The expression he gives me is hard to read and I turn away, a lump in my throat. “We’ll need some butter,” he says, pointing to it on the refrigerated shelf. “Get a good one while I sort out some cheese.”
My hand hovers over the assortment. A good one. Like I have the faintest idea of what that means. The most expensive? The best value? I pick one with a gold foil wrapper because it appears the nicest.
At the automated checkout, he swipes a card through without even looking at the total on the screen and I wonder what it’s like to be that wealthy. There isn’t a day when I don’t know exactly how much is in my bank account. What I can afford. The much larger list of what I can’t.
When he picks up the bag, I realise I’m staring and blush, trying to skip ahead, but Zach pulls me back and curves his free hand around my waist.
After a day spent labelling me as the new school slut, I don’t understand this change at all.
Back home, he shoos Finley and Rosa out of the kitchen and appoints me as his sous-chef. A laborious appointment forhim,since it means he has to explain everything he wants doing.
Peeling the potatoes, I can handle, but some of the other terms are beyond my comprehension. But he seems to enjoy explaining things, his voice warm as he talks me through the most basic of tasks.
Even in our woefully inadequate kitchen, he pulls together enough equipment to get everything done to his satisfaction.
The meal is ready at an impossibly late hour, but no one complains as we all sit around the dining table for the first time and set to work.
“I’d ask for the recipe,” Finley says with her mouth full and eyelashes fluttering, “but there’s no way I’d be able to make this.”
“You’ll just have to stay on Zach’s good side,” Rosa says, tapping my foot with hers. “Then he’ll come over and cook for us again.”
“Didn’t realise I was on his good side to start with,” I mutter, but that just confuses my flatmates—welcome to my world—so I smile and nod instead.
“We’ll do the dishes,” Rosa says, nominating herself and Finley when we’re all replete. “And you two can relax in the lounge.”
“Or the bedroom,” Zach says, pulling me up from my chair. “Thank you for the lovely conversation, ladies. I’ll see you again on the way out.”
They’re so charmed, I’m annoyed. Something he easily reads from my expression as he shuts the door, trapping me inside my room with him.
“Ready to give up yet?”
Give up what? This charming and attentive version of Zach or the merciless killer who held my face tight while he ordered me never to contact him. The man who lined up his friends to embarrass me in front of the entire class or the doting boy who cared enough to make sure we enjoyed a home-cooked meal tonight.
“No.” When he puts a hand near my face, I flinch, and he takes it away again. “Sorry.”
And now I’m even more annoyed because what doIhave to be sorry for? He’s spent the day trying to destroy my reputation at school. No, strike that. He’ssucceededin destroying my reputation and I’ve got another four un-turn-downable requests yet to go.
But he looks so… sad about something. I think of what he said about his mum and feel awful. If I could just understand for a minute what was going on, I could respond in kind. Be good for him. Or be far worse if that was appropriate.
Zach frowns at the wall for a minute, then shakes himself. “I’ll have something better for you next week. Give me your number.”
Better for whom, I wonder, then halt. Better for him, of course. Could there ever be any doubt? I pull out my supermarket bought phone and send him a quick text. His eyes stare at the tiny device with complete and utter puzzlement.
“What’s that?”
It feels superfluous to state the obvious, but I don’t have another answer. “My phone.”
“Aren’t you allowed a proper one?”
“Allowed?” I nibble on my thumbnail and it’s my turn to stare at him with confusion. “What d’you mean?”
His eyes move from me to my room, almost bare of any comforts. The bedspread is a cheap and cheerful duvet that I got on special, and doesn’t match to the bedraggled curtains, or the battered dresser that I got at a garage sale at the end of the street.
A faint hint of colour washes into his cheeks, then he shakes his head. “Don’t worry. See you tomorrow.”
With that, he walks out of the room, takes a moment to banter with my roommates, then heads out the door.
“Could I order one of those in my size?” Rosa says to Finley’s encouraging giggle the moment he pulls out from the drive.
