He laughs with a shake of his head as she drops her open laptop onto his lap.
“Please and thank you,” she says, her voice sing-songy and saccharine sweet.
While she pulls Tripp’s hair through a fine-tooth comb and carefully trims off the ends, I watch pictures of half-naked werewolf-looking dudes, aliens, and cartoonish people scroll by on the laptop.
“What’s all that?” I ask with a nod in the direction of the screen.
“It’s Stuff Your e-Reader day!” Julia tells me far too excitedly.
At the confused arch of my brow, Tripp explains, “It’s the day that I get an email every ten seconds because my wife won’t stop downloading digital books she’ll never read.”
“I— will get to them eventually,” she insists, using the handle of her shears to smack against the back of his head.
With a doubtful shake of his head, he scrolls through, clicking on book after book.
Excusing myself, I stop in the kitchen to pull another one of my beers from the refrigerator.
I spend enough time here and keep enough groceries here that I may as well be a full-time resident. It isn’t like they haven’t offered, on more than one occasion, at that. It’s always a tempting offer; cheap rent, roommates I know that I already like and don’t have to vet, a fully-stocked garage where I would be able to store and fix up my bikes.
The only caveat that comes with it is that I’d be living with a married couple.
No thanks. I’d rather not be involved in the fighting or the making up afterward. I’d like to avoid becoming a tool to help fix what breaks during those fights. I’ve seen that show already with an old pair of roommates, and I’d pay double my current rent to avoid ever having to deal with that mess again.
I shudder at the memory of them as I return to the living room, where Julia is attaching a guard to a set of clippers and Tripp’s face is twisted into something between confusion and horror as he looks at the screen of the laptop.
“Shifter?Knotting?” He asks. Pivoting in the chair, he turns to look at her with his face twisting into concern. “Baby, what the hell is knotting?”
“Don’t read the descriptions,” she tells him with an embarrassed giggle, waving him back toward the laptop in front of him. “Just click.”
“So he just sits there and what, buys you books while you tell him what to do?” I laugh, dropping onto the couch and leaning into the cushions as I take a sip from my beer. “You’re a princess.”
“The books are free,” she argues, “and any princess-ing I do is Tripp’s fault for treating me like one.”
Both of them laugh – an empty, hollow laugh, and Tripp’s finger hovers for a moment too long above the cursor before he finally presses down to click on something.
Julia’s clippers hang millimeters from Tripp’s head, just for a second before she sucks in a breath and swipes them through his hair to polish up the back of it.
My eyes move between them at the shift in the energy filling the room, then to Koda, who is watching from a safe distance as Drumstick climbs through the nooks and crannies of his cat tree in the corner of the room.
“Well, that got uncomfortable,” I comment, and Julia visibly deflates.
The energy in the room struggles to return to normal after that, even through frozen pizza and a few more beers. The only brief moment of reprieve comes from Drumstick chasing Koda around the coffee table and subsequently up the stairs, more than likely with the intention of trapping him in the bathroom.
I think the little freak likes the acoustics in there when the dog cries.
“Koda,” I call up the stairs, and he comes trotting down after jumping over the cat, his clumsy baby-deer-like limbs nearly giving out on him as he lands.
“You’re welcome to stay,” Julia offers. “The couch is still just as comfy and we have plenty of extra blankets.”
A look passes between her and Tripp – a conversation without words.
Married couple stuff.
“I’m okay,” I say with a shake of my head. “It’s just a twenty minute walk, no big.”
Using his head to gesture toward Koda, Tripp says, “Will he fit in the Forester? I can drop you.”
“No you can’t, you’ve both been drinking,” Jules argues. As if worried that she’s somehow offended me, she perks up and moves to meet my gaze. “I can totally take you, though. I insist.”
