It’s a weird switch of roles for us with me worrying about him, but I want to be there for him the same way he’s always been for me. I nudge him. “It’s going to be okay. I know it won’t be the same, but they’ll still be here for us. Plus, you’ve got me.”
He grins.
“Anyway, the real reason I came to find you was to see what you were doing tonight. We need a night out. A fun night with all our friends to let loose and forget about parent drama.”
“I don’t know. Maybe. Let me see what’s going on tonight. It is a Monday night after all.”
“Monday is a perfectly good day to drink. Live a little, bro.”
“Bro?” He hitches the backpack higher on his shoulder. “You sound like Heath.”
We get to his car and he quirks a brow as I open the passenger side door.
“I mean, since you’re going home anyway, can you give me a ride?”
He shakes his head. “Get in.”
At the apartment, I walk back toward Heath’s room. He’s sitting at his desk in front of his laptop.
“Hey,” I say cheerily as I enter.
One side of his mouth pulls up. “Hey. Did I forget we were hanging out?”
“Nope, thought I’d surprise you. I didn’t hear back from you last night after your hockey stuff.”
“Yeah, sorry, I crashed.”
I go to him and he swivels to make room for me on his lap. “Let’s go out tonight.”
“It’s Monday.”
“Why does everyone keep using that as an excuse?”
He chuckles softly.
I take a deep breath. The girls are right. I need to make sure we’re on the same page. “Also, I have something I want to talk to you about later.”
He stiffens under me. Okay, that was probably not the smoothest. “Don’t worry, it’s nothing too crazy. A proposition if you will.”
God, now he probably thinks I want to chain him to the bed and peg him.
His phone pings on his desk, Maverick’s name flashes on the screen with a text. “All right, sure. I’ll text you later. I’ve gotta check on Maverick. He didn’t make conditioning this morning. He’s got the flu or something. He hasn’t been by all day.”
I stand to let him up. “Well, then he really must be sick.”
He takes a step toward the door and then backtracks and brushes his lips against mine before hurrying out to go check on Maverick.
34
Heath
“Mav? Buddy, where are you?” I call as I enter his apartment. He’s got a one-bedroom ground level unit. On a normal day it’s already darker than ours upstairs, but today all the lights are off, the TV too, so it’s like a cave.
The place is awesome. Nice leather furniture, a huge TV that takes up the better part of one wall, he’s even got throw pillows. Why he always wants to hang at our place is beyond me.
Charli barks and I follow the sound to the bedroom where my buddy is on his back with the comforter and blanket thrown off the bed and an arm over his eyes. Charli lies at the end of the mattress near his feet.
“You don’t look so good.” I step closer and then back. “Or smell so good.”
“I think I threw up a kidney.” His voice is raspy and pained.
“What can I do? Do you need water? Soup? I can make a call about getting you a new kidney.”
A knock at the door has me looking back through the living room to the front door. “Are you expecting someone else?”
“It’s food. Can you grab it?”
I cross through the apartment and open the door, taking a deep breath of clean, uncontaminated air. After thanking the delivery guy, I take the bag of food back to the sick room.
“Here ya go.”
“Not for me.” He heaves. “Oh, just the smell makes me want to hurl again. It’s for you, so you’ll stay with me.”
“You didn’t need to bribe me.”
“Look, I know I’m your favorite person, but eventually your stomach would have convinced you to leave me.”
I chuckle and take the bag back out to the kitchen. “There is a lot of food in here.”
“You’re a hungry bitch.”
He’s in the same position, but Charli has moved up to his hip and Maverick strokes her with the hand closest.
“What do you need?”
“I just want to lie here until the room stops moving. Tell me a story.”
I take a seat on the floor near the door and lean my back up against the wall. I like the dude, but he smells, and I don’t want whatever he has. “A story?”
“Anything to distract me.” He peeks out from under his arm and then reaches over to his nightstand and tosses me his Shakespeare textbook. “Read to me. Do the funny voices.”
“I thought you were done with Shakespeare.”
“I am. We’re on Shelley now, but that book is all the way in my backpack.”
I hesitate.
“Come on. Pleeeease? I dig the rhyming shit; it’s beautiful.”
“All right, all right.” I open the book and start.
Maverick falls asleep about five minutes in, which is good because reading sappy words about love is the last thing I want to be doing. I go out to the living room and eat, feed Charli, and then take her out for a quick walk.
Back inside, I take my spot in his room sitting on the floor and I must pass out because the next thing I know, Charli is licking my face, and Maverick is standing in front of me with a grin.
“Feeling better?” I ask, nudging Charli away and wiping a hand across my slobbery cheek.
“I think so. I’m gonna try to eat.”
I follow him out to the kitchen, and he heats up some of the Chinese he ordered. We sit on stools at the counter. The smell of food has me heating up a plate too a few minutes later. Ginny texted while I was asleep to let me know the plans for tonight, meeting up at The Hideout with our friends. I’m real nervous about
