Page 22 of All For You
But thankfully, Aspen leaned away from me with a sneer.
“I really hate when you call me that.”
“I know, but I enjoy riling you up, so….”
As she stood from the small love seat, I followed her movements, grabbing her now empty bottle along the way.
“Can I think about it? Maybe give you an answer in the morning?”
“Sure.”
I held up the bottles, a silently question for the location of the trash can, and she pointed me toward the cabinetunder her sink. Spinning around, I leaned my body against the countertop. The entire thing shifted, and I worried I’d break the Formica.
“I guess I’ll be heading out.”
Rolling her eyes, Aspen moved toward a small chest and pulled out some blankets and a pillow. “You can stay here. I’ll take the couch, and you can have the bed.”
“Absolutely not.” Eyeing the two-person loveseat, I knew even tiny Aspen was too tall to sleep comfortably on it. We’d both be uncomfortable. “You take the bed. I’ll make a pallet on the floor. So long as you don’t kill me in my sleep.”
I could see she wanted to argue, but she relented and placed the blankets and pillow on the couch. “Okay, though I want it to go on record that I at least attempted to be civil and offered you the bed, whenever your trainer tells you that you’ve screwed up your back.”
Little did she know sleeping on the floor wasn’t nearly as bad as sleeping on the wet ground outside your family home in the hopes of avoiding your father. At least here, in her home, I’d be warm.
People tended to think my life was amazing, but they had no idea what I saw behind my eyelids every night when I fell asleep.
Aspen slipped into the small bathroom while I took the stack of blankets and laid them on the rug in the middle of the room. Shoving the coffee table against the wall, I sorted the pallet until I had a makeshift bed set up.
“Here,” Aspen said, reappearing with a freshly cleaned face and an oversized shirt covering her body. In her hands, she held a mass of material. “It’s a pair of basketball shorts and a T-shirt of Andrew’s. You’re around the same size.”
“Thanks.” Reaching behind my neck, I fisted my shirt and tugged it over my head. I was proud of the dips and planes ofmy defined muscles. The hard work I put in over the years paid off as I watched Aspen’s eyes widen in shock. It made it all the more satisfying.
“I’ll take these,” I said as I grabbed the change of clothes and sauntered past Aspen toward the bathroom. Her mouth hung open as I closed the door behind me.
On the counter, she thoughtfully left a spare toothbrush. I prayed our truce remained intact as I brushed my teeth. I didn’t need a reenactment of sixth grade, when she added Methylene Blue to my drink and left me with Smurf-colored teeth for a week.
I quickly changed out of my shorts and replaced them with the loungewear Aspen provided. By the time I made it back out to the small living space, she was nowhere to be found. There was a lamp on the end table, illuminating the room just enough for me to keep from bumping into things in the unfamiliar space.
Situating myself on the pallet, I reached up and switched off the lamp, casting the room in utter darkness except for a dim light coming from the upstairs loft area where Aspen slept.
“Goodnight, Aspen,” I called out as I turned onto my side, my eyes adjusting to the darkness and focusing on the pictures across the way.
“Goodnight, Owen,” she hollered in return. “Goodnight, Fred.”
That gave me pause, and I found myself asking, “Who is Fred?”
“The little mouse that scurries around the house. Don’t worry; he’s harmless.”
Was I scared of a tiny mouse? No. But did the thought of sharing my bed with a rodent keep me up half the night? Absolutely.
Chapter Seven – Aspen
Sleeping in the same space as Owen proved to be as impossible as I expected. I was a little ashamed of the mouse joke I threw out the night before, but he couldn’t expect our truce to cancel out all the pranks. There was no mouse to be found, now that I’d moved into the old property manager's house. It had been vacant for years, ever since my parents built their new farmhouse. There had been a small animal infestation when I first took it over, but after having someone come in and set a few traps, I’d been pest-free for the last two years.
Regardless, I wished I’d set up a camera to witness the look on Owen’s face at my end-of-the-night joke.
I was surprised to have slept at all by the time my alarm buzzed. I turned it down as low as possible to keep from waking Owen, though I heard him turning and grunting most of the night. Guilt flooded through me a few times, but he had the luxury of hanging around town today, whereas I had to work. Just like I did every day.
Thankfully, by the time I got dressed and made my way down from the loft, any residual consequences from drinking the two beers last night were long gone. Working and testing the soils with a headache was never a fun task. Especially when it was self-induced.
