Hudson turns, his eyes narrowed in our direction as if he suspects every word she says.
“She is the customer,” Aspen prods.
Hudson rolls his eyes but takes a step away. “Fine, but I’ll be back and I’ll keep my eye on you the entire time.”
I give him a two-finger scout pledge.
As soon as Hudson is out of earshot, Aspen leans in, her voice raised in excitement. “Okay so give us all the deets.”
These questions are so invasive, but they’ll never give in. “I’m serious. He’s an okay guy. I just don’t know what to talk about when he’s around and expecting conversation.”
“You have boy brain!” Marissa yells and a few nerds turn in our direction.
“What?”
Aspen nods her head. “Yup. I’ve seen it before when it comes to this group. Boy brain is when you clam up around hot guys. It gets to the best of us, Amanda. Don’t feel bad.”
“I’m a happily married woman. Ryland is hot,” Marissa says nodding her head. “You’ve seen him. But yesterday there was a moderately hot guy at the checkout down at the café under our apartment. I was flabbergasted. He was so hot. Not a normal hot, but bad boy hot. Bad Boy Hottie leaned in and was all ‘how you doing?’ I totally clammed up.” She shakes her head in embarrassment. “I did the whole stupid girly giggle we’re ashamed of and said ummm, but with forty-four thousand more m’s at the end. It was so embarrassing.”
“It’s not the same thing,” I protest, finishing my breakfast, closing the container, and putting it on the tray sitting on the coffee table.
“It’s the same thing,” Simone argues.
Marissa and Aspen both chime in with the fact they agree it’s the exact same thing and start sharing times they said dumb shit around someone cute.
No one understands the problem isn’t I say dumb shit around Hudson. It’s the exact opposite. He is cute, but I don’t find it difficult to have a conversation with him. The opposite. While it’s odd having somebody in my space, I find his company comforting in a weird way. I can’t explain it. Sometimes it feels like he’s always been there, eating my favorite chips from the bag or not recycling the orange juice carton properly. He’s meshed himself into my life and my space so well I barely remember what it was like before he was taking up my space. Still it doesn’t mean Hudson is anything more to me than a bodyguard.
I love my friends, but they are absolutely boy crazy. Each of them found their someone special, and they knew right away. It won’t work the same for me. I need someone who can be my best friend. Someone who is okay spending a Friday night in watchingThe Walking Deadon television, and someone who loves my guinea pigs. Hudson strikes out on all three of those ideal male qualities.
We share nothing in common. Hudson isn’t a guy who sits around the house doing nothing most of the time, and for some reason he’s scared of Cupcake and Ginny. He refuses to hold them. The pigs weigh at most a pound each, yet he acts like they are going to claw his face and poop on his shirt. I guess they might. They are guinea pigs, after all. The pig part is more applicable than you’d imagine.
But, really, I mean what man in his right mind is scared of guinea pigs? Especially a big guy like Hudson.
If it wasn’t for those three issues, I could totally jump his bones. Well, I don’t possess the ability to just jump on him — that’s more of a Marissa thing — but I’d try to flirt more. Do something.
I haven’t dated anyone since the DJ. Science could probably tell me why, but for whatever reason I am attracted to men who do not have their lives together. The guy was almost thirty and still trying to get his basement band to strike it rich. Kudos to them for sticking with the dream and all that, but also, it’s time to grow up. My friends found these highly accomplished men who own their own mega businesses or invest money or whatever Grant does for a living. Is it so horrible to wish the same for myself? I don’t need a mega millionaire, but someone who has a checkinganda savings account would be nice.
6
“Sooo, what did you think of the girls?” I ask Hudson as I push my key into my apartment door.
The key sticks and I’m forced to pull it out and put it in correctly before I get the door unlocked. It doesn’t help that I do everything while facing Hudson with an annoyed expression rather than keeping an eye on the lock. Before he got here, I didn’t lock the door. I mean we have a code to gain access to the top floor and my only neighbors are Marissa and Ryland. Neither of them will break in and steal my stuff or kill me. But Hudson refused to leave for Sunday brunch until I locked the door behind us. I had to dig around to even find my key. He’s worse than one of my brothers.
“Are they always so… loud?” he asks when I finally get the door open and walk inside, not waiting for him.
I laugh. “Yes.”
Cupcake and Ginny squeak loudly in their cage, the sound carrying through the whole apartment. Thank goodness Ryland has never asked to visit. I’d be screwed.
I turn, intending to go right for the fridge. These two have me trained. “Do you want to feed the guinea pigs?” If Hudson gets to know them, hopefully he won’t be so anti-guinea pig.
He looks as if I’ve lost my mind. “You want me to feed them?”
With my head in the fridge, I open the crisper and gather up a handful of fresh veggies. “You take the romaine lettuce and drop it through the top of the cage.” It’s not a complicated process.
“Romaine? What, they’re too special for regular lettuce?”
I rip off two pieces of lettuce from the stalk. “No, real lettuce gives them gas.”
