Page 91 of Girls Will Be Girls
His lips lift on one side. “I mean, it can be interesting, it pays well, I like some of the people I work with.”
“But do you actually like the work?”
He shrugs. “Every job sucks a bit.”
I roll my lips together, trying to decide whether to say anything, if it’s my place, but Lou is definitely a person I can say anything to without being judged.
“It’s just whenever you talk about it, your smile kind of falls,” I say. “And you just always seem so… exhausted when you get back.” I finally look up at him for a moment, but he’s staring right at me, so I avert my gaze again. “I’m sorry if that’s mean, or overstepping.”
His fingers lightly touch my chin as he turns my head back to him. “That’s not mean, and you can’t overstep with me.” He says, completely serious. “Okay?” He smiles, dropping his hands from my face.
“Okay.” I smile back.
He looks down at the beer bottle in his hands, scratching his thumb at the label a couple of times. “My feelings towards work tend to be worse when I’m not sleeping much.”
I turn my body in the water slightly to face him better. “You’re not sleeping well here?”
He bobs his head again, a sad smile on his lips as he looks at me. “I don’t really sleep well anywhere.” He continues. “I’ve had off-and-on insomnia for a while now.”
I remember back to all the times I’ve seen his sleepy eyes, his fatigued expression, and thought he was just normal tired from a big day at work.
“You don’t sleep at all?” I ask.
“On a good day, I’ll get a few hours.” He says. “Bad days I’m pretty much up all night.”
“How many bad days have you had here?”
He grins, but there’s no happiness behind it. “Most of them.”
I feel dread forming in the pit of my stomach. I feel an overwhelming need to help him, to fix this for him.
“Do you know why?” I ask.
“Doctors say it’s probably stress.” He takes a sip of his beer. “I also shouldn’t have beer.” He holds up his bottle with a smirk. “Or coffee, but after a year of going without and no change, Ifigure it’s better to get sleepy with a drink and perked up with caffeine than to slug through the day.”
“A year?” I whisper in disbelief as he shrugs playfully at me.
Without thinking too much, I lift myself out of the water onto the ledge. The crisp summer evening air cools my skin, sending goosebumps up my arms while my feet stay in the warm waters. I sit next to him, not caring that I’m dripping wet or that I’m now fully on display. I link our hands together as he watches me intently.
“I’m sorry,” I say. “That must suck so bad. What can I do?”
“What can you do?” He repeats, confused.
“Yeah.” I nod. “What can I do to help?”
He grins down at me, still looking a little confused, but doesn’t answer.
“I know I can’t actually make it better.” I continue. “But what can I do? How do we de-stress you?”
“Umm, I don’t know.” He says, and for the first time, I feel like he’s the flustered one. His usual cool demeanor slipping as his eyes drop down my body for just a second.
“Get your mind out of the gutter,” I say playfully.
He laughs, his eyes slipping for a second time and staying glued to my body. “It’s tough to climb out of the gutter with you sitting there like that.”
“This was your idea,” I smirk.
“Mm…” His eyes rake back up my body before coming to meet mine. “I don’t always have the best ideas.”
