Love Bites

by Annabelle Costa

  Really, there’s only one person I can call. Only one person who won’t be furious at me for waking them up at two in the morning over something this lame.

  I select Jamie’s number from my list of favorites. It rings several times and I’m already freaking out he’s not going to answer when I hear his sleepy voice on the other line, “’Lo?”

  “Jamie?” I can hear the fear in my own voice.

  “Hey, Brooke.” He instantly sounds more awake. “What’s going on? What happened?”

  “I…”

  I need you to make sure there isn’t someone hiding in my closet.

  Wow, that sounds really ridiculous.

  “Brooke?”

  “Can you come over?” I squeak. “I’m sorry… I just… I’m feeling a little freaked out now over the whole Sydney thing and… I’m sorry…”

  “Don’t apologize,” he says. “I’ll be right up.”

  I wait for him by my unlocked front door, one hand on the doorknob and one hand on my cell phone. I have the lights on in the living room, but between the blackness of the windows and the quiet in the room, I don’t feel comforted at all. Also, Jamie takes what seems like forever to get upstairs, although I realize that I pulled him out of bed, so he likely wasn’t dressed, and it’s not like he’s speedy at his best. After a good five minutes, I hear a gentle knock on the door.

  When I open the door and see Jamie standing there, the relief floods through me. He looks like a guy who just got pulled out of bed—his short brown hair is disheveled and his jeans and T-shirt are wrinkled. He’s got his cane in his left hand and he’s leaning more heavily on it than usual, the tight muscles in his left biceps bulging as he stifles a yawn. Even his glasses are slightly askew on his nose. If I wasn’t so glad to see him, I would have felt horribly guilty for waking him up.

  “Brooke?” His eyebrows scrunch together. “What’s going on?”

  I pull him inside, feeling comforted by the sensation of his strong forearm against my skin. Having Jamie here makes my apartment non-scary again. Now there are two of us versus whatever is in the closet.

  “Listen,” I say, “if I tell you what’s going on, do you promise not to laugh at me?”

  He scratches at his hair, which only makes it stand up more. “Uh, okay…”

  “I think there’s something in my bedroom closet.”

  Jamie frowns. He glances at my bedroom door, then back at me. “Like… a mouse?”

  If I tell him the truth, he’ll really think I’m nuts. I can’t tell him.

  “Yes,” I lie. “I think I saw a mouse.”

  “Shit,” he says. “Brooke, I’d be happy to take a look, but I honestly don’t know if I’ll be able to do much to catch it at two in the morning. Tomorrow we can go buy some traps and—”

  “Can you just look?” I interrupt him. “Like, look in my closet? See if you see a mouse?”

  He shrugs. “Sure, but it might be hidden. It’s a big closet and there are lots of places for a little mouse to hide.”

  Yes, but not an adult man.

  “Please look,” I say. “I can’t sleep without knowing if I’ve got a… a mouse.”

  “Of course,” he says.

  Jamie heads toward my bedroom, and now that the lights are on, I realize the room looks like a hurricane hit. I’ve got a lot of clothes in my closet, but it looks like a good twenty percent of those clothes are currently strewn about the floor. He hesitates, looking between the ground and his cane, clearly reluctant to take a step. “Uh, Brooke…”

  “Sorry about that.” I race around the room, yanking clothes from the floor to clear a path to the closet. How freaking embarrassing.

  I walk a couple of paces behind Jamie as he limps in the direction of my closet. It occurs to me too late that I should probably have a weapon. At the last second, I grab my hairbrush, which isn’t a very good weapon, but oh well. Better than nothing. Possibly.

  I watch Jamie’s hand on the closet door. My heart lurches in my chest and I’m certain something will leap out at us as soon as he pulls the door open. I grip the hairbrush tighter, anticipating…

  Nothing. There’s nothing in the closet.

  Well, that’s not entirely true. There are about ten-thousand tops and pants and dresses, of which I generally only cycle through at most twenty. My closet has a ridiculous amount of clothing in it. But the point is, it does not have any people in it. Not even one.

  I don’t know why I’m surprised. The thought of someone being in my closet was nothing short of insane. Yet for a moment, it seemed like a certainty.

  Jamie is staring down at the floor. “I don’t see any mice.”

  “Yeah.” I wave my hand. “I may have just imagined it.”

  “If you want,” he says, “I can go out and get you a trap tomorrow…”

  “That’s okay,” I say quickly. God, I’ve already bothered him enough. I don’t want him going out to buy traps for my imaginary rodent problem. “Thanks for coming by, Jamie. Really.”

  He turns away from the closet and focuses his blue eyes on my face. “It’s no problem.”

  Now that I’m not terrified for my life, I’m able to focus on something else. The fact that Jamie looks so damn sexy having just rolled out of bed. His eyes flicker downward and I realize I’m wearing nothing but the oversized Papa Roach T-shirt I use as a nightgown. Well, at least I’ve got on underwear and my legs have been recently shaved.

  “I couldn’t sleep,” I blurt out, my cheeks reddening. “I guess that’s why I got scared. I’m still… well, you know…”

  “Yeah,” he says, his eyes quickly lifting from my bare legs. “I know what you mean. I wasn’t sleeping so great myself.”

  I look at Jamie’s face. Even though it’s the middle of the night and I have to work tomorrow, all I can think of is that I don’t want him to leave. He makes me feel safe.

  He makes me feel a lot of things.

  “Um,” I say, “do you want to… I mean, I know you’ve probably got work tomorrow, but maybe… we could watch TV a little?”

  He doesn’t even hesitate. “Sure.”

  Five minutes later, Jamie is channel-surfing on my couch while I fish around in the fridge for two beers. I suspect beer isn’t the best thing to be drinking for insomnia when my alarm will be going off in less than five hours, but it does always make me sleepy. And after what I’ve been through tonight, I need a beer.

  I hand Jamie a Corona and flop down next to him on the couch. I dug a pair of pajama shorts out of my dresser so I’d be decent, although I suspect he wouldn’t have minded if I hadn’t. I look him over as he twists off the cap of the Corona and takes a swig.

  “You can take your sneakers off,” I tell him.

  Jamie glances down at his gray Nikes. “Uh, it’s okay.”

  During the three years I’ve gotten to know Jamie, I’ve become aware of the fact that he has braces on both his ankles because the cane alone is obviously not enough. He never, ever takes his shoes off when he comes over and I’m guessing that’s why. But considering I’m in my pajamas, it feels odd that he has his shoes on. It feels too… formal. Like he’s on his way out.

  “It’ll be cozier,” I say.

  He looks at me, his brow furrowed as he considers it. Finally, he says, “Okay.”

  Resting his beer on the coffee table, he lifts the leg of his pants on the left to reveal a plastic brace that partially encircles his calf and is held together with Velcro. The brace looks old, like he’s been using it way too long and ought to be replaced, but he’s been unable to make the time. He undoes the Velcro, then pulls off his shoe and the brace together. Without the brace, his ankle drops, his toes angled downward.

  He repeats the process on his other leg. Midway through, he glances up at me, a worried expression on his face. I want to assure him I don’t care, but I sense it’s better not to say anything at all. I simply lift my shoulder in a half-shrug.

  He puts his shoes with the braces sticking out to the side o
f the couch, where he put his cane. And then he grabs his beer back off the table and takes a very long swig.

  “Isn’t that better?” I say.

  “Yeah,” he says. “Just as long as there isn’t a fire and I have to get out of here fast.”

  I think of the noises in my closet. But there was no one there. There’s no reason we’d need to make a quick escape.

  “Can you walk without them?” I ask.

  He hesitates. “No. Not really.”

  “Well, I’ll keep the fire extinguisher handy then.”

  He rolls his eyes and smiles.

  “So what are we watching?” I ask.

  Jamie grabs the remote and turns up the volume a notch. “Infomercial.”

  “An infomercial? Really? That’s the best you could find? Isn’t there an old episode of Friends or Family Guy we can watch?”

  “Infomercials are awesome,” he says. “It’s the best part of being awake at two in the morning.”

  I look at the TV, where a guy in a checkered shirt is demonstrating a fantastic new juicer. He’s dropping a lemon into the machine, rind and all. A studio audience member is on stage with him, reacting with amazement.

  “At least find an infomercial for a product for male pattern baldness,” I say.

  “Male pattern baldness!” he bursts out. He touches his light brown hair, which I’m guessing is as thick as it’s ever been. “What are you saying to me, Brooke?”

  I giggle. “Are you saying you don’t know about that huge bald spot on the back of your head?”

  His eyes widen, although I’m sure he knows I’m joking. He grabs the remote control and tucks it under his thigh. “Just for that, we’re watching this infomercial for the next hour.”

  “Don’t think I won’t tackle you, Kramer.”

  A smile plays on his lips. “I’d like to see you try.”

  Our eyes meet. My heart is thumping in my chest the same way it was when I thought there was someone hiding in the closet, but for an entirely different reason. Before I can overthink it, I pounce on him, reaching my hand between his thigh and the recesses of the couch to retrieve the remote. He makes a halfhearted attempt to stop me—from the tight muscles I can see in his arms, he could clearly throw me off him quite easily but he lets me get at the remote.

  “Aha!” I cry out, holding the remote up in triumph. I’m still partially on top of him, my other hand supporting myself on his shoulder. “Now we can watch something good. And you can’t stop me!”

  That unreadable smile is still on his lips. “We can watch anything you want, Brooke.”

  From where I am crouched, my lips are roughly ten inches away from his. Ten inches and we’ll be kissing. Ten inches and the close friendship we’ve been building for three years will turn into something more. Something better.

  Or maybe wrecked forever.

  God, I don’t know what to do.

  I lean back against the couch again, widening the distance between our lips to about fifteen inches. “I’ll tell you what,” I say. “I’ll let you watch your infomercial on one condition.”

  “What’s that?”

  I grin at him. “You have to give me a foot massage.”

  He looks at my manicured toes doubtfully. I’m actually very meticulous about my foot care—I get regular pedicures and rub moisturizing lotion on them every night before bed. “I don’t know. You walk around in those sweaty sneakers all day…”

  I smack him in the arm. “I took a shower before bed last night, you jerk.”

  “Okay.” He grins back at me. “Deal.”

  Jamie ends up being incredibly good at foot massages. We watch the juicer infomercial together, but between the beer and his fingers all over my feet and then going up to my calves, I start to feel incredibly relaxed. I feel my eyes starting to drift closed.

  “You’re really good at this,” I murmur. “You’ve done this before?”

  “I’ve been known to give a foot massage here and there.”

  I put my beer down on the coffee table so it doesn’t spill as I sink down against the couch cushions. “It’s really nice.”

  “Glad you like it.”

  I let Jamie keep rubbing my feet and legs as sleep tugs at my brain. It feels so nice being here with him. Why do I keep hesitating with him? Yes, I don’t want to lose his friendship, but there’s clearly a chance for so much more.

  But before I can think about it more, I pass out.

  Chapter 5: Brooke

  I haven’t been to a funeral in years. The last one I went to was my grandfather’s about five years ago. He was close to ninety years old and a cranky old bastard, so nobody was either surprised or terribly sad to see him go. I remember sitting next to my dad, who kept making comments about how he’d never have to field another call about his father’s bowels ever again. I couldn’t tell if he was sad over it or not.

  Jamie has agreed to drive me and Gabby to the funeral so we can avoid taking the alternate bus/subway route, or worse, hoofing it across town in the muggy July heat in our uncomfortable black outfits and heels. I still have the black skirt and blouse that I wore to my grandfather’s funeral, so I dig it out. The skirt has gotten embarrassingly snug, but it still fits as long as I don’t eat anything or breathe too aggressively.

  Jamie is meeting me at my apartment. We both slept the entire night on my couch together the other night, and woke up when the alarm went off on my phone. Jamie had slept partially sitting up all night and he looked really wrecked, so we didn’t get much of a chance to talk. He just went back to his own place so that I could shower and get to work. Our only other interaction since then was texting about today.

  He shows up at my apartment right on time as usual. When I throw open the door for him, my breath catches in my throat.

  “Oh,” I say.

  He blinks at me. “What?”

  “You, uh…” I’ve never seen Jamie in a dark suit before. Despite his blue eyes, light hair, and fair coloring, he doesn’t seem washed out by it. He looks… well, really handsome. In fact, I may even need to throw in another “really.” He looks really, really handsome. He always looks good, but today… sheesh. “You look nice is all.”

  “Shocker.” He clutches his chest in mock surprise while holding his cane with his other hand. He rarely lets go of it when he’s standing. “You don’t look so bad yourself, Nelson.”

  It’s probably somehow wrong to be flirting just before we go to a friend’s funeral. We might go to hell for this one. But more and more, it’s feeling like there’s something between the two of us.

  I wonder if he feels it too. I hope it’s not just all in my head.

  Fifteen minutes later, we’re shooting along the FDR Drive in Jamie’s Hybrid Civic. I’m riding shotgun and Gabby’s in the back, but she’s sitting in the middle and leaning forward so that it almost seems like she’s right between us. I’m not even sure if she has her seatbelt on, which I find annoying considering we just had a friend die on us. I don’t want to lose Gabby too—I really might end up at Bellevue if that happened.

  Although that seems unlikely considering Jamie drives like an old man. Granted, he uses hand controls to operate his car because he told me once he doesn’t trust his legs to do what he needs them to do on the road, but I don’t know if he can blame his overabundance of caution on that. Maybe it’s because he got hurt in a car accident, so he’s got some PTSD. Either way, I’m worried Gabby is going to reach over and start trying to operate the gas controls herself.

  “Jamie,” Gabby says, “can I ask you a question?”

  “Sure.”

  “Is there a bomb in the car that will explode if you accelerate a mile over the speed limit?”

  He rolls his eyes. “There’s nothing wrong with being cautious.”

  “I could walk faster than this,” Gabby complains. “I could literally walk faster than this car is going. Hell, you could walk faster than this, Jamie.”

  Luckily, Jamie is generally very good-natured
when he’s teased about his limp.

  “How about this, Gabby?” he says. “What if I pull over and you can get out and walk the rest of the way? Maybe we can race.”

  “Yeah, you don’t want that,” she retorts. “Because then Brooke will get out with me.”

  He glares at her in the rearview mirror. “No way.”

  She pokes me in the arm. “What do you say, Brooke? You want to get out with me?”

  “Would you two shut up?” I say. I feel a headache starting in my left temple. “We’re going to Sydney’s funeral, okay? Let Jamie drive, Gabby.”

  Gabby drops back against her seat, suddenly quiet. “You’re right,” she finally says. “This really sucks.”

  I wish I hadn’t said anything, because the three of us end up sitting in depressing silence for the rest of the trip to the church downtown. Even though it felt wrong, it was better when we were joking around. Now all we have to think about is the fact that Sydney Lancaster was murdered at twenty-eight years old.

  The funeral is mobbed compared with my grandfather’s—I can see before we even get into the church that it’s going to be a full house based on the number of people climbing the stairs—it’ll be standing room only. There are all these young, trendy people who I’m sure are Syd’s friends from the magazine. Sydney had so many friends. She might have been a little bit toxic, but everyone loved her.

  I wonder how many people would show up at my funeral.

  No, I shouldn’t think about that.

  When we get to the foot of the stairs, I can see Jamie hesitating. He always manages the stairs to get into our building, but there are more here. A lot more.

  “There’s probably a back entrance,” I tell him. Gabby is already bounding up the stairs, running to join some of her other friends. But I’m not going to abandon Jamie.

  “It’s okay,” he says quickly. “There’s a railing. I can manage.”

  He seems able to do it, using the same slow careful process as he does on the stairs at our building, leading with his stronger right leg and dragging the left up along with him. But after the third step, it’s obvious that this is going to be an incredibly slow process. He lifts his blue eyes to look at me and smiles apologetically, “Brooke, you go ahead. Really.”