Authors: S. Walden

Tags: #Romance, #Contemporary

LoveLines (13 page)

“Leave me alone! It was really huge! I freaking hat
e living by the beach sometimes! I’m spraying my house every other day. Nothing can live in here, you know. Kids. Dogs. Cats.”

“Don’t say cats. Never say cats.”

“Stop stereotyping women with cats,” I replied, scraping up the butchered bug. I really went to town on that thing. Perhaps subconsciously I pretended it was my sister.

“Whatever. I’m just jealous of them anyway. Cats can take care of themselves,” Erica said.

I rolled my eyes. “You bitch about your kids all the time, but you couldn’t imagine your world without them.”

Brief pause.

“I know,” Erica sighed.

“I’m going now. Thanks for making me feel better. And no, I don’t believe you about the maid of honor OCD thing, but I’ll do it because sh
e’s my sister. It’s totally screwed up that they’re taking advantage of me, but whatever.”

“Look at it this way,” Erica began. “If you ever want to change careers and be a wedding coordinator, you’ve already got one in your portfolio.”

“True.”

“Love
ya, girly. Go to bed. And don’t think about Nicki. Think about Reece’s pieces.”

I burst out laughing. “You’re a dork. I love you.”

That night I did dream about Reece’s pieces. I’m not really a candy girl, but he made me want to finish the entire bag.

My phone beeped
some time around 6:30 A.M. the following morning.

Reece: We need to talk about
that kiss. When can I call you?

I couldn’t read the tone. Who can ever read tones in text messages and emails anyway? My insti
nct, though, was to lean toward the negative. (Hey, I had a history to back it up.) I immediately thought the worst: He doesn’t like me. He doesn’t want whatever happened at the theater to go any further. I’m a bad kisser.

I glanced at the time: 6:31 A.M. Oh, what the hell? He was obviously awake.

“Reece?” I said hesitantly into the phone.

“Bailey!” he replied. “Did I wake you? I didn’t mean to wake you.
That’s why I texted. I thought maybe you turn your sound alerts off at night. I’m sorry if I woke you. I’ve just been up all night. I couldn’t sleep. I wanted to call you yesterday, but I thought maybe I should leave you alone for a day or two. But then it just drove me crazy all day, and then I didn’t sleep last night. I think I mentioned I didn’t sleep. And I kept thinking about you and the theater and . . .”

I grinned from ear to ear as I listened to Reece prattle on about how he couldn’t get me out of his mind. Silly Bailey. And you thought you were a bad kisser!

“Reece?” I interrupted.

“Oh, I’m sorry. Am I talking too much? I have a problem with tha
t. It’s something I’m working on. I talk more when I’m nervous—”

“Reece!”

He went silent.

“I wanted to call you yesterday, too,” I said.

He sighed into the phone. A happy sigh. “Really?”

“Yes. I nearly did, but then my sister called and wanted me over at our parents’ house
last night. She needed to make an announcement and whatever. It’s not important,” I said.

“What announcement?” Reece asked.

“Oh, about how she’s getting married,” I said dismissively.

“That’s pretty cool.”

I grunted. We fell silent.

“I’ve been thinking about you nonstop,” Reece admitted.

“Really?” I asked. I wanted to confess the same thing, but I wasn’t sure it was wise for girls to be so transparent. I’d already initiated the first kiss. That was as far as I’d go.

“Oh, yes,” Reece replied. “I . . . I know we aren’t supposed to date.” Brief pause. “But I want to.”

I chewed my lower lip. I knew it was unwise—getting involved with a coworker. Soooo unwise. I also knew that no one had ever knocked my socks off with a kiss like Reece had. And that had to mean something.

Plus, it wasn’t just the kiss. It was everything that led up to the kiss. It was Reece buying me drinks from the vending machine just to be nice. Stopping by my cubicle to ask about my weekend—and really listening to me talk about it. Eating lunch with me. Telling me jokes. Walking me to my car during that storm when I’d forgotten my umbrella. Yeah, I’d forgotten my umbrella. He’d already sufficiently infiltrated my brain. I was relaxing, taking a step back. Hell,
I was forgetting my steps altogether.

“Reece?”
I said carefully.

“
Oh no. You sound unsure,” he said.

“No
no. Not unsure,” I replied. “I just have to tell you something.”

“You’re already dating someone,” he said.

“Ha! No. Not that.” The words were right there—right on the tip of my tongue—but I couldn’t say them. I had suddenly grown embarrassed—ashamed of myself for lacking. That’s how I constantly felt, that I lacked the abilities others had to function normally.

“Yes?” he encouraged.

“I have a condition!” I blurted.

Silence.

“Like an STD?” he asked.

“God no! No!
Oh my God.” I blushed profusely and turned my face, burying it in my pillow.

“Okay. So
, no STD,” Reece said. “By the way, it would have been okay if you had. We’d figure out how to work with it.”

“Oh. My. God. Stop talking about STDs,” I demanded.

“You got it.”

And another bout of silence. (That’s the thing about first phone calls: they’re herky-jerky. Conversation may flow perfectly one minute, and then the next minute the air is
filled with silent discomfort.)

“Bailey?”

“I’m here.”

“
Wanna tell me about your condition?”

“Not really.”

“You brought it up,” Reece pointed out.

“I’m aware.”

“Sooo . . .”

“You’ll run away,” I said softly.

“I’m a man. I don’t run,” Reece replied.

I smiled. “It’s made all the others run away.”

“Because they weren’t men.”

I liked this guy. A lot.

“Now tell me,” Reece demanded gently.

I took a
deep breath. “I have Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder.”

“Okay.”

“Okay?” I asked.

“Yeah. Okay.”

I shook my head. “Wait. That’s it? Did you just hear what I said? I have OCD. Like major OCD. Not fake OCD. Not, ‘Oh my God, I just can’t drive my car if it’s not vacuumed out. I’m so OCD.’ Not like that.”

He chuckled. “You don’t have to explain. I get it. I know. I’ve always known.”

“
What
?”

“I know,” he repeated.

“How do you know?”

“Stuff you do.”

“Like what?”

“Well, you arrive at work every day at exactly 7:58 A.M.”

I gasped. “Have you been watching me?!”

“Umm, a little. Not in a
stalkerish way, though. I thought you were cute. So I watched you when I could.”

I said nothing. I needed more time to process this.

“You arrange your pens in the same order all the time. By color. I noticed that first. Remember the first time I visited you at your cubicle to discuss the phablet campaign?”

“What about it?” I asked.

“I scattered your pens, and you arranged them?”

I wanted to die. The longer he talked, the worse I sounded.
Like a total nut job.

“Bailey?”

“I’m here.”

“Do you think I’m a stalker?” Reece asked.

I smiled. “No. But I think I’m a freak.”

“Why? Because you arrange your pens? Because you eat lunch at exactly noon every day? Because you
sanitize—”

“Okay, stop!” I cried. “
That’s a little stalkerish.”

He laughed. “I like those things about you.”

I thought about that. No one I’d ever dated liked those things about me. In fact, those were precisely the things that made them run.

This was weird. How could my tics possibly be attractive? Although
, I had to remember that he was describing the tame ones. He’d yet to witness the out-of-control tics. And I never wanted him to see them. They were bad enough when I was having a normal day. They were downright scary when my anxiety kicked into high gear.

“Bailey?”

“I’m here.”

“I don’t mind that you have OCD. Do you believe me?”

“Not yet,” I admitted.

“Well, that’s fair. But maybe we could hang out more—outside of the office—and then I can show you how much I don’t care.”

I flushed a deep red. Didn’t see it, but I could feel it all over my face, neck, and chest.

“Okay,” I said.

“Do you have plans today?” he asked.

“Not really,”
I replied.

Sundays were usually my
“project” days. I actually wrote out a to-do list last night before going to bed. But he didn’t need to know that. And right now I didn’t care about it anymore. Well, that’s a slight lie. I cared about it a little. I
was
in the process of knitting fall hats for Erica’s kids. I wanted to finish them today. Get them to her by next week. I also had a sewing project . . . Oh my God, Bailey! A hot guy wants to hang out with you today! Priorities. For the love of God, priorities!

“May I come over?”
Reece asked.

“You
wanna come over here?” I breathed, heartbeat ramping up.

“Sure. Why not?”
he replied. “We could cook breakfast together.”

What? I didn’t know if the offer was sweet or
weasely. I’m not a distrusting person, but this seemed a bit too forward. I mean, the only time I ever cooked breakfast with a guy was when he stayed over. It’s an intimate thing, cooking breakfast with someone. And it usually falls at the end of a certain order of events: 1. Go on a date. 2. Invite guy back for a drink. 3. Make out hard. 4. Sex. 5. Sleep over. 6. Put coffee on. (For him, not me.)

“It’s just a ploy to see where you live and to learn more about you,” Reece said. It’s like he could read my thoughts. “I don’t have any other agenda. I swear.”

I grinned. “Well, okay.” I gave him my address and an hour—just enough time to shower, blow dry, and apply light make-up.

I was too busy fantasizing about Reece in my house to notice while I was in the shower. I ignored the bathroom mirror and practically danced into my bedroom, hopped up on exhilaration. It wasn’t until I dropped my towel and took a look at myself in the full-length mirror that I screamed bloody murder.

“ERICA!!!”

I was a walking Impressionism painting. No joke. I looked like I stood naked in front of Monet while he swirled orange and yellow clouds all over my body. My instinct was to jump back into the shower and scrub the hell out of my skin, but then I’d look like a tomato when Reece arrived.

Reece! Oh God! Fucking 100 degrees outside, and I couldn’t even wear shorts and a T-shirt in front of him! Oh, I could kill Erica.
Kill
her. Why did I let her spray me in circles? Something told me she should have been spraying lines. Why didn’t I speak up? Why didn’t I just tell her to practice on her husband?

I had no choice but to cover up in jeans and
a long-sleeve tee. For the first time in my life, I felt sorry for people with psoriasis and eczema. And then I felt guilty for comparing my tanning plight to their skin conditions.

When I answered the door, my jaw dropped. Reece stood on the porch in a
tight white T-shirt and plaid pajama pants holding two bags of groceries. Oh yeah. He also sported slippers.

“Where are your pajamas?” he asked. “It’s breakfast time.”

I grinned. “Did you actually go to the store like that?”

“Uh huh.”

“You went to the store in your PJs,” I clarified.

“Yes. Now are you
gonna invite me in?”

I moved aside and watched him walk into my house for the first time. The first of many times, I hoped.
He placed the bags on the coffee table and looked around. I gave him a few moments to observe the scene, watching for his reaction to my home, my things—me.

“So I guess I’m alone in wearing PJs for breakfast?” he asked.

“You really want me to change into my PJs?”

“Too much too soon?”

“I’ve no idea.”

“
Lemme guess. No appropriate PJs you could wear around me?”

I burst out laughing. “Yeah, that’s it.”

He waited. He could tell I wasn’t finished.

“I suppose guys think we really go to bed in chemises or teddies every night?” I asked.

“Guys
hope
that’s the case.”

“Ha
ha.”

“Well, I won’t pressure you, but you’re making me look like an idiot over here.”

I didn’t believe him for a second.