I make a mental note to check in later with ol’ Mr. Landlord just as Bree’s finger falls away from my mouth. “Seriously, don’t worry! I’ll figure something out like I always do. But for now, I’ll take some ibuprofen and ice it between classes. I’m okay. I promise.”
Because I’m only her friend, I have no choice but to hold up my hands in surrender. “Okay, I’ll let it go. I won’t ask if I can give you money anymore.”
She tips a cute, snooty chin. “Thank you.”
“Hey, Bree?”
“Yes?” she asks suspiciously.
“Do you want to move in with me?”
She groans loudly and lets her head fall back against the couch cushion. “Nattthaaaannnn. Let it go!”
“Seriously, think about it. We both hate your apartment—”
“You hate my apartment.”
“Because it’s not fit for human habitation! I’m a thousand percent sure there’s mold, the stairs are so sticky but no one knows why, and that SMELL! What even is that?”
She grimaces, knowing exactly what I’m talking about. “Someone suspects it’s a raccoon that got in between the walls and died, but we can’t be certain. Or…” Her eyes dart. “…itmightbeadeadhuman.” She mumbles that last part, and I consider holding her hostage and forcing her to live in my clean, mold-free apartment against her will.
“Best of all, if you lived here, you wouldn’t have to pay any rent, and then you wouldn’t need to make as much from the studio.” It’s a loophole, a way for her to cut costs without accepting a single dime from me.
Bree holds my gaze for so long I think she’s wavering. “No.”
She’s a needle, and I’m a full balloon. “Why? You already practically live here. You even have your own room.”
She holds up a correcting finger. “Guest room! It’s a guest room.”
It’s her room. She makes me call it the guest room, but she has spare clothes in there, some colorful throw pillows she added herself, and several items of makeup in the drawers. She sleeps here at least once a week when we stay up too late watching a movie and she’s too tired to walk home. Yeah, that’s the other thing—her apartment is only five blocks down the street (yes, five blocks makes a huge difference in a big city like LA), so we’re practically already roommates, just separated by hundreds of other roommates. Logic.
“No, and I’m serious—drop it,” she says in a tone that lets me know I’m inching up to pushy-asshole-best-friend territory and I need to cool it.
Some might be tempted to think my full-time job is pro athlete. Wrong. It’s forcing myself to behave inside this grey area with Bree where I’m wild about her on the inside and nothing but a platonic guy-friend on the outside. It’s a cruel form of torture. It’s staring at the sun and not blinking even though it burns like hell.
Oh, and did I mention I accidentally saw her naked a few weeks ago? Yeah, that hasn’t helped. Bree doesn’t know, and I don’t intend on telling her because she’d get super weird about it and avoid me for a whole week. We each have a key to the other’s apartment, so I let myself in like I always do, but this time I had forgotten to tell her I was coming over. She walked out of the bathroom butt naked and then went back in without ever seeing me standing there in the hallway, jaw sweeping the floor. I turned around immediately and left, but that beautiful image is burned—no, something better than burned…engraved, transcribed, memorialized in my memory forever.
“Give me one valid reason why you don’t want to live here, and I’ll let it go for good. Scout’s honor.” I hold up my right hand.
Bree eyes it, tries not to smile, and then folds down my pinky and thumb. “You’re not a Boy Scout so your honor means nothing, but I can’t move in with you because it would be too weird. There, I gave you an answer. Now you have to drop it.” Bree hops up from the floor, and this time I let her go. Her curly ponytail swings behind her, loose wisps clinging to the sweat on her neck as she walks into the kitchen.
I follow behind, not ready to drop the topic of conversation quite yet because I think I finally found the real reason. “Who would it be weird for? You or Martin? Surely he knows he has nothing to worry about between us.” I strongly dislike her boyfriend. He doesn’t deserve her. I mean, I don’t deserve her either, but that’s beside the point. What kind of douchebag would be okay with his girlfriend living in a hazardous building and not offer for her to move in with him?
Bree’s eyes leave mine, her mouth twisting to the side. She’s debating something, and I lift my brows to encourage her. “Bree?”
She spins away, and her wrist full of ever-present, colorful braided bracelets dives into her monstrosity of a purse. “Did I mention I have something for you? It’ll cheer you right up after your breakup with Screechy…I mean Kelsey.” She chuckles to herself over her little quip, and I try not to let her see me smile. I couldn’t care less about my breakup with Kelsey. I’m more concerned about why she’s trying to change the subject right now.
She digs and digs and digs through her bag, and I know what’s coming. Bree has a trinket obsession. If she sees something that reminds her of one of her friends or family members, she buys it and stuffs it in that Mary Poppins satchel to bestow upon us later. I have two whole shelves of items she’s given me over the years. Her sister Lily has three shelves. We made a bet once to see who had more “Breenkets,” as we call them, and I lost. Lily beat me by seven.
Finally, she finds what she’s looking for, and out of her bottomless bag comes a miniature-sized magic eight ball.
Her rainbow nails place it delicately in my upturned palm, and she quietly says, “Number eight. You know, because you’re number eight on the team.” I’ll set it next to my number eight playing card, number eight shot glass, and number eight birthday candle. “Also, Martin and I broke up.”
Wait, huh?
The world stops spinning. Crickets silence. Everyone, everywhere on the planet turns to look at us. I, however, have to try very hard to remain neutral. Somehow I instinctively know that my reaction right now is crucial if I want to keep the status quo of our friendship. Don’t mess things up, Nathan.
“Since when?”