Although Jen would be sure to notice if I suddenly sprouted a bandanna over my entire face like I was playing Blind Man’s Bluff, and she’d question me about it.
Shit.
Seeing that there was no way to win here, it made more sense to leave my eyes on the seeing side of the spectrum.
Double shit.
“You okay? You look funny.”
Yeah, I’ll just bet I did.
“Just thinking about how to spice the chicken. You want to make the salad?” I turned my back to her and bent down to pick up the lettuce with one hand, surreptitiously adjusting the front of my pants with the other.
This was going to be one long fucking week.
After the clean-up (which I totally did, so keep your comments to yourself—just because there was a woman in the house did not mean that I expected her matching x-chromosomes to take over the housework), Jen wandered to the living room to pick out a movie while I grabbed us a couple of beers.
I also went back to my room and picked up the bag containing her key. It looked a little ratty now, that bag. I shook the contents into my hand and tossed the paper sack into the trash.
As Jen perused the titles on the shelves, I called her name quietly. She tossed a “Yeah?” over her shoulder, her eyes still glued to the spines of the DVD cases.
In her defense, I have over four hundred movies, and she probably didn’t want to lose her place. Still, this was important. I wanted her attention.
I needed to see her expression when she took the keychain.
Sure, I’d given Jen the Pop Tarts I’d picked out for myself, a constant hard time, and that one kiss, but this was the first thing I’d chosen specifically for her, and her liking it mattered.
“I have something for you.”
That got her to turn away from the shelf of videos. She smiled brightly and said, “It’s not an air horn to wake me up with, is it?”
“No, but now that you mention it…”
She took a step closer and smacked me on the arm. “I knew you couldn’t keep your hands off me,” I said, reaching out to grasp the one she’d whacked me with. I pressed the keychain into her palm. “Your key.”
I watched her face as she opened her fingers and took in what I’d found. Her smile widened as she dangled the fob by the key. The pink and black AC/DC logo spun slowly, the matching crystal-studded lightning bolt that ran down the middle of the letters winking in the fading light of the setting sun.
“Wow, Tack. This is really cool. Thank you.” She popped up on her toes and, with one hand on the side of my face, kissed me on the cheek. It was over so fast that I barely had time to register what she’d done. And though her hands were both back down by her sides, I felt the tingle where her fingertips had been on my skin.
It burned. Or maybe that was simply how it felt when a grown man turned into a sappy girl.
She spun off to put the key in her purse, and I just stood there, silent and unable to move. This was a gigantic deal, both the key and what it was attached to, and she’d reduced it to something to stuff into the front pocket of her handbag.
Wow.
I cracked the top of my beer and settled into the corner of the couch.
Jen returned in her flannel pants and tee and told me I should choose the movie. I picked HBO instead; I didn’t want to get stuck with rolling credits and a comfy, snoozing Jensen trapping me on the sofa again.
Since there was beer to be consumed, Jensen decided to sort of recline on the sofa, using me as her backrest. I didn’t argue—she was soft and warm and a total conundrum.
I seriously didn’t know what to make of this dynamo named Jensen MacKenzie. Sometimes she flirted, other times she treated me like I was her brother. She was constantly surprising me with her reactions to pretty much everything, and her wit and intelligence were both razor-sharp. It was rare that someone beat me to a punchline, or treated me like the straightman, but she managed to do it every single day.
I wasn’t sure if I was jealous that she was better than me or half in love with her.
So when she nestled into my shoulder, I decided it was best not to read anything into it (I’d probably be wrong, anyway) and made a spot for her to rest her head by putting my arm up on the back of the sofa. After a few adjustments, she settled her cheek into the hollow I’d created and drew her legs up onto the cushions sideways.
Ted was just starting, and though it was a little raunchy, it was also hilarious and a movie Jensen had never seen. A half an hour into the movie, my arm was falling asleep, and so was Jen. I could tell because she’d stopped laughing, and her beer was tilting precariously in her drooping hand. I took the bottle and polished it off, then set it with my two empties on the floor.