“Not helping you with that second part.”
“And then carry on with my life. Find a guy who is the opposite of you in every way, you know, in that he doesn’t make me want to vom-gag. And then I’ll get married, have babies, and with my soundproofed walls, it’ll be like you never existed.”
“Thanks for the play-by-play. It’ll come in handy for the biography I’m writing about you:Moaning into the Void: The Penelope Huff Story.”
“Cool. It can be the companion piece for the self-help book I wrote about your life,Repulsing Women: The Jack Craig Handbook. I’ve already sold the movie rights, too.” I wave my hand so he can picture it in lights.
A glance in the mirror by my door confirms that I look just like I did when I sneaked into his apartment: cheeks flushed, eyes bright. And it’s not just my appearance that’s impacted. It’s like my senses are heightened; the colors on my wall hanging are more vibrant, the fire truck siren outside is louder. He hands me a scraper-like tool, handle first. I grip it, but he doesn’t let go, instead staring into my eyes with a smolder that is part annoyance, partsomething.
I swallow.
Sparring with Jack sets my pulse racing. With rage, obviously. Nothing more. I yank the tool away from him.
He lifts an eyebrow and then scoops up a second tool before aggressively stabbing one edge of it through the wall.
I follow his lead.
We work side by side, me in my yoga pants and a tank top, him in joggers and a faded green T-shirt. At one point, I try to squeeze past him but fail to calculate for the sofa at his back. My breath hitches at the slide of my thigh against his, the heat of his chest against mine. Stuck between Jack’s body and the wall, I freeze and tip my chin up, my startled eyes meeting his inscrutable ones. He sets a steadying hand on my hip. I’m enveloped in the crisp, woodsy scent of pine forests and something decidedly Jack. The intense urge to press my nose against his chest and inhale is mortifying.
You do not like him. Not physically. Not his personality. Not anything. He might not be a cheater, but he’s still a dick. And he doesn’t smell like a pine forest. He smells like cab air freshener.
“Hands off me.” The bite in my tone is jarring even to my own ears.
“Reflex. There is literally nothing I want less than my hands on you.”
“Super! We finally agree on something.” My voice is chipper, but I want to swing my stabby tool at his head.
He grits his teeth as I press on past him. “Next time, go around the sofa,” he says, his voice strained.
I clamp my jaw shut and continue chipping away at the never-ending debris coming out of this wall. I catch him watching me one or two times after that, though I’m not sure if he’s dissatisfied with my demo technique or if he’s noticed these yoga pants are the most flattering I own. After his proclamation, it’s probably not the latter.
The light beyond my curtains dims, and the streetlights come out to play, sending our shadows dancing across my apartment floor. I glance at the time on my phone and yawn reflexively when I see the hour. It’s contagious, and Jack struggles to contain his own as he hands me a bag for our debris. It’s a good two hours of bending and grunting before everything is cleaned up.
And then Jack walks through The Hole—no more climbing, since he managed to rip out the wall in that area all the way to the floor—to get his vacuum. I watch him methodically attack every corner where dust could possibly be hiding. He even uses the hose and all of the attachments I’ve misplaced for my own vacuum. There is a serene expression on his face as he works.
“How much of the vacuuming is to piss me off?” I ask.
He powers off the machine, and for a second, I think he didn’t hear me. Finally, he mumbles, “About twenty percent.”
Wow.
“Why?” I don’t need to elaborate. We both know what I’m asking.
“I deal with a lot of messed-up shit at work.”
“What do you do, anyway? Han Solo impersonator?”
“Yes. Looking for a Chewbacca. You game?” He’s squeezed a laugh out of me, and he smirks in return. “Lawyer. Have my own shingle, but do some pro bono work on the side.”
A lawyer donating his time. What the shit? Does. Not. Compute.
“How about you?” he asks.
“I’m in marketing. For a software company. Evadon. You didn’t hear that through the wall already?”
He ignores the jab. “Sued them on an employment matter not too long ago.”
“So you were made to be my Lex Luthor. I don’t follow what about your job makes you vacuum, though.”
