Page 8 of Marked By Mayhem

For once, there may be a chance for me to work on something I love.

My boss might just have conjured up a real assignment. Color me surprised – or at least a less cynical shade of sarcasm.

The sound of the door unlocking breaks my train of thought.

I push the door open, and there stands a fine-looking stranger. At least I think so initially.

It’s Reed. In one of his acting attires. At half past ten in the morning.

At first, I do nothing but stare at his shining hair and his spring-green eyes.

He is wearing a silk shirt the color of the inside of a casaba melon, a beret, and a tremendous scarf wrapped twice around him as a skirt. "Can you believe this, Ella?" he says in a thin, tapered voice that doesn't match anything else about him.

He pushes past me, holding his right arm with his left, as if it were something he'd rather be rid of.

Reed has been my flatmate since we were thrown together by a computer during our internship at Paramount Press. Although our careers took contrasting paths, we stuck to each other. He went through a rough patch when he came out to his parents and decided to stay in L.A.

I sort of anchor him to the real world, and in return, well, I suppose he makes me laugh.

Right now, his arm is encased from wrist to elbow in a black plaster cast.

"Tell me," he whines. "What am I supposed to do about Clorox?"

"Clorox?" I murmur, stumbling up the stairs behind him and watching this stranger/friend-of-mine pour a glass of orange juice from the refrigerator. He smirks.

"What's the matter? Your boss has you up half the night at work talking about himself again?"

Should I tell him I wasn’t at work?

That I was with the ever-so-handsome owner of The Odeon in Bel-Air.

My hands clench defensively at my sides.

I want to tell him that I wasn’t working overtime for that idiot Frank this time.

It was something out of the ordinary. I want to tell him how this man I met is incredibly hot and charming. Like the ones we see in the movies. I want to tell him about the unexpected night I had.

Maybe no.

Not now.

He looks like a mess, and I want the explanation.

Reed drains his glass of orange juice, sits down on the maple stool, and wraps his legs around it.

I narrow my eyes, trying to recall his hair color. "Wasn’t your hair… purple?" I say.

He wrinkles his nose. "Like a zillion years ago. I was pink later, blue afterward, and it's cherry-red now," he says. "What has gotten into you? Why do you look so confused?"

Correction. Happy, Reed. One, for the night I had. Two, for the new possibility at work.

"Well, nothing quite like seeing you first thing in the morning,” I remark.

“Yeah,” Reed snorts. “The pleasure is mine.”

I point to his black cast. “Tendinitis? Overexertion? Some other occupational hazard?”

“Fuck you,” Reed says lightly. “I slipped on a sidewalk.”

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