I stared at the ceiling. “Heating pad would be great.”
“Deflection. Cute.”
“Drew.”
“On it, Texas.”
He disappeared down the hall and came back with a heating pad, a folded towel, and a remote. He tucked the pad beneath my hamstring with the precision of someone who had done this a hundred times, then adjusted the pillow under my knee.
“Too hot?”
“No.”
“Tell me if it is.”
“I know how temperature works.”
“And yet I’m still talking.”
He handed me the remote. “Netflix. Pick something that won’t make me lose faith in humanity.”
“That rules out most of your personality.”
“Mean women are my weakness.”
“Clearly.”
He pulled out his phone. “Hungry?”
“A little.”
“Good. I’m starving.”
“You’re always starving.”
“I’m a growing boy.”
“You’re enormous.”
“Exactly. Growth is working.”
He ordered food with the speed of a man who had memorized the delivery radius of every restaurant within ten miles. Thai noodles, dumplings, rice, something spicy for him, something less spicy for me because apparently he knew that too now.
Then he stood.
“I’m gonna shower,” he said. “You good?”
I was on his couch, in his jersey, with my leg on a heating pad, his remote in my hand, and my common sense bleeding out somewhere near the beach.
“Yeah,” I said. “I’m good.”
His gaze moved over me once.
Not dirty.
Not exactly.
Worse.
