I hold my hand out towards her. “There you go. See, I knew she was more than just annoying.”
“I thought you said you didn’t want any more women working here.”
“She practically lives here as it is.” I leave the desk and walk to the back door. Opening it, I lean out, glancing at the lot and the external wall. “We could probably extend another ten feet. The shop could use it. It was a bit cramped with three artists as it was. We could make a piercing room on this side.” I point opposite to the back room.
“So now you’re talking about three artists again?”
“Yep.” I shrug.
“And who do you—“
“Reeze.”
Carey shakes his head. He already knows how I feel about Reeze coming back. He knows why we hired him in the first place, and why he’s such a perfect fit—all the behind the back fucking aside. And he also knows that the currently MIA elephant in the room is Eden, and the lengths I’m going to have to go to to convince him it’s a good idea. “You’re playing with fire.”
“I want what I want,” I say with a shrug. Taking my phone, I unlock it, select a number, and hold it to my ear.
“Who are you calling now?”
“Your brother.”
“So fucking dumb,” Carey snickers as he rounds the desk. As the phone rings in my ear, I watch him take a box of frames from beneath the side cupboards as Liv spreads out some of the remaining sketches on top.
“Talk.” Eden answers. It’s abrupt, and rude, and everything I expect.
“Are you ever gonna talk to me politely?”
“Since when do people talk politely to their family?”
I sigh, and let the air hang between us. I can tell he has me on loudspeaker, and with Carey’s voice steady in the background, I slide the lunch room door closed. Eyeing Eden’s plaid jacket hanging on the locker, I move towards it. With my free hand supporting it, I press the inside—just below the tag—against my nose, and breath in deeply. Carey’s scent fills me up, making me feel light and euphoric, and stuffs me full of a twisted, fucked up pride. To be sniffing my best friend’s coat, longing for the smell of his brother, while secretly fucking him behind my best friend’s back, shouldn’t feel as good as it does. The guilt I once felt about keeping our relationship from Eden hardly exists anymore. We’re not doing anything wrong, so what’s there to feel guilty about?
“I haven’t heard from you in a while,” Eden finally says, breaking the extended silence.
“Yeah, um… Things have been really busy. At the shop, I mean. Cause I’m on my own.”
“Is Carey not there anymore? He never mentioned anything when I spoke to him the other day.”
“N-no,” I stutter, mid inhale, and step back from the coat. “He’s still here. And he’s a big help.”
“Thanks for giving him something to do instead of sitting around my apartment all day.”
Images of what the apartment looked like when I took Carey back there, and that fucking dead roach in the corner flash into my head. “Yeah, sure, no worries,” I snicker. “But I’m still the only artist—”
“I think we should get Reeze back,” Eden interrupts, and I cough.
“Are you serious?” Is everything gonna just fall into my lap now as a present for working myself ragged the past two and a bit months?
Eden hums, “Sure, why not?”
I tread lightly, pretending to be skeptical, because these words coming out of Eden's mouth make no goddamn sense. “Won’t it be awkward?”
“Nah. I’m over it… He fucked up, sure. I don’t need to ever see Shawn’s face again, but it’s not like I didn’t play a role in the breakdown of our relationship.”
“Wow, that’s ah… That might be the most mature thing I’ve ever heard you say.” I may lock him up away from civilization once a year if it’s going to make him this level headed.
“Reeze is an amazing artist. It’d be dumb of me to let him get away. As long as he’s not already moved on.”
“He’s still living in Shawn’s parent’s pool house. That’s gotta be weird, but she’s living downtown now so I guess they don’t see each other.” Silence extends again and I know it’s because he doesn’t want to hear about Shawn. “Anyway… I think you should be the one to call him. It’s not gonna mean as much coming from me.”
