Rock N Soul (20 page)

I fished the remote out from between the couch cushions and started up the show, but I fell asleep on the couch in the middle of an episode. I think I woke up again partway through the next one, with Chris sitting very close to my side and his arm around my shoulders, which were tingling with the not-quite-weight and not-quite-warmth of his arm. At least I thought they were. Maybe all of that was a dream, though.

When I woke up the next morning, I was still sitting on the couch, but at some point during the night I had curled up against the armrest to use it as a pillow. Chris was watching some vapid-sounding show that seemed to follow the lives of several college-aged girls who lived on a ranch and had aspirations to become country singers.

“What the hell are you watching?” I asked, rubbing my eyes.

“It’s called
The Meadow Larks
, and it’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever watched in my life,” he said, not taking his gaze off the screen.

“And yet you’re watching it.” I sat up and tried to stretch my cramped muscles.

“Well, your streaming service timed out and went back to TV when I ran out of
Supernatural
episodes, and I couldn’t change the channel, so I was stuck with this. And it’s a marathon too, so I’ve been watching for a while,” he said. “Except now I’m
involved
in this ridiculous thing, so shut up so I can see if Martha chokes during her big moment.”

I peered at the screen. “Are they at a rodeo?”

“Yeah,” he said. “And Tina was supposed to sing the national anthem but she got kicked in the throat by an angry sheep and she’s in the hospital recovering, so Martha has to sing it, except she’s terrified of the high note, so everybody thinks she’s going to bomb spectacularly. And Kelly just found out that there are talent scouts in the audience—”

“Wait,” I interrupted. “There are music scouts in the audience of a rodeo?”

“Yes. And so Martha—”

“Why?”

He glared at me. “Why what?”

“Why are there music scouts in the audience at a rodeo?” I repeated. “I mean, what do they think they’re going to do there?”

“Well, somebody has to sing the national anthem,” Chris said. “It’s a rule or something.”

“So some big-time music scouts flew all the way out to Indiana to watch this one chick sing the national anthem even though she may or may not be able to hit the high note?”

He gave an exasperated sigh. “First off, it’s not Indiana, it’s Tennessee. Second off, yeah, I guess they did. I don’t write the show, I’m just telling you what happened. And third off, shut up. I’m only interested because I was forced against my will to watch this all night long.”

“Whatever,” I said. “You like it.”

“Shut up,” he said again. “And if you’re just going to talk through it, you might as well go take a shower or whatever you have to do for your morning ritual, so that you can leave me alone to finish this episode.”

“A shower sounds pretty awesome, actually.” I stood and stretched again, making an involuntary whimper as my muscles popped back into place with that deliciously satisfying kind of pain.

“Then go,” Chris said, fluttering his hand toward the bathroom in a “hurry up” gesture. “Go go go. And be quiet. Martha’s about to sing.”

I rolled my eyes at him but obeyed, grabbing some clean clothes out of my dresser before going into the bathroom and starting the shower. I let the hot water soak into my skin for a long time before I started washing.

“I’m sorry I said I wanted to kiss you.”

I shrieked and nearly lost my footing. “Chris! What the hell!”

“Oh,” he said. “I’m also sorry I nearly scared you to death just now.”

I glanced around the shower to make sure he wasn’t sticking his head through the curtain or anything equally intrusive. “Well, apology accepted, but Jesus, dude. Couldn’t you have waited until I got done in the bathroom instead of just barging in like some crazy-ass poltergeist?”

“I could have,” he said. “But I was bored.”

“You had Martha,” I pointed out.

“Yeah, well, she takes this big deep breath to start singing and it goes to credits,” he said, sounding very put out about the whole thing. “And wouldn’t you know it? That’s the last episode available. So I’m going to need you to check on when the next one airs.”

“Fine, fine. I’ll look it up when I get done in the shower. So if you want to know, then go away so I can finish washing.”

There was silence for long enough that I thought Chris might have gone back into the living room. It was hard to tell when he didn’t have audible footsteps and didn’t need to open and close doors.

Then he spoke up. “I really am sorry. About last night.”

I forced myself to keep washing like it was normal to be having this type of conversation. “It’s cool, man.”

“I’m not some creepy pervert who wants to take advantage of you,” he continued. “It was just idle curiosity. Whether I could maybe touch you or somebody else or if I’m going to be flying solo forever. I didn’t mean . . . I didn’t want you to think I was going to do anything you didn’t want me to do.”

“It’s cool,” I repeated. “It was a weird night. No offense taken, and we can, you know, move on.”

“And never speak of it again?”

I shrugged even though he couldn’t see it through the shower curtain. “Not unless it becomes relevant, I guess.”

“Becomes relevant how?”

Like if we started actually lusting after each other
, I thought. But it didn’t seem like the time to bring up that possibility, not when I wasn’t sure I wanted it to happen and not when he was already so upset about possibly offending me by suggesting that we try to make out. So instead I said, “I don’t know, man. I just mean we don’t have to keep talking about it unless there’s a reason to.”

“Yeah,” he said. “That seems like a good idea.”

“So don’t worry about it. We’re cool.”

Another silence, although not such a long one this time. “And you’re cool that I’m bisexual and that I’ve boned dudes before?”

“Totally cool.” I finished rinsing off and then just stood there, shifting from foot to foot. “I was just surprised, you know? I assumed you were this big ladies’ man.”

“I was,” he insisted. “Don’t you be like that too. Just because I’m into guys doesn’t mean I’ve been lying to all the women. I just, you know, like both.”

I sighed, because being bisexual myself I understood that reaction, which made me feel like kind of a tool for causing it. “I get that. That wasn’t what I meant to say.”

“It’s cool,” he said, his voice a little stronger and more confident than before.

“So, you know, you can get out of my bathroom now,” I said. “Especially when I’m in it.”

“Okay,” he said. “But hurry up. I’m bored.”

I groaned and pulled back the shower curtain a little so I could glare at him, but he was already gone.

“This is stupid,” Chris said. His eyes were shut but his eyebrows were raised. “You have no secrets from me. Why do I need to close my eyes?”

It had been a few days since the porn incident, and we’d managed to get past the residual weirdness. Mostly, anyway. I’d at least managed to convince myself that it would be unethical to download his sex videos to my laptop in case the site ever crashed. And I’d even done better by convincing myself there wasn’t one video in particular that I’d want rescued if it did. Small victories.

“Just shut up and humor me.” I faked like I was going to hit him in the stomach—not that it would have worked—and then once I was satisfied that he wasn’t cheating, I walked over and picked up the box Gemma had brought by that morning.

She’d been pretty awesome helping me get the supplies, which was great since it wouldn’t be much of a surprise if Chris saw me buying streamers. I’d texted her a list of what I needed while he wasn’t looking, and we did a furtive drug-deal-style exchange just outside the door when she brought the box over. I didn’t have a hell of a lot of money to spend on the whole thing, but it wasn’t like there was much I could buy for Chris that he’d be able to use even if I’d been loaded, so this was good enough.

“How long do I have to stand here like this?” He tapped his fingers on his upper thigh and raised his eyebrows even more.

“Well,” I said, tearing into a pack of royal-blue streamers, “you have to stand there with your eyes closed until I tell you to open them. But there’s no time limit on how long you have to stand there scowling like a douche, so you can stop
that
whenever you feel like it.” It kind of worried me how sure I was that he’d be able to hear the smile in my voice.

He snorted. “I just don’t know why I can’t watch whatever you’re doing.”

“Shut up,” I told him. “It won’t kill you to stop being a voyeur for, like, five minutes.” I dragged my beat-up plastic stepstool out and started taping streamers to the ceiling.

“I’m bored,” he whined.

“If I had a quarter for every time you’ve said that since I met you, I wouldn’t be living in this shitty apartment.” There was a banner in the box too—one of the ones that had each letter cut out in metallic cardboard and strung together. I taped that up over the TV and attached streamers to the sides of it.

After I was done streamering, I looked around the room. It wasn’t going to win any party-planning awards, but it was festive enough for a low-budget affair. I pulled a stupid green party hat out of the box and put it on. “Okay, you can open your eyes now.”

Chris’s eyes snapped open, and he gave me bitch-face for a second before the decorations registered. “What is this?”

“Happy birthday!” I chirped, and I reached back into the supply box. There was a packet of confetti inside, and I ripped it open and threw some in the air above Chris’s head. It floated down through him, and he rolled his eyes. I grabbed a plastic kazoo from the supplies and blew it at him.

“You’re throwing me a birthday party,” he deadpanned. “I’m dead and you’re throwing me a birthday party.”

“Well, I could throw you a deathday party if you’d rather, but you’ll have to wait a few months for that,” I told him, giving him a challenging look. “And besides, that’s pretty morbid.”

“We’ll see how I feel once the time rolls around,” he said. “What else is in the box?”

I pulled out a bag of scones and a pack of candles. I took out a raspberry scone and held it up. “I’m going to stick a candle in this and then I guess I’ll have to blow it out for you. And
then
I’m going to let you watch me eat it and I’m not even going to bitch about how creepy it is.”

He stared at me for a second. “Why?”

I shrugged one shoulder and tried to look nonchalant. “Because it’s your birthday, dude. And I wanted to do something nice for you.” It had nothing to do with the way his hair shimmered in the sunlight. Nothing at all.

He just kept staring at me, and eventually it got weird.

“What?” I asked him. I blew into the kazoo again and then felt stupid for doing it.

“Nothing,” he said, shaking his head like he was trying to clear it. “I just didn’t really expect a birthday party.”

“Hence the term ‘surprise party,’” I told him. “And anyway, it’s some streamers and a scone. It’s not exactly the Grammys’ after-party or anything.”

He laughed a little at that, which broke some of the tension. Then he smiled an almost genuine sort of smile and said, “Thanks. Really. This is . . . nice.” He paused like he was thinking, so I let him think and didn’t do the kazoo thing again. “It’s been a while since someone was nice to me.”

“Well, don’t get used to it,” I warned. “I like snarking at you too much to be
nice
to you. But every man ought to get a birthday scone, you know?”

“It would be better if I could actually eat it,” he said, the barest hint of a whimper in his voice, “but I’ll take what I can get. Will you make ‘oh my God, this is so delicious’ noises while you eat it?”

I raised an eyebrow. “Probably not.” That sounded like a terrible idea, to make orgasm noises in front of a guy who’d started appearing in my morning-shower fantasies with alarming regularity in the last few days.

“It’s my birthday, though,” he whined, and he gave me puppy-dog eyes that were just completely unfair.