like…that braid.”
I pause in the middle of pulling up my hair and look at Jesse over my shoulder.
He’s lying against the headboard, not even pretending to do anything besides stare at me performing the most mundane of tasks.
All this attention could be unsettling, maybe should be, but after learning how hard he tried not to look, and for how many years, it makes me feel… warm.
“What braid?”
“The one that starts high at the top of your head.”
“You mean, a French braid?”
He shrugs. “You had it at PNW GameCon, three years ago. On the second day of the expo.”
“Oh my god.” I laugh. “There is no way you remember what my hair was like at some random con, let alone on which day.”
He simply blinks at me, a hint of a challenge in his eyes.
I turn, hands on my hips. “Okay. What was I wearing?”
“Jeans and a white T-shirt.”
He’s right. The funny thing is that normally I wouldn’t remember what I was wearing, but that day FlyButter took a team picture, which currently hangs in our headquarters’ entrance. I pass it every time I take the elevator. “Do you have an eidetic memory, or…?”
“Or.”
The unsaid is almost explicit: It’s only when it comes to me that he’s been storing up details for years, cataloging every piece of available information, hoarding them like small treasures.
I lean against the dresser. “What other clothes of mine do you like?”
He doesn’t have to think it through for very long at all. “You own a dress. Striped.”
“Pink and white?”
He nods.
“What do you like about it?”
“It’s lovely.” He shrugs, like that’s all.
And then adds with a self-effacing, almost sheepish smile, “It’s a little shorter and tighter than what you usually wear, so it made me…
Things happened, when you wore it.” I have no idea how to reply to that, which is just as well, since Jesse continues with: “But I like all your clothes.”
I smile and face the mirror again, sectioning damp strands of hair for the braid Jesse asked for. He requested so nicely, after all. And I don’t mind playing DJ for him. In fact, the idea makes my heart beat twice as fast.
“Do you think it’ll work out?” I ask distractedly. “Limerence 3. FlyButter and Nephilim?”
He nods without hesitating. “It will. I’ll make sure that it does. I’ve been wanting to work with you since I first saw your portfolio.”
I turn around but keep working on my hair. “It was you, wasn’t it? That interview where I met you…You were the one who picked my résumé out of the pile, not your boss.”
“That guy wouldn’t know talent if it ran him over on the highway.”
“But you do?”
Jesse shrugs. “It doesn’t take a practiced eye to see how brilliant you are.”
I am tempted to glance away and minimize what he told me—but he’s right. I am good at what I do. Instead, I say, “I have another dress.”
Jesse doesn’t comment on the abrupt change of topic and waits for me to continue.
“It’s pale yellow and orange. Longish.”
“I don’t remember that one.”
“You wouldn’t. It’s a bit too dressy for conferences or work. But I was thinking of wearing it for Chelsea’s ceremony.” My cousin. Who’s marrying his former college roommate. Jesse’s in the wedding party—just like I am.
“I look forward to seeing it.”
I pick up a hairband and start tying the end of my braid, thinking that in the next few months we’re going to be meeting quite a lot.
Work. Family functions. The thought felt like a nightmare a couple of days ago, but…
no longer. Not at all. I walk to the bed, and a moment later he’s pulling me into him.
“Hey,” he murmurs against the skin of my throat.
I smile into his hair. Just a little. “Hey.”
During dinner, I reach a major realization: Jesse needs to stop staring at me like that, or everyone is going to figure out exactly what’s going on between us.
I don’t habitually care much about what my colleagues think, not when it comes to my personal life, but considering that Limerence 3 is at stake, a romantic relationship between lead designers feels like something better kept close to the vest. Would the publisher consider it a liability?
Would they fear a messy breakup and subsequent delays in development?
Would they strip the lead designer title from either of us?
I have no idea. The thought does worry me a little, but it’s hard to work up a lot of anxiety, especially after spending the perfect day with Jesse.
I can’t get over the simplicity of it. We spent a few hours fooling around and talking about video games, the places we’ve been and the ones we want to travel to, how lonely it was for him to grow up as an only child and how irritating for me to have a million siblings.
“It sounds fun,” he said, thumb sweeping over my cheekbone. “Always having people around.”
“That’s the problem: There was always someone around, making noise. I didn’t fully comprehend the concept of silence until I was in college. You remember the way my family sounded at the engagement party?”
“How could I forget.”
“That was all day. Every day. For eighteen years.”
He smiled. “Sometimes chaos is better than silence.”
“Yeah?” I snuggled closer. “What were your parents like?”
“Gone, for the most part. I was on my own a lot. But there were pros, too.”
“How so?”
“Let’s just say that I got to play lots of age-inappropriate games from a young age.”
“Please, tell me you weren’t playing Grand Theft Auto at seven or anything like that.”
“Oh, Viola.” A brief kiss. “You know I can’t do that.”
We took a nap, Jesse curled around me, which warmed me up fully for the first time since coming here. When we woke up, the first thing I saw was his sleepy, happy smile, as though he couldn’t imagine anything better than finding me next to him, and I couldn’t help tracing its contours.
It just…fills me with immense joy. Being with him. Telling him things. Waiting to hear what he’ll say back. Being reminded of his existence.
Still, he should focus on his salad, or on the conversation that Ashley and Kai have been trying to rope him into—anything but me, because whenever I feel his eyes on any part of my body, I can’t help but stare back.
“We might get stuck here,” Mike is saying at our table, squirting ketchup on his fries. “If it doesn’t stop snowing. Not sure what’s going to happen weather-wise, the forecasts have been kind of hit or miss.”
We are scheduled to leave the lodge tomorrow night. Normally, I’d loathe the prospect of being kept from the cozy quiet of my apartment for a few more hours, but not this time.
I risk a glance at Jesse. Who is, of course, still staring at me.
Oh, well. We exchange a small, private smile, and it’s not the end of the world. No one notices, and no one cares, even as my heart nearly explodes.
“What time are we supposed to leave?” Shannon pours some more wine into her glass.
“Around five or six p.m. If the roads are accessible,” Mike says. “We’re kind of snowed in as of right now, but the plows will be running soon.”
Shannon clasps her hands together. “So what you’re saying is, tonight may not be our last night here. But it also may be.”
“Correct.”
“We need to figure out something extra fun, then.”
I scratch the tip of my nose, and the smell of Jesse is suddenly here, all around me. It’s delicious. After we get back to town, I’ll go to the grocery store and stock up on his brand of body wash.
“Oooh.” Mila leans forward. “How about we do another movie marathon?”
“Veto on anything Transformers,” Kai says.
“Oh, man.” Ethan leans back against his chair, pouting like a five-year-old.
“It’s for the best.” Shannon pats his back. “I think I saw the Indiana Jones DVDs.”
“Good one.”
“I haven’t seen Temple of Doom in years.”
“Okay, but we’re not watching Crystal Skull, right?”
“God, no.”
“Still better than Transformers.”
“Oh, shut up.”
“Listen—not all Transformers movies are created equal—”
“Viola,” Mila interrupts, stealing a fry from Mike’s plate. “You okay with Indiana Jones?”
“Oh.” I smile, sliding my chair back a few inches and rising to my feet. “I’m tired, actually. I think I’ll go to bed early today.”
Ethan frowns up at me. “You’ve been in bed all day. Are you sick?”
“Nope. Just a small headache.”
“I thought those bad migraines stopped when you started those meds?”
“They did.” I pick up my empty plate and fork. “I don’t think that’s what I have. I just need to catch up on sleep.”
“How many hours can one possibly sleep in a day?”
I bite the inside of my cheek. “I’ll count and report back?”
“I get it, though,” one of Nephilim’s programmers says through a mouthful of focaccia. “The mattresses here are so fucking comfortable.”
“What—no! They’re way too soft. It’s scoliosis waiting to happen…”
I sneak away from the table as the lumbar-health argument heats up, quickly disposing of my dirty plate and grabbing a bottle of mango juice to take upstairs. Behind me, I notice Otto stands by Jesse’s chair, leaning forward to talk to him.
“I’m willing to forget what you said about Fallout and play Red Dead Redemption with you,” I overhear him say. His upper lip is not as curled as usual. “Even though you are wrong. And an idiot.”
When I turn around and head for my room, my eyes meet Jesse’s. There is a glint in them—one I’ve recently come to recognize.
“That’s very magnanimous of you,” I hear him reply right before stepping out. “But no, thanks.”