Page 17 of There's Pumpkin About You
She looks annoyed and a chuckle sits on my chest. Has no one ever stopped to think that maybe I’m just saying things as they are? That I’m merely forming a sentence and associating it with the proper tone that implies whether or not it’s an opinion or fact.
I look away and roll my shoulder. With my free hand, I reach for the coffee and take a sip. That familiar combination of coffee and pumpkin floats over my tongue and I all but groan. It’s a taste I love, but it’s currently being dampened by the knowledge that I’m drinking it at the wrong time. When I woke up this morning, I had expected her to bring a coffee again, because if there is one thing I can deduct about Wren Southwick, it’s that she’s stubborn enough to bring coffee every day until I say yes. It’s partly what makes me want to say no.
Now that she’s brought me exactly what I expected to have almost four hours ago, I’m bombarded by the usual feeling that comes with the slightest change. The closest analogy I can offer is that it’s as if I have a million and one ants crawling under my skin. Not that it’s scientifically possible to have a million ants crawling under your skin because both you and the ants would die, but the sensation is imaginable all the same.
I close my eyes and twist my head from side to side in a pathetic attempt to control my reaction. Getting overstimulated isn’t something that I need her seeing. I don’t need a woman like Wren knowing that I struggle with something as simple as drinking coffee at a time that wasn’t self-appointed.
“I still haven’t decided, by the way.” I put my coffee back on my desk and clench my fist under the table. “Despite my brother trying to make the decision for me.”
We sit in silence, and I welcome it even though it’s awkward. When I find the confidence to slide my gaze back up to Wren, I find her watching me through slitted lids.
She’s analyzing me and I’m surprised that’s something I’m noticing so easily. Slitted eyelids usually equal anger, exactly like it did when she glared at me the first day I met her. But it’s all there in the cute little tilt to her head and the way her lips tease me with a hint of a smile.
“What about a trial period?” she asks.
“How the hell do you conduct a trial period to rebuild a barn?”
“It’s not a trial period for the barn; it’s a trial for us. To see if we can work together. The barn gets fixed regardless because let’s face it, it seriously needs a touch-up either way. We can fix the things that desperately need it to start off with, such as the upper level, the broken windows and the flooring. If you find that it’s too difficult and I’m too untrustworthy because of my—how did you put it? Pretty face?—then we part ways, I find a new venue, but you still have the help from my brother and his team to finish the work. Oh, but I still get my pumpkin order either way, I’ll just be nice and say that if we part ways, I’ll lessen the quantity to make it easier on you guys.”
I run my hand through my hair and adjust my glasses. “How long would it take you to find a new venue?”
She scoffs. “What do you think this is, my first day? I’ll find a backup so that it’s ready to go in case I need it.”
My eyes float around my desk to the incomplete invoices, the tax returns and the unprocessed orders. I lift my wrist to look at my watch which now sits on the wrong side thanks to the disgustingly orange cast that decorates my right wrist. I’m twelve minutes late.
I readjust myself in my seat and clear my throat. “Next time you come by, make sure it’s either before nine, between eleven and twelve, or after two. If you’re bringing coffee, then don’t bring it after nine.”
There’s the anger. There’s a big difference between the two emotions when I see it on her. It’s no longer a puzzle I have to work out, maybe because I can’t help but analyze her every expression. Or, maybe because the fire in her eyes cannot possibly be anything else. She doesn’t bother to hide anything in that brown and green gaze.
“If you’re going to talk to me, make sure you’re not doing it like a butthead.”
“Butthead?” I question.
She offers a single nod.
I don’t want to tell her that I don’t understand. Most people mistake misunderstanding for stupidity these days.
“Right,” is all I can find to say.
“By that I mean that you can’t talk to me so rudely all the time.”
I scratch my beard, completely perplexed. Thankfully, Bash chooses this moment to walk into the office. He looks cautious as he walks in, green eyes nervously flitting between Wren and me as if sensing the energy in the room before opening his mouth.
“Everything okay in here?”
“Everything is fine,” Wren says at the exact same time that I say, “I think she was just telling me that I’m an asshole.”
Bash smiles. “Glad to know she’s telling it to you like it is.”
I glare at him fiercely. Bash is used to my “sour personality” as Wren puts it, mostly because he knows it isn’t sour at all. I’m just sick of being nice to people first and then being treated like an idiot just because I’m different. They hear the word “disorder” and take that to mean the same thing as “incompetent”.
Wren turns towards Bash, her lips breaking out into a smile that threatens to cloud my judgment.
“Gus was just agreeing to a trial period to see how working together pans out.”
Bash looks impressed. “Really?” he beams. “Well, isn’t that good news. I was just telling him yesterday how good it would be if we took you up on your unbelievably kind offer.”
She pretends to be shocked at the news even though I told her just minutes before that he wants to work with her. There is just no need to be so fucking dramatic. Both of them.
