Page 34 of Lovesick
“Don’t care!” he called. Then he answered the phone with a quick, “This is Mark,” and disappeared up the attic ladder with the light pounce of a cat. I swallowed hard and stared at the explosion of papers on the table.
Sweet baby pineapple, but what had I gotten myself into?
* * *
An hour later, I stood knee-deep in a mess of paperwork that didn’t make any sense, attempting for the tenth time to connect to the internet with a different password because Mark couldn’t remember which one was current, all while trying to note on a new spreadsheet just how many categories of paperwork I’d unearthed from one stack.
One of which included a midterm exam from eighth grade.
The list stopped at ninety-seven categories so far, only five of which were business.
When JJ breezed into the cabin, smelling like sunshine and snow, with flushed cheeks and a radiant smile, I wanted to throw said paperwork at his head and tell him to leave me alone or give me coffee. The last thing I needed was the equivalent of a Greek god watching me fail.
“Hey.” His smile widened. “You made it.”
He closed the door behind him, darkening the room again. Then he tilted his head back and frowned. “Did the bulb burn out over there?”
I set down a folder full of receipts. “Please tell me you can change it. I need the light and can’t find the light bulbs.”
“Of course.”
He slipped past me and into the back, rummaging in a closet near the bathroom. Less than a minute later, light flooded my disastrous workspace.
“Thank you!”
JJ rolled his eyes. “That’s Mark. Bet you a hundred bucks he didn’t even notice it’d burned out.”
“I think you are a hundred percent correct.”
He propped his hands on his hips. Breath failed me when he pulled his hair down and ran his fingers through it. This was going to be harder than I’d thought.Wayharder than I’d thought.
And that had nothing to do with Mark’s disorganization.
“So,” JJ said. “He got the paperwork out for you, eh?”
“This is only some of it.” I ran a hand over my face, already weary. “I haven’t even attempted the boxes in the guest bedroom. I’m a little afraid a mouse will jump out at me when I open them.”
“Oh, I can help with that.”
“Really?” There was entirely too much hope in my voice.
Five minutes later, as I swept an unholy amount of unused lined paper into another pile, he’d stacked four more boxes in front of me.
“That should be the last of it.”
My heart sank to the floor. “This is going to take forever,” I whispered.
JJ rested a sympathetic hand on my shoulder. “I think you’re brave, for what it’s worth. And probably not paid enough even at forty an hour, so go for a raise.”
He moved into the kitchen with a wink.
I used the reprieve to slow my traitorous heart. Eventually, I worked up the moxie to ask, “Where have you been?”
“Climbing.”
“I’m sorry, you were what?”
“Climbing.”
