Chapter 6

What part of struggles with change did you not understand?

– Marcella

“Fi…” Squinting in my bathroom mirror, I death-stare at the shape of my mouth as it wraps around the first two letters of my dear, dear boyfriend’s name. I’m all but biting my lip. Like he does periodically. What a narcissistic name if it makes everyone pick up that bad habit of his.

My lips pull back from my teeth as I achieve the N sound.

The dim yellow glow of my bathroom light makes my harsh expression and flushed, fresh-from-a-hot-shower skin look ghastly.

Honestly.

What is that man thinking?

“All together now,” I mutter. “Fff…” I swear instead.

Dropping my head, I stare at the off-white sink. It’s crammed right next to my toilet, which is smooshed right against a standing shower. It’s a straight, unflattering line of plumbing appliances with a half foot of dingy linoleum in front of it.

I need to look for apartments with bathrooms that don’t cosplay as closets.

I need to locate the main office of that stupid loan company. By the time my September bill is due, I have to be on their doorstep.

In less than two weeks, their stupid scam ends and my money will be my own. So by around mid-September, I want to be out of here, in a place with a bathtub, lighting that doesn’t make me look like a horror movie character, and enough room in front of my toilet to take a deep breath without hitting the toilet paper holder.

My ambitions might just be a little out of control.

Eye twitching, I try an endearment on for size—something classic, emotionless. “Honey.”

Suddenly, I’m in a sitcom from the 1960’s, playing a little wife. And I swear to all that is good that is the last thing I want the F-meister to picture. Seeing me as his little wife is what we are trying to avoid. Thank you very much.

Why in the world did I fill out that dumb form?

Because, Marcella, if you hadn’t, you wouldn’t be paying off a debt with over a hundred percent interest next month. Because, Marcella, if you hadn’t , you wouldn’t be giving up on finding a nickname for your idiotic boss in favor of looking into nice apartments instead.

Defeated, I drag myself out of the bathroom, get changed into my pj’s, and curl up on my couch with my laptop. Without five thousand dollars going to loans every month…I could get a stupid nice place. Is that…is that really true? What?

Sitting up straighter, I drag a leg against my chest and scroll through the options within my post-debt budget. Multiple bedrooms. Multiple bathrooms. These pictures look like they belong in magazines. These places have built-in heating and air. From actual vents. In the ceiling.

No. I’m totally delusional. There’s no way I can afford this kind of stuff. Let’s pop out a handy-dandy calculator and go through my finances one more time. With feeling .

…

I could buy a house.

An actual house.

If I stick it out in this crappy apartment until the new year, I’ll have enough money to get a down payment on a modest house with a mortgage low enough for me to afford a Publix cake every week . Which is, of course, a terrible plan unless I am also planning to become quite rotund in a vastly unhealthy manner, but you know something else?

I could afford a gym membership .

A quick, hopeful Google search informs me that, no, exercise doesn’t negate the effects of an unhealthy diet, so I’m glaring at my screen when my phone begins to ring. Without glancing too hard at where I have it set beside my laptop, I slide the FaceTime answer scroll.

“Hey, if you’re Brigid, leave your husband and move into a mansion with Penny and me. If you’re Penny, we’re moving into a mansion together. Help me convince Bridge to leave her husband.”

A distinctly low throat clear alerts me that I am talking to neither Penny nor Brigid. My attention flies toward my screen, which contains a face. A masculine face. A Ffff…face.

Thanks to all my good practicing, I swear, grab the loose neck of my pajama t-shirt—which contains roughly fifty holes from where the washed-to-death fabric has started to give up—and scoot back, frantic. I am only in a ratty t-shirt and a pair of underwear. And…and my camera is pointed at my ceiling.

Thank goodness my camera is pointed at my ceiling.

“I don’t believe I’m either of the people you expected,” Flibbertigibbets says, somewhat distractedly.

“Why are you video calling me at—” My attention flies to the corner of my computer screen. “—seven-thirty at night?”

Frogbutt’s blue eyes turn weepy. “Because. I’ve texted and audio called for work-related things this late before. This call isn’t work-related. I needed a distinction.”

Oh. A distinction. I get it. That makes perfect sense. No big deal. It’s just… Well… Now I need heart medication .

I’m sitting here half naked because he wanted to distinguish that this wasn’t a work call where he’d be telling me to pack my bags and be at the airport in thirty minutes. I am going to cut him in the morning. “Calling me on video this late is extremely inappropriate behavior for the first day of a new relationship.”

“It isn’t even past dusk, Marcella.”

“I always run on winter time. So it is well past dusk and, in fact, nearly my bedtime. I must be asleep by eight, lest the shadows activate my seasonal depression.”

He ignores me to comment, “Is that water damage on your ceiling?”

I balk, scoff, reel. “ Excuse you! Do not come into my home and judge my ceiling .”

Something distinctly breaks downstairs, shattering like a bomb going off. In seconds, the least-functional relationship in the world is screaming swears at each other, while more stuff breaks.

No small amount of distress wanders into Frankfurt McGee’s weepy blue eyes.

“Shut up,” I hiss. “Don’t you even—”

“Where are you right now?” He’s standing. I dislike this. Very much.

“You sit back down. You sit back down right now .”

“Your friend, Brigid, is she in an abusive relationship?”

I blurt, “What?”

The camera angle shifts, and I think this man is pulling on his shoes. “I’m attempting to emotionally manipulate you, full disclosure. You mentioned convincing her to leave her husband and move into a mansion with you and…Penny, was it?”

“Do not desecrate my friends’ names in my own abode, sir.”

He comes back into view, brows dipped with disappointment. “What did I tell you about calling me sir ?”

“It’s the internet sir, dang it! Note the absence of respect in my tone.”

He frowns. Actually frowns. I don’t know that I’ve ever seen him frown before. Never once. It’s…not a bad expression on him, truly. “Where do you live, Marcella?”

I wish I had a gun. Georgia is a Stand Your Ground state. Thus, lethal force is allowed to prevent things like home invasion. As a wee lassie in my underwear, being preyed upon by Frickerfracker here, if he shows up at my door, I totally have a valid reason to shoot him.

I just, still, don’t have pants.

And Fuzznugget is smart enough to remember he’s my boss and has my address on file any second now.

Before I can scramble for my closet, I learn that someone has a gun downstairs.

The second a shot fires, my skin goes cold, and I spit out my address as though I’m fully clothed, as though my dearest sweetest boyfriend will save me.

I am wearing pants when the cops show up outside my windows, casting red and blue lights into the dying sun rays. I am wearing pants when F-boy—no do not call him that—shows up outside my door, flanked by my two favorite bodyguards in all black.

He’s past my archway in a second, cupping my cheek firmly and scanning me from head to toe. It’s force I’m unused to and unsure whether or not I like, but the palpable worry pouring off him keeps me quiet. A relieved breath leaves his chest once he’s identified that I’m still alive, I guess.

When his attention skims my living room, sheer bewilderment breeds with the worry, twisting his expression into a minefield of concern. “Marcella…you live… here ?” Starkly horrified, he covers his mouth. “I thought I paid you well. The economy can’t be this bad.”

I do not want to tell him that my debt is actually somewhat insurmountable if he hasn’t figured that part out yet, so I cross my arms and mutter, “Actually, it can be. Look in my bedroom. I don’t even own a bed. It’s just a gaping floor space, whereby I partake of the occasional existential crisis.”

Perhaps he missed the sarcasm in my tone, because F-man—somehow, this works for my brain—sets me gently aside and marches to my room. A half-strangled gasping sound of mutilated despair echoes up my hallway as I fix my usual composed calm into place and tilt my head up at F-man’s massive guards.

“Jeff, Mark, doing well?”

Jeff smiles while Mark shrugs his giant, tattooed arms and grunts a so-so sort of reply.

F-man stomps back up my hallway, a hand with a pointing finger thrown out behind him. “ There’s no bed in there! ”

I drop my cheap smile. “I did say so.”

“You got the sarcastic tone right that time. I thought you were joking . Where do you sleep ?”

I jab my thumb at my couch. The simple throw blanket over the armrest nearest the coughing AC window unit is probably nicely chilled by now, meaning it’s just about bedtime. Shame that I have unexpected company . “Sometimes,” I begin, wistful, “I pretend I’m a little homeless lass, curled up on one of those sofas country folk leave on their front lawns for weeks on end with a water-damaged FREE sign taped to the back cushions…”

All the peachy red undertones in F-man’s skin drain away, leaving his hair more orange than usual. “Marcella…”

“You know something?” I say, taking a step closer to him.

“I’m not sure I want to…”

The corner of my mouth tips up. “You’re more palatable when you aren’t smiling all the time.”

His throat bobs as red soars back up his neck. Softly, he says, “You aren’t the only one with a dedicated work persona, pumpkin.”

My nose wrinkles. “You ruined this moment with that nickname. This plot point is over. I’m going to couch now. Goodbye.”

His eyes widen a fraction, then his shaken concern melts into a gentle smile as he bites his bottom lip. “I hope you know I’m never letting you sleep here again.”

“I hope you aren’t suggesting you’ll make choices that would separate me from my emotional-support black mold. I think my lungs have grown dependent on it.”

His smile vanishes, and he frees his lip. Yippee. He says, “Surely now you’re joking.”

I show him under my kitchen sink and the wall above the shower. When he’s the silly, sad outline of a man who appears to have lost all sense of self, I say, “I’m planning to move out either mid-September or early next year. I’m just trying to decide whether I want a better apartment or if I want to house hunt. With how often you spring surprise trips on me, I need to craft a secure haven for my days and nights of blissful recharge. Having a house, somewhere that’s mine , may assist in those dreams. I have always wanted a butterfly garden, so I’ll need a yard.”

“Done,” he says.

I blink.

“ Already done.”

My eyebrow arches.

Grasping my shoulders, he takes a deep breath. “I have a house ten minutes out of the city. It’s yours now. Bring Penny. Save Brigid. If she requires legal assistance, my lawyers will be in touch tomorrow morning. You’ll wake up to fresh coffee and a Publix cake. There’s staff, security, and a thriving butterfly garden. The centerpiece fountain that lights up is the only light around for fifty acres. You’ll be able to see the stars.”

I stare at this crazy, crazy man who seems to have decided my pukingly-content-to-be-married friend is in a toxic relationship. Sure, I joke that she should divorce her husband every other day because Cody is a monster who doesn’t like snakes , but that’s just, like, normal friend stuff.

No boy would be perfect enough for the goddesses that are my best friends. Period.

Freeing my shoulders from F-man’s grasp, I cough, soaking in the awkward vibes, probably because Jeff and Mark are lingering threateningly in my living room right now. You know. Within earshot and whatever. “You’re getting a little carried away and a little ahead of yourself, don’t you think?”

“There are police lights outside your window. Right this second.”

“That’s called ambiance .”

His eyes close. He spreads his fingers and takes a calming, long inhale. I hope it fills his rich chest with black mold. When his eyes open again, he’s doing that bright smile thing I abhor with every cell in me. “Pumpkin, I am so pro healthy relationship. I love communication. I’m very invested in treasuring, respecting, and upholding your opinions, values, and decisions. I want to cherish everything you care about and prove that I also care. Your body, your mind, precious . Your spirit, angelic. Your soul, invaluable. It is my honor to protect you and your peace in every way by employing kindness and consideration at every possible intersection. No means no .”

“Yawn. Can you get to the point before I throw up?”

“The point is, I am not fond of force, but you are absolutely never going to sleep here again. You are going to get in your car with your necessities, and I am going to escort you personally to my vacation home. Tomorrow, we’ll work on saving and moving in your friends.”

Without smiling, I let a deranged few laughs fall from my lips. “You’re misunderstanding. Brigid is fine, living a fairy tale, and Penny and I don’t live together because she’s like you—bright and bubbly and loud . I love her to death in every possible way, but she listens to music in her bedroom. Without headphones. I’d simply kill her. And then myself. Because I don’t want to picture a world without her.”

“You have very complicated feelings.”

“Thanks. I think it’s called being a person . Not a fan, honestly. But here we are.”

Combing his fingers through his hair, he says, “It’ll be fine. The house is thirty-thousand square feet. You can have opposite side bedrooms. On different floors.”

I lose the ability to access my cognitive functions for a moment. By the time I’m back online, F-man has located the pajama shirt I tossed into the corner of my bed-less bedroom on his way to what I can only assume is the next step of forced transportation—emptying my clothes into his bodyguards’ arms so they all can dump me off in a th-thirty- thousand square foot palace.

My current apartment is roughly five hundred square feet…so that means…the place F-man’s talking about is roughly…sixty apartments.

Ha ha. I might scream.

F-man actually begins digging through my drawers, and that snaps me out of my coma. “What are—”

He waves a pair of holey underwear in my face. “What is this?”

“My panties !” I shriek. “What the—” I swear. “—are you doing ?”

He rips sock after sock out, unrolls them, and stuffs his fingers in the holes. “Why does everything you own have holes? You’re always so put together at work.” He rips out a bra, examines the staining, the strap. He tugs on the elastic, or he tries to, at least. It’s gone. It’s been gone. No more elastic to speak of. “What the—” A breathless curse whispers from his gaping lips. His head begins shaking softly. “Marcella…” When he sees my face, something like sense snaps into him. He peers between me and the cheap, plain bra I’ve had since high school. Heat explodes in his cheeks, and he swears as he drops it back into my drawer. “I’m sorry.” More swears. “I wasn’t thinking. I’m so—” Swear. “—sorry.”

Swallowing uninhibited rage, I mutter, “Are you done?”

“Y-yes.”

“So you’ll get out of my apartment now?”

“No.” He swipes a hand down his face; it’s trembling. “I’m dead serious, Marcella. I’m not leaving you here. And tomorrow, we’re taking the day off to get you a new wardrobe.”

“Do you even understand how much work it will be to adjust your schedule for that?”

“ Marcella .” Tone hard, he meets my eyes.

I flinch. “ Stop saying my name. And definitely don’t say it like that .”

“You’re my girlfriend, right?”

“I mean. Kinda?”

“How does your name on a legal document that says you’re my girlfriend result in kinda ?”

I cannot argue with the logic. Or, well, I could , but it would not make me correct, and then I’d feel gross. “Okay. You’re absolutely right. Yes, I am your…girlfriend.”

“An exemplary one, no less?”

I knew I’d regret saying that. Lips peeling back from my teeth, I fight my way through, “Y-eesss…?”

“Are you not also my assistant, who is under a different contract outlining that your availability is to be made around my schedule, outside of emergency situations involving health or familial disruptions?”

“Yes, I traded my soul to your company. That is a fact.”

“So, as my assistant, arranging time for me to spend with my girlfriend whenever I deem is perfectly reasonable, and, as my girlfriend, letting me spoil you when I discover you lack basic needs is also perfectly reasonable, isn’t it?”

I throw my hands in the air. “I don’t know! Maybe in rich people land it’s reasonable to give your girlfriend a house and buy her a new wardrobe on a whim, but I’m not from rich people land! The gunshot scared me. I appreciate you coming by and reminding me that a stray bullet most likely isn’t going to come through my floor now that the cops are here. You have done your perfectly normal boyfriend duties. Must you be such an overachiever?”

“Yes, actually.” His arms cross. “It’s a compulsion of mine.”

Oh my word.

His arms are crossed.

They’re crossed.

Over his chest.

Because he’s upset .

I’ve never seen this before.

The way the action displays his muscles is something I am entirely unprepared for.

“What are you looking at?” he asks.

My gaze drags up off his chest and to his face. I squeak, “Nothing.”

Confusion knits his brows, but he lets it slide. “Marcella, please. If not for you, for your friend. Think of Penny. I can’t imagine she’d want you to stay here if you had another option. I can’t imagine that she’s in a better situation if she can’t give you a better option.”

She…really isn’t. She’s a starving artist who takes that term too literally. She’ll forget to eat almost daily because she’s busy working two part-time minimum wage jobs and fighting in the weary evenings to get her projects off the ground before she passes out with a paintbrush in her hand.

If we were in the same building, I could work making sure she at least has dinner into my schedule. I could bring her water while she paints. It wouldn’t be so bad. Probably less loud than my current neighbors.

Dropping my chin, I mutter, “That’s playing dirty.”

“I cannot find it in myself to care less.”

My eyes close. “You suck.” And, yet, for the first time in two months, I’m not certain I despise this side of him. “Fine. Let’s hurry up and get going. I’ll need to get a head start on phone calls and emails to adjust your schedule tomorrow morning. The soonest I can make it work is noon.”

“Perfect. I’ll take you to lunch. Think of where you’d like to go.”

To bed. I would like to go to bed.

And, isn’t it ironic, that in the four years since I was a dorm student, I’m going to have a bed to go to…

The part where you mentioned wanting a functioning AC seventeen times in two hundred questions. Also, the police outside was a compelling factor in my lack of understanding.

– Finnegan