Page 15 of One Night with the Werewolf
Though I do really need to go over there and pick up my stuff. He has my favorite pair of hoop earrings and at least a few of my sweaters, not to mention my movies, and also my video games, and…
Shit. It might be harder to extricate myself from Jason than I thought.
But that’s stuff that I can walk in, dig through his laundry for, and take home with me. We have one shared streaming account, but I pay for that, so I can lock him out with a password change. At least we don’t have a dog or furniture.
Maybe I’m glad after all that we never moved in together.
I’ll wait until Monday to deal with Jason. Maybe we can arrange for me to come over when he’s at work. It’s not like I’m going to steal his spoons or anything—he has nothing I want except my stupid earrings.
Jason isn’t the one I’m really thinking about. It’s what it means. Without that link between us, I’ll never see Roscoe again. Frankly, I should probably just delete him from my phone after what was said this morning, but I certainly don’t have the mental fortitude to do that.
Not today. I will. I promise, I will. Just… tomorrow.
I don’t delete it.
No, every time I remember to do it, I hover over the button. What if I really needed him again someday? I think that if I had no one else in the world to call for help, Roscoe would come.
That is a strange feeling to have about a stranger. I know that, should all else fail, I could rely on someone I slept with for a single night. But then he would vanish from my life again.
So, no, I don’t delete it. I keep him in the back of my mind, especially as I organize getting the rest of my things from Jason. He’s flippant in his text messages, giving me vague answers about when I can come over. Finally, I get in my car and drive to his apartment, and bang on the door until someone lets me inside.
“Jason’s not here,” his roommate, Troy, tells me.
“I don’t care.” I push past him into the apartment, and he doesn’t stop me.
I plow down the hallway toward Jason’s room as his other roommate pops his head out of his door. Neither of them gets in my way as I go through his room, finding my earrings, my sweaters, even some coasters that he must have taken from my apartment. I grab a book I lent him that he never read, since he doesn’t really read, and start fishing my movies out of the cabinet.
“Hey, we like that one,” Troy says, but I shoot him a death glare and he steps away.
They’ve never seen me like this before—a jilted woman, but not by Jason.
Finally, I get the fuck out of that apartment, hopefully never to see it again.
At least I get to start my new job in a few weeks, after I’ve gotten up to speed on my greater responsibilities. It’s scary, of course, but exciting, too. And the raise definitely makes the commitment worthwhile—as does the new window in my office.
Soon it’s September, and already some of the leaves are starting to change. I’m always a little sad when summer ends because I love outdoor adventures and hiking, but autumn is beautiful, too, in its own way.
Then my new job starts, and I try even harder to stop thinking about him.Roscoe. I hate that I can’t get him out of my head. I hate that I go back to that night over and over, knowing I can’t do anything to relive it. It’s gone forever, and that finality is crushing.
The month creaks along slowly. I thought that over time, the drunken memory would fade, but that doesn’t seem to be thecase at all. No, those few bright spots I have remain that way, and I spend a lot of dark, lonely nights riding my vibe while I remember them.
I wonder if Roscoe thinks about me at all. Do I occupy his mind the way he occupies mine? I doubt it. Not with how easily and stiffly he told me off. In the light of day, I must have looked very different to him—like a stupid, sad young girl clinging to someone on the worst day of her life.
Then it’s October, and the weather is cooling off fast and the days are getting shorter. I’ve come down with some kind of cold this week, because even though I’m not coughing, I feel like trash. I’m sluggish and my brain feels fuzzy, and I can hardly focus on the email I’ve been trying to read for the last thirty minutes.
I tell my boss I’m not well, and she shoos me out immediately, the germophobe that she is. My work has become my everything since that night with Roscoe, because it gives me something to focus on, something to steal that real estate in my mind. I’m not sure what I’ll do all day without it.
Back at home, I curl up on the couch with a blanket and turn on the television, hoping that curing my cold requires some tea with lemon and honey and a few hours of true rest. But I’m too hot as I lie there, and so I toss off the blanket, which makes me freeze again.
What the fuck is going on? Maybe it’s more of a flu than a cold, I think, as my stomach starts churning. Maybe the honey-lemon tea was a bad idea.
Instantly I’m off the couch, sprinting for the bathroom to crouch over the toilet just before bile explodes out of me. I retch into the porcelain bowl, gasping because there’s very little in my belly and all that’s coming out is water.
Eventually, the need to puke subsides. I fall to the cool tile floor, pressing my face against it as if to remind myself that I’m alive.
As soon as I can get back to my phone, I shoot a text to Arin to tell them that I am, unfortunately, very sick. Maybe they shouldn’t even come home and risk infection.
Sit your ass down and wait for me.
