“I like this shirt!” he protested, glancing down at it.
“Are you joking? That shirt is a white undershirt from Walmart. Or actually, it was white at one time. Now it’s the color of a tea bag.”
“You’re exaggerating.” He looked up and studied me, very serious. “Jessica?”
“Yes?”
“I mustache you a question.”
My lip twitched. “Let me mullet over.”
We both lost it. He pulled out his phone. “We need a picture of this.”
Did I want to preserve a picture of me with a painted gray mustache? Not necessarily. But I did want a picture of me with Riley, and I did want to see what I looked like. There were certainly more embarrassing pics of me floating around the Internet—hello, why do all friends insist on posting pictures with your eyes closed?
“You can’t tag me,” I told him.
“You don’t look that bad.”
“It’s not that. I’m supposed to be in West Virginia, remember?”
He grinned. “Oh, yeah, that’s right. Come here, sinner. Wait, give me a matching ’stache first.”
Riley stood stock-still while I artistically swooped the paintbrush over his face. “This is hard, because you have legit stubble.” I was also aware of just how close to me he was standing. How close my mouth was to his.
He looked unaffected though. “Your life is so hard.”
Just for that, I gave him a handlebar mustache, painting curls at the ends with a flourish. “You look amazing.”
“Alright, pose with me. No duck face. I hate duck face. I will pop your lips with a pin if you do duck face.”
“Tell me how you really feel.”
Riley threw his arm around me and held up the phone with the other. I leaned against his shoulder, and gave a serious Hercule Poirot stare, one eyebrow raised, a finger pretending to twirl my paint mustache. Riley snapped and we looked at it. I looked evil. He looked adorably cute, grinning with his dimples flashing, looking every inch of a guy despite the gray paint.
Seeing us together did something weird to me. I sucked in a breath, heart pounding, and I tried to laugh, but it came out sounding louder than I intended.
“I’m Riley Mann, and I approve this message,” he said. He didn’t seem to notice I was acting like a freak.
“That’s because you look good and I look scary,” I told him.
“Yep.”
Of course. I had totally walked in to that one. I shoved him. “Send that to me, jerk.”
“Send you the picture you don’t like?”
“I didn’t say I don’t like it. Just that I resent that you look better than me.”
“Get used to it. Now you’d better wash that off your face before I have to scrub you with turpentine.”
“Sounds hot.” I hadn’t thought about the fact that the paint was drying. Rushing to the bathroom, I took to my face with exfoliant. I ended up beet red with raw skin, but the paint came off.
Riley stood behind me waiting his turn. I was so determined to get the paint off quickly I didn’t even protest that he was just lingering in the doorway watching me. It occurred to me at one point that he seemed to be looking at my butt, but given that his expression never changed, it didn’t seem to have much impact on him.
I turned to him. “The sink is yours.” I looked like I’d been slapped with a wet noodle, my skin stinging, but I was paint-free.
“Can I use that stuff?”
“You want to exfoliate?”
“I want the paint off.” He picked the tube off the counter. “How do I use this?”
“You rub it on,” I said dryly. “Then wash it off.”
“Can you do it for me?” He held the tube out to me.
If it was any other guy, I’d think this was some sort of awkward come-on. But this was Riley. He might as well be asking me to pop his pimple or dig out a splinter for him. There was nothing even remotely sexual in his expression.
Maybe he didn’t like blondes.
Maybe he liked exotic brunettes.
I wondered what I would look like with dark hair.
Then I mentally grimaced. Stupid. That’s what I would look like with dark hair. Like a desperate chick trying too hard. What the hell was wrong with me?
Slapping scrub on his face, I rubbed it vigorously into his skin, trying not to make eye contact or think about the fact that I was thinking about what kind of girl he thought was hot.
“I’m not going to suggest nursing as a career for you,” he commented. “You don’t exactly have a gentle touch.”
Lifting a washcloth—one of mine, I might add—I rubbed off the lotion. Hard. “Do it yourself if you don’t like the way I do it.” Or maybe get a brunette to do it.
Ugh. Why was I being a crazy bitch? I threw down the washcloth and nudged past him. “
“Sure.” He held up his hands. “Wasn’t trying to block you. You going to bed?”
“Yes, if that’s okay with you.” Bitch just kept right on rolling out of my mouth, and I couldn’t seem to stop it.
“I have no opinion on it one way or the other.”
Which was exactly why I was so annoyed. I wanted him to have an opinion about me. About bed. About me in bed.
“Good night.” I paused in the doorway and forced myself to be rational. “Thanks for painting the kitchen.”
“Gee, it was my pleasure,” he said, eyeballing me in the mirror.
Yeah. That was the most obvious sarcasm yet. Because I knew I was being a dick, I just retreated to my temporary room. Where I did something really ridiculous. I opened the picture that Riley had sent me and I stared at the two of us as I lay on the bed, fully dressed, lights off. Over the drone of the air-conditioning I murmured to myself, “Riley Mann,” and then felt like the biggest middle school dork that had ever existed. I didn’t crush on guys. They crushed on me.
So what the hell was wrong with me? I checked my menstruation app on my phone to see if I could blame the sap attack on hormones, but no such luck. It was a whole week until my period.
Rolling on my side, I did something equally as bizarre. I forwarded the picture to Rory with the label “Roomies.”
She texted back a minute later.
Yeah. That was me. Feeling awesomely stupid.
I deleted the text from Riley with the mustache picture in a moment of owning my power.
Which was lame because I knew that it was still there in the text I’d sent Rory.
It wasn’t hot in the room, but my body felt like it was heating from the inside out. There was no way I could get undressed without risk of extreme arousal. I lay there, phone on my chest, legs crossed, reciting Bible passages about death and destruction to myself until I finally fell asleep.
I dreamed that a swarm of locusts had Riley’s face.
Which was perhaps the most deeply disturbing image I’d ever encountered in my life.
