The next day was one of those days.
I hadn’t been awake an hour before I’d stubbed my toe, burned my toast, and watched Peanut throw up on my seagrass rug. Which happened sometimes. It didn’t necessarily mean he was sick, but I called the vet anyway. They said it was nothing to worry about, but we made an appointment for a checkup on Thursday, just to be safe. I was supposed to watch him until then and call if he seemed worse.
An appointment with Dr. Addison should have been a sunny patch upon the horizon.
But he still had never called to apologize after standing me up, so I really wasn’t sure at all how he felt about me.
I wasn’t entirely sure how I felt about him, either.
Because that “fake, not fake” kiss with Joe kept popping into my head in flashes: The tension of his surprise, and how fast he’d melted into the moment. The tickle of his hair as I’d cupped his neck with my hand. His arm tightening around me, pulling me closer. The velvety smoothness of the skin on his lips.
If anybody at all had asked me anything about it—including Joe himself—I’d have sworn up and down it was one hundred percent platonic.
But those flashes of memory were full-body experiences. And when they appeared in my mind, I had to suck in a quick cool breath, and then stand up and walk around for a minute.
Dr. Addison needed to pick up his pace. I could feel Joe gaining on him.
But then I remembered that I was the one who’d wanted to take things slow in the first place. What was I even doing? I shouldn’t be thinking about anything at all right now except getting that portrait done—or killing myself trying. I shouldn’t be going around kissing people! Even for humanitarian reasons.
Screw humanity! I had work to do!
But first—today—I had a long to-do list. None of it fun. Starting with a brain scan with Dr. Estrera. Which meant I had to walk along Joe’s hallway and past his apartment to get to the elevator. Which was a full-body experience on its own.
This was his floor.
This was the spot where he’d handed me a box of tissues.
That was his apartment door.
And there was the man himself, in his pajamas—
—coming out—
—of Parker’s apartment.
Wait—what?
I darted into the stairwell before he saw me and held my breath.
Did I just see that?
It was eight in the morning. Why on earth would Joe be coming out of Parker’s apartment first thing in the morning?
Besides the obvious.
I tried to put it together. Joe. Pajamas. Parker’s apartment. Eight in the morning.
It couldn’t be what it looked like, right?
I mean, it was hard to ignore the probability that he had somehow, just hours after a fake kiss with me, added Parker to his charcuterie board of women. That he really was a mutton muncher, or whatever that old-timey insult was.
I so badly wanted there to be some other explanation.
But—what?
My mind paged frantically through the possibilities. Had she pretended to faint again? Had she begged him to come kill a cockroach? Maybe her toilet was clogged and he was helpfully plunging it for her, like a gentleman?
Ugh. Ridiculous.
I couldn’t even convince myself.
While I waited for it to make sense, Parker’s hairless cat, of all things, wandered into the stairwell, as if pets were allowed to roam the halls at will. It appraised me petulantly for a minute, and then it walked right up to me, turning as it did to back up and lift its tail. I leapt away within seconds of getting peed on.
How had it come to this?
One thing was for certain: The pleasant, Joe-infused buzz I’d been feeling all morning? It stopped buzzing.
* * *
THE DAY WAS downhill from there, if you can believe it.
I mean, by the end, this day made burned toast seem adorable.
Hiding in the stairwell made me late, so I cut it a little close with the crosswalk light. I made it across, but a guy who I inconvenienced for three seconds decided to roll down his car window, shoot the bird at me, and shout, “Fuck you!” before flooring it and tearing off.
I glared after him, like, Really, sir? Wasn’t that just a little much?
He was clearly doomed to a life of rage and disappointment.
But it still kind of smarted, I admit.
Next, I climbed into my waiting Uber and, trying to multitask, checked the comments on my Etsy shop on the ride—only to discover the hands-down meanest review of my work I’d ever beheld.
I took a screenshot for posterity:
These portraits are an insult to the art world. Banal, trite, and cheesy to the max, this is “art” I can’t unsee. Seriously. My eyes are burning. Trash like this is the reason humanity is doomed to hell.