Alarm

Aiden dr

ipped his way over to the bathroom, leaving his waffle on the table. After I heard the shower start, I wiped the water off of the floor. I was still feeling guilty about poking around in his house and figured the least I could do was clean up a bit.

I also didn’t know what to think of the labels on the boxes. I was sure it meant that Aiden had a child, but why wouldn’t he mention something that important? Did he think I might not like kids? Was he a deadbeat dad who didn’t properly provide for his child?

That didn’t seem right. I might not have known Aiden very well, but he did seem like someone who liked to take care of people. He liked to cook for others, and he’d taken me to do all these wonderful things. It didn’t seem to fit that he wouldn’t take care of a child that was his.

So why would he hide it?

Maybe I was completely wrong, and Cayden wasn’t his child. Maybe it was his dog that remained with a pet boarder while I was visiting.

Dogs don’t read books or ride bikes.

Oh, yeah.

Aiden reappeared with dry clothes and slightly damp hair. There were water droplets glistening around his neck, encouraging me to think about licking them off. Similar thoughts ran through my head as he pulled out a crockpot and began slicing up vegetables for a stew.

“All right,” Aiden said when he had all the ingredients in the crockpot, “what are we going to do today? A motorcycle ride is definitely out.”

“I think you are right there,” I agreed, glad to have something to think about other than the way water danced around on Aiden’s skin. “What else do you have in mind?”

Aiden contemplated for a moment and then suddenly snapped his fingers.

“I’ve got just the thing to do!” He jumped up and headed down the hallway I’d been poking around in earlier. He came back a minute later with a large black box in his hands. “Xbox! I haven’t played this since I moved here.”

“Video games?”

“There’s nothing like blowing up a bunch of shit on a rainy day!” he announced. “Team Fortress 2, here we come!”

For the next couple of hours, we sat on the floor in front of the couch, and Aiden showed me how to work the controls to play the game. We ran virtual characters around on the screen, blowing up members of the other team and burning things down. It was insanely violent and a ton of fun.

“You sure you’ve never played this before?” Aiden asked as I blew up another one of our opponents.

“Never,” I said. “I’ve always stuck with city-building games.”

“Well, you missed your calling.” He laughed. “You are putting a lot of fourteen-year-old boys to shame with your mad skills.”

I giggled and blew up another opponent.

It was evening by the time we quit for dinner. Along with sandwiches, we ate the stew Aiden had made in the crockpot. He placed a bunch of fruit out for dessert.

“You really are a great cook,” I told him.

“Thanks,” he said.

“Who taught you?”

He looked away and licked his lips before responding.

“Um, this girl I used to see,” he said quietly.

“She cooked a lot?”

“Yeah, at first,” he said. “I think she taught me so she wouldn’t have to do it anymore.”

He laughed humorlessly, and awkward silence ensued.

When he didn’t say anything else, I wanted to ask him more about her, but ex-girlfriends were always a bit of a taboo subject. I certainly didn’t want to dive into a conversation about Zach. I wondered if the woman he was talking about might have been the same girl Lo had mentioned, but I’d pried into Aiden’s life enough for one day.