“Feel free to follow me to the house,” I said, glancing over at him. “But, full disclosure—the bedroom isnotmove-in ready. Unless your idea of luxury is decorative chaos and a mountain of laundry that may or may not be clean.”
I shot him a grin, and to his credit, Derek didn’t even flinch.
“Noted,” he said, slipping his hands into his pockets and leaningagainst the door of his verynot dustyvehicle. Even his car was pristine and pressed. “I’ll try not to be too emotionally damaged by the lack of turndown service.”
I huffed out a laugh and tapped the top of my white pickup truck like it was a well-behaved dog. A visible handprint was left behind in the filth, making me quickly wipe my hand on my shorts. “Yeah, well, if you see a sock with eyes, don’t make it weird.”
Derek let out an amused breath, pulling out his keys. “Too late.”
I shook my head and climbed into the driver’s seat, pretending like this whole situation wasn’t so insanely fucked up.
On the drive back to my place, my brain took off like it was qualifying for a NASCAR race. Just vroom-vrooming through every possible overreaction I could come up with.
Bless my father’s heart, truly. Charlie Shaffer was the picture of Southern decency. The man would give the shirt off his back, the keys to his truck, and apparently,myspare bedroom to someone in need.
Which was beautiful, really. Noble. Inspiring, even.
And incredibly inconvenient.
If my mother hadn’t decided that she’d repurpose mine and my brother’s bedrooms after we’d moved out, there still would have been space for Derek to live with them. Instead, she now had a workout room, home office, and a fucking creative hobby space. Which, what evenwasa creative hobby space?
And, look, realistically, I wouldn’t have minded putting someone up if I had even a five second notice and the chance to meet the guy before being volun-told he was my new roommate.
But it’d be fine.
He seemed fine.
Derek didn’t come off as a serial killer, which was a plus. Ourlittle back-and-forth as we headed to our cars was surprisingly easy, actually. The guy had timing. And if he could dish it out as easily as he took it?
Things might be okay.
But, I reeled myself back in,I don’t know this guy from Adam.
Just because he could banter didn’t mean he wasn’t secretly the type to enforce a chore schedule or separate the fridge with painters tape to indicatehis sideandmy side. Who knows? Maybe we’d be terrible roommates. Maybe I’d wake up one day and find he’d labeled the shelves in the pantry by varying degrees of healthiness.
I mean, I could be easygoing…generally. But I’d never had to share my space like this before. Even in college, my privileged ass lived in my own apartment, paid for by my parents. I dodged the roommate lottery like it was the plague, especially after hearing my friends’ horror stories of passive-aggressive Post-its and catching roommates fucking on the common room couch.
What if he was the kind of guy who made smoothies at six a.m. while listening to podcasts on productivity? What if he separated his laundry not just by color, but also byitem? Shirts in one load, pants in another and dish towels in their own spa day.
I chewed on my lip, spiraling. I needed to get myself under control before I went too deep while driving. Taking a few slow breaths, I tried to calm myself.
Sixteen loads of laundry would be deeply annoying, but if he folded them himself and let me have washer access, I could make it work.
The water bill would be a bitch, though.
Maybe if he made his smoothies in his bathroom, the blender noise wouldn’t reach my end of the house. Not that I was suggesting heshouldblend bananas next to his toothbrush, but… options.
I just needed to talk to him. Like a grown-up. A calm, reasonable grown-up. God, I hoped I could be one of those.
As we crossed the bridge heading toward the southern side of Westwend, I made a quiet little deal with myself. I would do my best to make Derek feel welcome, help him settle in, and be a decent human.
If he turned out to be a dick or left passive-aggressive notes about sink cleanliness, well, then I’d march him right back to my parents’ house.
He wasn’t my problem to begin with, so you need to take him back!
Or, you know… something assertive like that.
At one of the town’s few red lights, I grabbed my phone and shot a quick text to one of my employees, letting her know I wouldn’t be back in today. She responded instantly, hitting me with a “When’s the funeral and for who?” I cussed and ran a hand through my hair. I didn’t have time to go through the whole situation right now, so I quickly typed that I would explain later. She sent a thumbs-up emoji two-seconds later, and the light flipped to green.
