Page 24 of Head Over Heels

He’s giving me a weird look now. “Ilikehanging with you.”

“I guess that’s sort of my point. You like hanging with me because I’m safe and you know there’s no way in hell I’ll stop being safe.”

He opens his mouth, then shuts it again.

Shit.I’ve gone too far.

“You—might be right.”

Okay, that wassonot the response I was expecting. I was expecting him to get mad or say something else, but he looks thoughtful. He pushes himself to his feet and says, “I’m going to get myself a beer. Switch to your iPad, and we’ll have an official consolation party.”

Okay then. Conversation over.

He goes into the kitchen and comes back with a beer and his iPad. He dims the light and plops down on the couch next to me. Fiddles around with the Netflix app.

“What’re you watching?”

“The Fate of the Furious.The eighth Fast and Furious movie.”

“Of course you are,” I sigh.

“At least my movie doesn’t deplete the rain forest by using up all the tissues in the house.”

I stick my tongue out at him and pull the tissue box closer.

We watch for a while side by side.

Sometimes I go to the movies with Eve. We sit together and share popcorn and Junior Mints. We watch the same movie. We cry at the same time.

That’s the gold standard, right?

I guess all I’m saying is that I’ve never understood why sitting side by side in Chase’s living room with two different movies and two different drinks should feel so—I don’t know,cozy.

One of life’s little mysteries.

Chapter 11

Chase

“Holyshit.”

Liv turns from where she is straightening a framed photo on the wall in her room. “I’m going to take that as a compliment,” she says dryly.

It’s Sunday afternoon. I came upstairs because I heard hammering, and when you hear hammering in your house, it’s usually a good idea to check it out.

Somehow, Liv has turned my dull-ass guest room into something out of a magazine. A couple of hours ago it was a big blank—white walls, drab carpet, a bed made up with camp-style blankets and a lone pillow, some stacked milk crates, and a shabby dresser.

She has transformed it into a beach cottage, all light and airy. The bed is neatly made up with blue-and-white bedding. The windows are covered with sheer white curtains and framed with a cobalt-blue scarf. She has draped white fabric over the milk crates and dresser and arranged knickknacks on top—including a mason jar full of vivid sea glass. As I watch, she hangs a photo of a beach, beside two others.

The whole thing is pointless and wasteful and—pretty. And those stupid beach photos make me want to go change into my bathing suit. (I wonder what Liv would look like in a bikini—nope. No, I don’t. Oh, crap. Yes. I do. In a little red bikini with boy shorts, curves spilling out everywhere, white creamy skin dotted with freckles. I have to stop. She made it clear last night that she’s not interested in anything physical with me.You know there’s no way in hell I’ll stop being safe.)

“Ninety-two,” she says.

“What?”

“You were going to ask. How much I spent. Ninety-two dollars.”

“How did you do all this for ninety-two dollars?”

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