With Love, from Cold World(43)

“No excuses for yourself,” he clarified. “This is you, cracking the whip on . . . yourself.”

“It works!” she said. “Haven’t you ever had a task you’re scared of? Like, you don’t even want to open that can of worms. So you write step one down on your list, put a number next to it, and boom. When that number comes up, you have to do it. You don’t give yourself the chance to be scared of it.”

He shifted back on her desk, bringing his ankle up to cross over his knee. She should care that he’d just pushed back a whole stack of papers that were now fanned precariously close to the edge. She should care that he was making himself so at home in here when they’d been arguing off and on all day. But she didn’t. She was too focused on his face, which had lit from something within as he grabbed a pen off her desk and turned to the next page in the notepad.

“I like this idea,” he said, starting to jot something down. “Random numbers to help you get over the stuff you’re scared of.”

“Or just don’t want to do,” she pointed out. “I use it for all kinds of trivial daily tasks. Anything urgent I bump to the top of the list, but everything else gets assigned a number one to ten, and then when I cross one off I assign the next thing on the list that number.”

“Got it,” he said. “We’re going to play a little differently.”

Lauren felt a frisson of . . . was it anxiety, or anticipation? “What do you mean play?”

“Shhh, hang on,” he said, still writing. “Sorry, didn’t mean to shush you. Just give me a second. I’m trying to think of two more.”

“Two more what?”

“Okay,” he said, finishing his writing and sliding the notepad back toward her. “What do you think?”

She turned it so she could better read the ten items he’d listed. His handwriting, which she’d already noticed before was almost unnaturally neat, was a little messier now, the letters joined in a half-print, half-cursive hybrid.

         Ask me anything



     My favorite _________ is . . .



     I dare you to . . .



     Tell me a secret



     Would you rather . . .



     Compliment me!



     I can’t stand _________



     Contest



     Take a break!



     Freestyle





“What is this?”

“The Random Number Generator Game,” Asa said, waggling his eyebrows. “I just invented it. Well, based one hundred percent on your original idea. So I guess you were right that you’d end up doing all the work if we ever paired up together.”

She looked over the list again. Tell me a secret made her stomach flutter; the notion that she’d ever compliment Asa to his face or ask him for a compliment turned that flutter into a pit. She understood the concept now—a list of conversation starters that you’d have to answer without giving yourself the chance to be scared of them first.

“Contest?” she asked.

“Arm-wrestle, who can create the longest paper clip chain in twenty seconds, it doesn’t matter,” he said. “And before you ask, freestyle just means come up with something on your own. Really it’s because I couldn’t think of anything else.”

She took another sip of her drink automatically, but she’d already forgotten that it was hot chocolate and not coffee. This time she couldn’t stop herself from making a face. “It’s late,” she said. “I’m expecting Daniel to call back any minute.”

“So we use this to pass the time.” He pulled out his phone. “Is there an app for the random number thing?”

She sighed, giving in. “Try random dot org. It uses atmospheric noise to generate its numbers, instead of a pseudo-random algorithm.”

He raised his eyebrows at her. “Okay, but you’re not allowed to make I’m a huge nerd your secret, because that one’s out.”

She couldn’t help but laugh. It was funny, how much she didn’t mind his teasing when she knew that the spirit behind it was friendly. It actually made her feel oddly warm and fuzzy inside, the way he called her a nerd as if he liked it.

“I’ll go first,” he said, tapping his phone before turning it to her so she could see the number seven on his screen. “I can’t stand . . . hmm. I can’t stand hot chocolate.”

“Oh my god,” she said. “Me, either! I mean, it was very nice of you to bring me this, but yeah. It’s not my favorite.”

“Whoops,” he said. “Slip of the tongue. I meant to say I can’t stand raw onions. But I guessed you didn’t like it, from the way your nose crinkled after that first sip. Why didn’t you say anything?”

Lauren couldn’t believe he’d set her up like that. She couldn’t believe she’d fallen for it. “Chocolate is not a valid slip of the tongue for onions,” she said. “And we’re only on the first question and you’re already cheating! That can’t bode well.”