“Do you need me to carry you there?”
I am not drunk enough to give him the incorrect answer, but I hear it come out of my mouth on another sob anyway. “Yeeesssss.”
Okay.
Maybe I’m that drunk.
This has happened maybe four times in my life. Because I’mboring.
I can’t see Blurry Theo well enough to know if he’s still watching me like I’m a wounded mountain lion or if he’s looking forward to touching me again.
“I want to be fun like you,” I wail. “I want to drink without crying. I want tolive. I don’t want to feel dirty and wrong and in trouble because I had a reaction to your body in the car.”
He doesn’t say anything while he lifts my arm and puts it behind his neck.
I can’t see him at all. He’s just a big blob of light brown hair and sun-kissed white skin. And solid warmth lifting me like I’m a china doll.
“Am I over your shoulder?” I ask.
“No.”
“I feel like I’m upside down.”
“That’s because your underwear is always too tight. Push the door handle if you want to see the kittens.”
He’s carrying me.
Theo Monroe, the bane of my existence in my school years, is carrying me into a room of kittens because I’m crying because I’m drunk.
“Why are you nice?”
“Because I like to like myself.”
He kicks the door shut behind us while a chorus of teeny-tiny meows goes up.
“They’re so cute,” I cry.
My eyes won’t open wide enough to let me see them. No matter how hard I try, I can’t pry my eyelids open far enough to see all the cuteness. Plus, Theo keeps making noises like I’m not supposed to squirm.
I canfeelthem against my chest. It’s like a nipple-tickling rumble.
But only one nipple.
Just the nipple closest to him.
“Why are you attractive?” I ask.
“Because I’m secretly a god sent down from Mount Olympus to test all of the women to see who’ll look past this awesome exterior to the super cool dude inside.”
I pry my eyelids wider apart and almost poke myself in the eye as I start to laugh while I’m still crying. “I can’t see.”
He heaves a sigh, sets me down, and then suddenly lightning flashes in all corners of the room.
“Stop,” I cry. “No thunderstorms! Make it—oh.Oh.”
He turned on the lights.
That’s why I couldn’t see. The lights were off.
