by V. K. Ludwig
Hazel picked up a huge bowl filled with popcorn and walked over to the couch. “Please don’t turn this into another Sunday with political debates. I just want a nice movie marathon.”
Adair and I exchanged a quick smile and walked over to the couch. Hazel chaperoned in the middle with the bowl of popcorn on her lap, while Adair crossed his legs on top of the coffee table.
We took turns grabbing handfuls of popcorn, the butter covering my hands in grease. At each kiss in the movies, my thoughts trailed to Adair who sat less than three feet away from me, yet entirely out of reach.
Another kiss.
Sweet nothings whispered into ears.
I let my hand dive into the bowl. Instead of popcorn, I found Adair’d hand, and two of our finger intertwined. An electrifying sensation shot along my arm and jumpstarted that desire inside of me once more. Our eyes locked.
He leaned slightly forward and shook his head, his lips forming a rough-edged but silent STOP IT.
I pulled my hand out and a fistful of popcorn along with it, crunching every single one of them down with such force, my gums ached. If Adair refused to help, then I needed to find someone else who would.
“Adair, can you take me to the store tomorrow?” I asked.
He didn’t turn to look at me. “Why?”
“Because I’m getting cabin fever, and I want to browse what they got. Please?”
“I can take you,” Hazel said.
“No, I’ll do it.” Adair shoved in his seat. “Need to check in on some probes anyway.”
I gazed over to him once more and how he had crossed his arms in front of his chest now, as is my fingers had somehow spoiled the popcorn. His thumb rubbed against his index finger repeatedly. This village had almost two-hundred clansmen without a partner, and I got stuck with the one who refused to touch me.
The Jerk
Chapter 3
Adair
Three women from the Districts joined our Clan. Three! And I got stuck with the crazy one. Now she paced back and forth the length of the lab’s workstation, her hand sliding along the countertops and jumping over the deep iron sinks.
“Have you thought about making some sort of brochure to point out the benefits of the program?” Ruth asked Max, who sat on his desk with one eye glued to a microscope.
“Yeah,” he said, “but I feel like nobody will read it unless Rowan publicly endorses it. Most people don’t seem interested in how their genetics will influence the health of a potential child with their partner.”
The exchanger by the boarded window hummed a fresh breeze of air into the otherwise stagnant room, and a whiff of formaldehyde still hung in the room.
I placed the Petri dish back into the cooler and walked over to my whiteboard, adding to the formula I had started weeks ago.
“Most of the villagers are simple people, Max,” I said, pulled off my rubber gloves and dumped them in the yellow hazard bucket. “They won’t listen to scientific theories; only life-facts.”
“Hey,” Ruth called out and waved her hand at me. “Why don’t you join his databank? You were part of the Newgenics program, right? I saw your profile once along with your hologram.”
The black tip of my felt pen took a dive and scribbled a long, jagged line down the whiteboard. All the while, the blood sucked out of my limbs. “You saw my profile?”
“Uh-huh. You’ve got great genetic material, and the people here respect you, don’ they? So why not let Max add you to his program, and encourage others to do the same?”
“No, thanks.”
Max and Ruth exchanged a quick glance.
“Why not? What’s the difference?”
“Because here I still have the chance to find a wife one day, and I don’t want her to choose me because I’m approved breeding stock.”
“Well…” she said but let her tight voice trail off. Then she tugged on her boring hair updo and shoved stray strands back into formation. No other words followed. Instead, she continued her pacing, and I was suddenly struck by how distant she had been all day.
“How is the training going?” I asked Max, distracting myself from the fact that Ruth once had access to everything there was to know about me.
“Hazel said I’m learning fast. She even thinks I might be done sooner than needed, and mentioned she might leave for the Clan of the Mountains earlier than planned.”
“She said that?”
“Uh-huh.”
Something cold swept through my chest, and I knew exactly where it came from. In less than six months, my sister would get married, leaving me behind. A twenty-nine-year-old guy with no wife, no kids, and no family left.
For once, the thought of protecting Ruth offered some small comfort — even if the game she played exhausted me, and her flirting took every single fiber of self-control I had in me.
I couldn’t help but stare at how my shaky hand rested pressed against the whiteboard. The same hand that had touched hers inside the popcorn bowl yesterday.
She had no idea how my body reacted around her. Nor did she understand how much it took me not to act on it. But Rowan ordered me to protect her.
Protect. Such an honorable word to punch me in the balls like that. River might have been stupid enough to break the rules, but not me.
Come to think, it kinda worked out well for him. My lungs struggled across my next breath. What if this wasn’t a game for her after all? What if she wanted me… or at least something of me?
If that night out by the burn pit taught me anything, it was that life is short. Why not give in to her?
No, no, no.
Get a grip, Adair.
I took a deep breath and put my felt pen down. This was nothing but a silly game to her, and forgetting that, might cut my life even shorter.
“Are you done?” she asked in a bored tone.
“Yeah. Let me wash my hands, and then we can go to the store. I hate the smell of rubber on my skin.”
Five minutes later we were out the door and headed over to the village store, which was nothing more but a huge repurposed cargo trailer with squares cut out for windows. The moment I held the door open and Ruth stepped inside, all eyes were on her.
Some of the guys hid it well and stole glances over the edges of magazines or through a stack of canned pickles. Others gorged themselves on her, letting their eyes slither across her breasts and down between her legs. Those were the ones I had to look out for.
“Make it quick,” I said and pointed at the tackle in the back corner. “I’ll be over there and see if they got something new. Perhaps I’ll find gear for you, and we can take a trip to Wolf Lake for some ice fishing.”
“I only want to look around a bit and see something else for a change. Maybe they got coffee?”
“I’ll ask Earl. Shout if you need me, or if any of these guys bother you, okay?”
“Uh-huh,” she said and strolled off.
Her hand darted for each can she came across on the crooked five-tiered shelves, the colonial red paint peeling in large flakes off the edges. She turned them around, squinted at each label as if deciphering them was actually a possibility, then placed them back in neat stacks.
I walked over to Earl, the owner, who leaned against the counter, his eyes glued to Ruth.
“She’s a pretty one, heh? Didn’t expect I’d ever get to see one of them Districts women at my old age. Never thought they’d look like one of ours either.”
“Why wouldn’t she?”
“Oh, I don’t know. Guess I’m just a silly old man who can’t believe how many more women we got now. In my time, I would have done everything for a girl like her to choose me. She’d make a fine wife, heh?”
I followed his gaze. Ruth didn’t want a husband, she had mentioned it many times.
She stood in the corner by the wooden apple crate seemingly sniffing and taking in the scent of each one, indifferent about how every guy inside this building stared at her. I included.
For most in here, her b
eauty came from her tits and the fact that she had a pussy between her legs. To me, it was all that, and the way she pushed her knees inside her nightgown when she watched a scary movie with us, or the fact that she, indeed, sniffed on each fruit or veggie she came across.
I pointed at the metal locker behind him. “Got any coffee grounds left in your treasure chest there?”
“Ay. Got a pound left from the Districts, but it’ll cost’ya.”
He pulled a keychain from his belt, stretched his plum-shaped body as long as he could and unlocked the metal cage. Then he retrieved a dark green package, the corners banged up and held together with red electrical tape.
“How much?” I asked.
“Three-hundred.”
My heart skipped a beat. “Three… Earl, that’s what I make in a month, man.”
“What you want me to say, Adair? It’s my last bag. If you’re fancy enough to ask for coffee, you gotta pay up.”
I let a tsk hiss from my tongue. “It’s not even for me. She asked for it.”
He bounced his head from one side to the other as if weighing his options, then placed his hand onto the package of the world’s most expensive coffee. “You like the girl?”
Yes. “She’s alright.”
He shoved the package toward me. “Tell you what. You give me one-hundred, and it’s yours. For the lady. Because you like her and I want her to like you back.”
“I didn’t bring that much,” I said and held out my hand. “I’ll leave you fifty, and come back tomorrow with the rest. I promise I’m good for the money.”
He grabbed for my hand and gave it a good shake. “I know you are, Adair. I know you are. Now get her that coffee before she likes that one over there better.”
“Which one?”
I swung around.
Tension crawled up my spine and snaked into my arms at what I saw. A guy with the face of a mailbox leaned against the shelf, hands inside his pockets and a stupid smile on his face. He stood about half a foot too close to her, but that wasn’t what pissed me off.
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