Humming louder, I tossed the roll of lights into the middle of the yard before dragging the end over to a lit strand and plugging it in. Everything blinked for two glorious seconds before a loud zap split the tranquil morning, and my lights went dead.
Confused, I followed my extension cord around to the back of the house where the outlet was. When I rounded the corner, I drew up short, mid–gum chomp, mid-hum.
Bryce held the end of the cord. The plug drooped over his knuckles.
I grinned. “Used to things hanging limply in your fist when you try to use them?”
“Hilarious.” His thick morning voice curled around the word in disgust.
Bryce wasn’t wearing a shirt because Bryce never wore a shirt. He was one of those people who likely spent a long time making it look like they spentnotime on their appearance.
My feelings for him had grown so intense, he’d turned into a Bitch Eating Crackers—meaning everything he did got to me, even something as innocent as eating crackers.
His stupid clothes were always the perfect level of worn and rumpled. His scruffy five-o’-clock shadow was a permanent fixture on his stupid face. The ginger hair on top of his stupid head looked three months overdue for a haircut at all times, and it always had a messyI just had wild sexlook, which had to be manufactured, because who would have sex with Bryce? As a final injustice, he didn’t look like he worked out, but he was still sinfullyhot in the same way that pale, willowy Victorian men with poor immune systems are hot.
Realizing I’d spent too long staring, I peeled my eyes away from the dusting of orange hair leading from his belly button to the low-slung waistband of his jeans. On anyone else, I’d call it a happy trail, but I had no desire to skip down Bryce’s. It was more like a dismal path to the underworld you only went down if you were dying, and the grim reaper dragged you, kicking and screaming.
“You’re trespassing.” I pointed at Bryce’s toe, which crossed the line of Christmas lights separating my half of the yard from his. “Like a good neighbor, stay over there.”
“Spare me,” said Bryce.
The spark his eyes usually held when we argued was absent today. That was weird. Maybe I’d finally overstepped, even though this didn’t seem nearly as devious as the time he signed me up for the alumni magazine of the Ivy League college that rejected me.
“You need to take these lights down,” said Bryce. “They’re a safety hazard. You’re going to turn the house into a fun new Christmas-in-May fire statistic.”
God, he was wound tight. “Well,” I said cheerfully, “I’ll be at work. So as long as you don’t get out in time, that’s all that matters.”
He let out a disbelieving bark of laughter. “Did you just wish me dead?”
Our dance of witlessness stuttered to a halt. Yes, we’d both clearly decided to hate each other for all eternity, but our insults usually remained in the realm of harmless playground clapbacks. It kept the fact that we would not be friends established without getting law enforcement involved. Times had changed. You couldn’t go around holding knives to the throats of your arch nemeses anymore.
I crossed my arms defensively. “It wasn’t like I said,I hope youdie.” I lifted my nose. “It was a subtle implication. I’m a lady. I have couth.”
“Courtney, Courtney, Courtney.” He tsked. “I’m afraid you’re so unlovable, even Mr. Rogers wouldn’t want to be your neighbor.”
Afeelingtook hold of my gut and twisted, sending a sharp sting through my body. Even the unluckiest squirrel found a nut sometimes, but if I kicked the nut away before he realized his success, he’d remain in despair, starved of victory.
I kicked all the nuts, hard and far, before plastering a smile on my face that I prayed was convincing enough to hide the fact I’d just kicked my own emotional nuts. “Geez, Bryce. Who crapped in your cornflakes this morning?”
“More like who de-cookie-doughed my birthday ice cream.” He gave me a pointed look.
“Is it your birthday?” I asked absently, as though I hadn’t been badgering our landlord for months to tell me Bryce’s birthday so I could make it particularly terrible.
“My eightieth, apparently.” He let out a long sigh and averted his eyes. “Look, I think we need to talk.” The edge of snark Bryce’s voice usually held was all rounded over so that it became something ordinary. “We can’t keep doing this forever.”
Suddenly,Ifelt ordinary, like any old neighbor he might have a polite conversation with. The razor-sharp words he usually reserved for me set me apart… made me feel special. With one sentence, he’d lumped me in with the rest of the world.
Bryce held up his phone with the screen pointed in my direction. “I saw this and thought of you.”
I leaned in, expecting to see a picture of Gollum or some other grotesque creature. What was there was worse. “A job posting?” The light of his screen blurred in my vision, the words distorting until I could barely read the ad. “You think I should house-sit for someone in California? That’s on the other side of the country.”
“Sittingis literally in the job description. You will excel.”
“Ha ha,” I said, because this must just be another game. An elaborate insult.
“I’m serious,” Bryce said, in that same cordial voice that made me feel like a nobody.
“You want me to leave?” It was as close as I’d ever gotten to asking him how he felt about me. I’d thought he was like me, and some part of him craved this rivalry we started.
