Page 33 of Overtime
I blink hard. All Ryan is missing are twinkling lights around her. That’s how pleased she is with her own idea. Meanwhile, Aran resumes cutting vegetables.
“Uh, I couldn’t possibly?—”
“It’s no big deal. Right, Aran?”
He shrugs a shoulder. “Sure, it’s not like she has a lot of stuff.”
My jaw hangs.
“Great! So when are you moving in?”
“I’m free this weekend,” Aran says with his usual gruff voice.
I flap my mouth closed. Open it again. Closed.
They’re both so strange. Just absolutely unlike anyone I’ve ever met. I’ve only known the guy for a day, and this girl for all of an hour. And yet here they are, casually offering to help me with something I’ve been agonizing over for months.
Oh, no. Here come the water works.
CHAPTER 11
ARAN
This is what I get for helping. Having to help more.
“You didn’t have to do all this,” Strawberry says behind me, watching as I unravel a wire tie from around a nail she used to hang lights around her room. “But,” she adds, “thank you for being tall.”
“I didn’t grow tall for you,” I deadpan, and she snorts softly.
“Okay, what’s next?” Archie walks into the room. I hear him shuffle something and then grunt. “Whew, this box is heavy.”
“Please don’t get hurt!” Her voice fades as she follows him.
I finish untangling the wire and stuff it into my pocket. Another section of the string lights falls to the floor. I’m done with one wall and have one more to go. The position is annoying because it makes my shoulders sting and I have to basically glue myself to the wall to reach. Strawberry probably had to get on a stepladder to do this, and I hope she had supervision. If she did this on her own, she could’ve really hurt herself.
“Captain, my car’s loaded up, so I’m headed to the base,” Mark says from the door.
I flash him a quick thumbs-up before getting back to work.
After Ryan volunteered me and the guys, and after seeing Strawberry’s eyes well up like fountains with a glitchy valve, Ihad no choice but to agree to help her move. This is why tears are my kryptonite. I get this visceral need to make them stop any way I can. Which is very annoying when, say, I’m trying to break up with a girl I haven’t clicked with. Can’t fix the tears if I’m the one causing them.
But this case was easy. All I had to do was get a few of the guys to haul her stuff in their cars and deliver it at Ryan’s. No biggie.
“Maddie, is this really necessary?” a voice calls out from the hallway. It’s one of the roommates, but I don’t know which one.
From the corner of my eye, I catch as Strawberry fully steps outside the room. But the walls are paper thin, and no matter how much she lowers her voice, I hear everything.
“Yes, it is.”
There’s an exasperated sigh. “We should’ve talked about this. What are we going to do now that we’re down a roommate? You should have at least given us warning so we could find someone.”
“Rebs, I told you last month that I was considering leaving,” Strawberry hisses.
“Your literal words were ‘I don’t think I belong here anymore’ and that’s not the same!”
“It is, because I don’t!” Strawberry grunts in a way that sounds remarkably like me.
I pause for a second, contemplating whether to close the door and give them privacy. But it’ll be quicker if I just finish this and go. If only this damn tie would just unwind, I’d be quicker. I yank it instead, and out comes the whole nail.
