Page 38 of Use Me Up

“You want to do that this afternoon?” he says. “We get drunk, make out heavily in front of Callie, eat brunch, and then we can go looking for a box of dye at the store. What are you thinking? Lighter? Darker?” He tilts his head, thinking about it.

“Are we here to make Callie jealous?” I say.

“I don’t know,” he says. “I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing.”

The waiter comes back, and Ellis says we’re going to do the buffet.

“Right, well, that’ll be maybe another twenty-five minutes, but they’re starting to bring things out,” says the waiter.

I look, and I can see that there is fruit and pastries and things already out.

“The hot food will be more like forty minutes,” says the waiter.

“That’s fine,” says Ellis.

“You can get the breads and fruit now,” says the waiter. “Do we need more martinis? Can I freshen up the coffee?”

“Yeah,” says Ellis. “Two more martinis.”

“Um, I don’t want that,” I say. I pick up the drink menu in the middle of the table and scan it. “Um, the pomegranate and prosecco, please?”

“Sure thing,” says the waiter, smiling as he leaves again.

I drink more of my black coffee. “Do you want me to be blond like her?”

“Do you want to look like her, Hannah?” he says.

“No,” I say. Maybe.

“If I said that I wanted you to change your hair to the way I wanted it, would you do that for me?” His voice has gotten deeper all of the sudden.

My pants feel tighter at his words, at his tone. I drag my upper teeth over my lower lip. “I think you know I would,” I say.

He licks his lips. “So, we’ll dye your hair this afternoon.”

“Whatever color you want,” I say.

“Whatever I want,” he breathes, gazing at me.

“Maybe I was wrong earlier,” I say softly.

“Yeah?”

“Maybe you could be with me,” I say. “But I don’t think it’s going to be healthy, exactly, whatever it is we end up doing together.”

He chuckles, picking up his coffee. “Yeah, I don’t know if I know how to do healthy, actually.”

8

ellis

I’m sort of surprised how much Hannah turns me on.

I’ve never really been attracted to another woman besides Calliope. Next to her, all other women have always seemed sort of boring, and I think that Hannah should seem boring. She’s right when she assesses herself, listing off all her flaws.

But I’m right, too.

She is pretty, it’s just a sort of wholesome, sweet kind of beauty, very girl next door, your best friend’s innocent little sister, that kind of thing. Which is still definitely fantasy fodder, and she’s sort of unaware that she’s a walking sexy stereotype, which makes her hotter.