Fortuity (Transcend 3)

My desperation lands me at Nate’s door in under five seconds. I don’t knock. I sulk inside and straight up the stairs to Morgan’s bathroom and the big bottle of conditioner.

After a long shower of working my fingers through each tangle and matted area, I dry off and use one of Morgan’s elastics to pull it back into a small ponytail. Still … I have nothing to wear except Nate’s tee.

The aroma of coffee and something sweet leads me downstairs into the kitchen.

Nate glances up from his phone, cup of coffee, and cinnamon roll. “Feel better?” He grins.

“I’m locked out. No. I don’t feel better.”

“Have a seat.” He nods to the chair bedside him, where he’s poured me a cup of coffee too and set a cinnamon roll and fruit on a small plate.

I glance past him into the living room and fetch a throw blanket from the sofa to wrap around my waist before sitting next to him. He smirks from behind his mug of coffee.

“You bake, huh?” I eye the roll as I bring the coffee to my lips.

“Technically, yes. I baked these. Now, if you ask if I mix ingredients, roll out dough, and whatever else is involved in making cinnamon rolls … then no. These came from one of those tubes where all you have to do is bake and frost them.”

“That works.” I shrug.

“Do you bake?”

I pull apart the roll and pinch off a bite. “I don’t, but I can. My family was pretty old-fashioned. Mom has always stayed at home. She still wears aprons that belonged to my grandma. You know … the ones with white shoulder straps and deep pockets?”

Nate’s grin mirrors mine as he nods several times.

“She’d putter around the house in a dress and one of her many white eyelet aprons or linen pinafores doing shit all day—laundry, baking, sewing, ironing, cleaning. You name it. If we scraped a knee, she had ointments and Band-Aids in one of her apron pockets. Lose a button? No problem. She had a mini sewing kit in her apron. Stain sticks, tissues, pacifiers, aspirin, and antibiotic ointment for the dogs ears … all in her apron. It was like her tool belt for the day. My dad says she’s an old soul born a generation too late. When Kyle and I would bring friends home for the first time, they all assumed she was our grandma, not our mom. Of course, not because she looked old, it was the apron. And … she didn’t work outside of the home.”

“That’s awesome.” Delight overtakes Nate’s face. “So she taught you to bake?”

“Sorry … that long story went nowhere. Yes, she taught me to bake, iron, fold fitted sheets, sew, and kiss booboos. Dad taught Kyle how to mow the lawn, change a tire, fix a leaky faucet, and hang a picture. Ironically, I never married or had kids, so all those domestic skills were lost on me. And Kyle went into a very white-collar profession where he chose to hire everything out, including simple things like mowing the lawn and fixing a leaky faucet. I’m sure our parents’ motto for years has been where did we go wrong?”

“Conventionalism isn’t reality,” Nate says while staring at me rubbing my hands. “Did you hurt yourself … hanging from the balcony?”

I pause my movements and reach for my coffee. “No.”

“You have to tell me why? It’s flat-out cruel to keep it a secret at this point.”

I roll my eyes. “My hair. Are you happy now? I didn’t want you to see my hair. I’m not sure my hair has ever looked so hideous. I couldn’t look at it without cringing and feeling the need to look away. And we’re not together. What we have is based on physical attraction. Or … it was.” My nose wrinkles. “That’s no doubt over now.”

“First…” he wipes his mouth with a napkin after taking the last bite of cinnamon roll “…I’m not that shallow. And if I were, we could still enjoy each other’s company for the rest of the summer. A paper sack over your head works just fine.”

It’s not funny. Not even a little. Okay … my lips betraying me by sneaking out a smile might mean it’s a tiny bit funny. “So you just want me for everything below my neck?”

“No. I think we’d cut a hole where your mouth is.”

I shake my head and laugh. How did we go from aprons to paper sacks? “So I can breathe?”

“Um … sure … that too.”

“That too? Okay, so the main reason for the hole is so that you can kiss me. I see where your priorities are.”

His lips curl together, and he rubs his fingers over them, hiding a look.

“Not to kiss me …” Realization settles into my cheeks in the form of a huge blush. Could I be any more naive? The hole is for something else, for something that didn’t happen last night. Nate is a lot of things, but at his core, he’s still a guy with normal guy desires.