Chapter 4

CHAPTER 4

December 24, 7:51 pm

NESSA

“ M ake yourself at home,” I say, opening the door wider. Hot New Guy—Jack—looks freezing. His teeth are literally chattering. “Here, sit by the fire and warm up.”

He either nods or shivers aggressively and makes a beeline toward the fireplace—one of the main reasons we keep renewing our lease. That and we all agreed it isn’t worth the hassle of moving until we can afford a place with an in-unit washer/dryer and a pool. Or until one of us gets married—which felt a lot further away at twenty-three than it does now at twenty-eight.

Jack drops to his knees and holds his open palms up to the glass. He looks like he’s praying, and I wonder if the holiday means more to him than Santa Claus, reindeer, and fruitcake. There’s something in his posture that looks more than just cold, though—he looks sad, almost defeated.

“Are you okay?” I ask. His teeth are still chattering, and his lips have a blueish tint in the firelight. The power’s only been out for about thirty minutes, but who knows how long he was outside in the blizzard before his assault on the snow people.

Jack lets out a shaky breath that sounds so cold it makes me shiver, and I stuff my hands in the pockets of my fleece-lined sweatpants. They’re toasty and warm—or maybe that’s my body heat? Isn’t that the best way to help someone get their body temperature back to normal? Skin-to-skin contact?

I take in his broad shoulders. The blanket is covering the bulk of him, but the memory of the first time I saw him is vivid enough to fill in the blanks.

It was a week or two after the Fourth of July, and I was heading out to a street festival when Jack—then Hot New Guy—was coming in from a run, shirtless. I remember being impressed by his calves, which is not a part of the male anatomy I’ve ever been particularly drawn to. The other thing I couldn’t help but notice was his height—at least six feet tall—and his barely-there chest hair, unlike the NJBs—Nice Jewish Boys—of my past.

I take a tentative step toward him and lay my hands on his back, rubbing wide circles. Maybe the friction will help? Jack makes another noise, this one more like a moan. The sound does something to me, and I do some quick math. It’s been eight and a half months since I’ve had the pleasure of getting off by something that didn’t require batteries.

No wonder I’m like a live wire around this guy. I continue making circles on his back until his breathing slows and his body seems to stabilize. Apparently, I have the opposite effect on him as he has on me. Which is for the best anyway, since Julie called dibs on him.

Plus, banging a neighbor is only convenient until somebody decides he “needs space” because you’re getting too clingy even though he’s the one who knocked on your window literally every night, and then, you have to see him bringing home a different girl every weekend because his front door was literally three feet from yours.

It's the story of my life: I’m either not enough or too much. One or the other, nothing in between. Never anyone’s first choice.

“Thank you,” Jack says now, and I hope I didn’t make things weird. I take a step back, suddenly not sure what to do with my hands.

I stuff them back in my pockets and say, “It’s the least I could do—I’m sorry your holiday keeps getting worse.”

Jack turns and smiles, a subtle quirk of his lips that makes my inner thermostat turn up a few degrees. “It’s starting to get better.”

I can tell the moment he clocks the Joy’s Noodles take-out bag on the floor. His eyebrows arch, and I follow his gaze to the coffee table where there are enough take-out containers to feed a family of four.

I’m bracing myself for a comment about the copious amount of food I got to properly eat my feelings when he says, “Thai? I thought Jews ate Chinese food on Christmas?”

“We’re not a monolith.” I don’t mean to sound offended, especially because he’s right. “But also, I haven’t found decent Chinese that delivers around here.”

“But you found good Thai?”

“The best. You hungry?”

His stomach answers for him, letting out a low, rumbling grumble. Almost like a growl. I can’t help but smile, even though I wish he were hungry for me and not my Pad See Ew.