The Assignment

My mouth hung open. “I put this in there?”

“You don’t remember?”

I continued to stare at it incredulously. Come to think of it, I’d been watching the news this morning before getting ready to leave the house... I must’ve stuck it in there without thinking? Gosh, I needed to get a grip.

“Wow. I’m really sorry. A remote is not a very good snack, is it?”

She snickered. “It probably tastes better than Troy’s cookies.” She shrugged. “Anyway, my friends thought it was funny.”

“I’m sure they did. Next time, tell them your crazy aunt has her head in the clouds sometimes.”

“Next time? You’re gonna put the remote in my lunch again?”

“Hopefully not.”

“If you want, you can accidentally put some M&Ms in there tomorrow. I won’t mind.”

I rustled her hair. “Silly girl.”

• • •

After a week that went by as slowly as molasses, Friday night finally arrived.

Troy and I had decided to eat dinner at the Japanese restaurant with my favorite sushi. I guess you could say it had become our place. We made easy conversation during the meal. But between Troy looking at me with hazy eyes like he wanted to devour me right there at the table, and my own urgent need to be touched by him—this dinner couldn’t have been over fast enough.

As we finished the last of our food, Troy seemed to read my mind. “Let’s go to my house tonight. It’s closer.”

I wasn’t going to argue with that. Not only was his place closer, but I’d been curious to see where he was living.

Troy drove faster than the legal limit all the way home. You weren’t going to hear me complain, though. At one point, he turned on some music—Frank Sinatra’s “The Lady is a Tramp.” I chuckled. Yes. Yes, I am right now, and I don’t need to be judged, Frank. I was about to get laid so good with this man tonight.

Troy’s dad’s house was a narrow, brick structure on a fairly busy residential street. Troy used his key to open the door, and we were greeted by a beautiful cat.

“Hey, Patrick! We have a visitor,” Troy announced.

“So this is the famous Patrick.” I knelt down to pet the kitty between his ears. He closed his eyes and purred. Patrick’s fur was multicolored with stripes. “He’s cuter than I ever imagined.”

“Don’t stroke his ego. He’ll never leave you alone tonight. And I sort of want you to myself.”

Then Troy grabbed my hand and led me to his room—which turned out to be a virtual time capsule. There were trophies up on a shelf and photos on the wall of many people we went to high school with.

“Has this place changed at all in ten years?”

“Pretty pathetic, right? Like I told you, this isn’t the house I grew up in, but my dad basically transferred all the crap from my old room to this one after he moved out of the house we shared with my grandparents. I wasn’t living in Meadowbrook when he bought this place, so I have nothing to do with the décor or this shrine to me.”

“I think it’s adorable. It would only be strange if you lived here full time and kept it like this.”

I walked over to one of the photos of Troy and rubbed my finger over the image of his youthful face.

“What are you thinking when you look at that guy?” he asked.

I sighed. “What an asshole.” I placed my hand on his shoulder. “I’m kidding.” But I shook my head as I turned back to the photo. “Looking at this makes it all seem like yesterday.”

“Is that photo giving you PTSD?” He blew out his cheeks. “Maybe bringing you here was a bad idea.”

I gripped his shirt and spoke in a seductive tone. “I’ll get over it soon enough.”

“Oh, I’ll make sure of that.”

I looked down. His erection was straining against his jeans. He was ready, but unfortunately my mind had taken a bit of a detour. I looked back over at the photo of young Troy and his beautiful, angular face.

“You know, I used to hate you, but I always thought you were hot. That was never up for debate. I definitely had an unwanted crush on you when you were dating Jasmine.”

He stroked the small of my back. “I never had a crush on you. I thought you were weird and standoffish…and later, after everything happened, batshit crazy.”

“Gee, thanks. Tell me how you really feel…”

“Hear me out.” He wrapped his arms around me from behind. “Now? I have a massive crush on you. You’re all I think about…”

I turned my head to look at him and saw that he was staring at the photo of himself. “I’m not that kid anymore, Aspyn. That kid…he was fucked up in the head. He’d felt abandoned his whole life. I acted out against others because I couldn’t act out against my mother—because she wasn’t around to receive any of my angst. In recent years, I’ve come to terms with the story of how I came to be, but back then? I was a mess.”