I feel like a car whose engine won’t start, sputtering and wheezing as I try to force my words out. “What? Why are you answering the door in a towel? Are you a pool boy?”
“I believe you said it was urgent. So I came as soon as I possibly could, your highness.” Jae counters. He walks down the dark hallway as he calls, “Just sit wherever. I will be right with you.” He disappears into a doorway. Hopefully to put some clothes on.
I am not about to fuck up my only friendship since Grant died because I can’t keep my cool seeing a guy naked. Not naked. In a towel. The tiniest towel I’ve ever seen.I step into the apartment. I have not been in here since it wasmyapartment.
He has completely redone the place in the time since I left. The dining room is painted a dark calypso green. He has a big, dark brown wooden table with metal fixtures and about a hundred books piled on top. Jackets, scarves and totebags strewn over mismatched chairs. His kitchen is a chef’s dream, ofcourse. A stainless-steel gas range with matching hood. A double oven. A state-of-the-art blender, food processor, coffee maker, toaster oven, you name it, arranged neatly on his countertop.
The green cabinets are gone and replaced with sleek, cream cabinets to complement his appliances. I bet the drawers are filled with meticulously sharpened chef knives, unstained silicone spatulas and god knows what else. It’s like a Pottery Barn threw up in here.
It is not the same place I left it. But I notice some things are the same. Cream baseboard, crown molding. An acid washed fireplace. Brass sconces. The French doors that lead to the balcony.
It doesn’t upset me as much as I thought it would. It’s just Jae-ifyed. I sit down on the brown leather sofa. He has it placed over a plush blue rug with a glass coffee table in the center. He has a flat-screen TV hung above the mantle on the fireplace. His remotes are organized neatly on the corner of his table.
I pet a needlepoint pillow with a house on it and gaze around my old living room. It is still quite barren with not much on the walls. Jae emerges from my former bedroom, seemingly now his bedroom, fully clothed this time. A black T-shirt and basketball shorts.I should not be eyeballing the size of his shorts inseam or thinking about him sleeping where I once slept.
His hair is still damp. I can hardly stop myself from daydreaming Jae in the shower, his perfectly sculpted body being drenched by a rainfall showerhead. I imagine what it would be like to place my two hands on his chest. How soft and warm his skin would be.Ineed to snap out of it.
I take a hot, heavy breath as Jae makes his way into the kitchen and starts pulling fresh fruits out of his refrigerator. How is this man hungry after all of that food?
He peels a banana and tosses it into his floor model blender. “Are you done checking me out?” In go the strawberries, raspberries, a splash of coconut milk and honey.
My confidence to confront him is obliterated in the blender with the fruit.
“I wasn’t checking you out.” I stand up and cross my arms.
“Then why are you still here, if not to check me out?” Jae starts the blender and I wish it were me inside the pitcher, getting sliced up into a thousand slivers. I did not think this through. It pretty much seems thatiswhy I’m here.
“Can’t a friend just visit?” I don’t think he could hear me. He pulls two glasses out of a cabinet and stops the blender. I just saw him less than two hours ago.
“You just saw me. Drink up.” He pours me a smoothie and hands me a glass. He walks around me and sits on his sofa, feet on the coffee table, remote in hand.
I muster up all the courage I possibly can and swallow the grassy golf ball in my throat. I hug myself tighter across my chest and turn to look at him from the island, setting my smoothie on the counter.
“Why’d you swipe on me on that app? I didn’t even know you used it.”
Jae looks at me, as if he might be serious for a second.
“Is it illegal to swipe on girls on apps? Are you the swipe police?”
“No,” I huff. “That is not an answer.”
“Yes, it is.”
I huff bigger. “Why did you swipe on me?” I repeat. I need to know the answer, or I will die in this apartment myself. The need to know if he has a genuine interest in me—in the way I do him—outweighs any embarrassment I might have over confronting him.
“Why wouldn’t I swipe on you?” Jae takes a gulp of smoothie.
“That’s what I’m asking you! Why are you swiping on me?” I am growing redder. He’s avoiding my question.
“Don’t worry about it. Drink your smoothie.”
I’m starting to figure out the implication of his avoidance of the question. Even though I desperately want to squash my growing attraction to Jae, I can’t help but wonder what it’d be like if he was attracted to me too. Maybe he should be asking me why I swiped on him.
Jae sits there quietly. Either he was joking and is realizing it would hurt my feelings to do so or heisgenuinely interested in me. Itwouldhurt my feelings if he did it as a joke. Which clearly he must have if he isn’t fessing up after this painfully teenage interaction.
I walk to stand in front of him, my smoothie still condensating on the counter.I give him a masterful, bitchy glare and when he doesn’t answer, I take a big sigh.
“Fine. Don’t answer. Sorry for bothering you.” I cut my losses. I don’t know what I was thinking in the first place.
