“You’d think they’d have developed a better way of dispensing it by now,” he remarked.
“I think it’s all about portion control. You’re not supposed to use half the bottle every time.”
“Once you try it, you won’t be complaining.”
He was right. It was awesome. Somehow he’d perfected the ratio of milk to ice cream so the end result was thick, like something from a restaurant, rather than runny, the way homemade milkshakes usually were. It was heavenly.
“Yum,” I told him. “Thanks for making it.”
“It’s my favorite thing to cook,” he said.
“Oh yeah? What else is in your culinary repertoire?”
“Sardine bagels. S’mores. Grilled cheese on the Foreman.”
“An impressive range.”
“I’ve never actually utilized the oven or stove,” he remarked in between slurps. “I find them superfluous.”
“I think your overwhelming talent has probably surpassed them,” I said. He laughed in the way only confident people do, loudly and with his head tossed back.
“So what’s your greatest fear?” he asked, when he finally caught his breath.
“Oh god,” I groaned.
“What?”
“Nothing.” I shook my head. “It’s nothing, really.” I didn’t want to say what was on my mind for fear of offending him.
“You’re a nihilist?”
“Very funny.” I scowled.
“Then what?”
“I just really, really hate these kinds of questions.”
“What kind? The curious kind? The kind that show an interest in who you are?”
“YES! Exactly. The getting-to-know-you ones. The only lamer question is, ‘What kind of music do you listen to?’”
“Actually,” he said offhandedly, “it wasn’t really about getting to know you. Had you allowed me to explain myself before jumping to conclusions, you might have learned that I was asking for different reasons, reasons that directly contribute to your well-being.”
“Okay, what? Why did you want to know? And it’s bats, by the way.”
He raised his eyebrows, grinning a little. “We’ll get back to that in a second. But that’s a relief. I’m just really glad it’s not spiders, like the rest of the female population.”
“Why?” I asked. “And by the way, that is such a stereotype.”
“I only asked because there is a massive tarantula right outside the patio window, and I didn’t want you to freak out if you turned around and saw it.” I jumped and whirled around, making a strange squeal-grunt noise that I hadn’t thought I was capable of producing. The spider’s hairy leg and half its body were lazily feeling around on the glass in the upper left-hand corner of the door.
“Huh,” he said. “It’ll be interesting to see what you get like around bats.” He came around from behind the counter to stand next to me. “God, it’s been so long since I’ve seen one of these. Pretty sick, right?”
“Definitely,” I told him. “And not in the way that you mean it, either.” I could feel the heat from his body touching the heat from mine, our two heats meeting somewhere in the middle and sizzling together to form electric circuitry I hoped he could feel, too.
If he felt it, he clearly didn’t find it as fascinating as the fist-sized spider in the window. “I used to have one of those,” he remarked. “Before I got Izzy. His name was Chad.” I glanced at him out of the corner of my eye. He appeared to be dead serious.
“Go on,” I encouraged. Owen moved closer to the window, his eyes locked on the furry arachnid. Izzy nuzzled close to me, her snout wetting my kneecap as if to commiserate.
“Yeah,” he told me. “That was back when I was ten. It was how I wound up with Izzy, actually. I begged my parents for a dog for years, and my mom always said, ‘No dog, but you can have any pet that lives in a cage.’ I thought that was sort of insensitive of her, given that living things of any kind shouldn’t be caged, but I went ahead and picked out my consolation pet.”
“Chad,” I said.
“Chad,” he agreed.
“So Chad, being revolting, shed a favorable light on dogs?”
“Not exactly,” he said, tapping the window a few times until the spider scuttled away, hopefully not toward the Cohens’ house. “My mom put up with it for a while. Everything was totally fine. She just wouldn’t come into my bedroom. Which worked, because then I didn’t have to clean it. But then I started feeling bad for Chad, so I set him free outside. And then the next day, he came back. My mom found him on the front stoop, where he was eating a mouse.”
“Oh my god.” I shuddered. “That’s so gross.”
“I thought it was good of Chad and kind of catlike, but my mom was freaked out. So that was the end of that.”
“How could you be sure it was him and not some random other tarantula? Apparently they’re abundant in these parts,” I said, nodding toward the door. I pulled out a bar stool behind me and took a seat, sucking up the remains of my milkshake while I listened. I liked hearing Owen tell stories. He was so open and easy to talk to. Plus, he was kind of a weirdo, like me.
“Yeah, well . . .” He trailed off, looking uncomfortable.
“What?” I asked, sensing my chance to pry out an embarrassing nugget of information.
“Nothing,” he mumbled.
“Seriously,” I told him, “you can’t do that. Not after your nihilist comment.”
“Fine,” he sighed, obviously reluctant to tell me. “Chad had an identifying feature. I had spray-painted him gold.”
I choked, snorting milkshake up my nose. I coughed several times before I was able to talk again. I hadn’t been expecting that. “Jesus,” I said. “How did he live through that experience? And why did your parents allow you to have contact with any living thing ever again?”
“The spray paint was nontoxic,” he said defensively. “It was just that kind kids use on their hair at Halloween. It wasn’t a big deal.”
“Right,” I said, unable to control my laughter.
“Forget it. I never should have told you.”
“Izzy, you’re just lucky to be alive, aren’t you?” I said in my most obnoxious baby voice, scratching Izzy under the chin. “Aren’t you, girl?”
“All right, all right,” he said, rolling his eyes. “It’s all soooo hilarious. Now let’s talk bats.”
“Just tell me you’re not easily grossed out,” I warned him.
“I’ve got a stomach of steel.” I tried not to picture what his stomach of steel might look like . . . or feel like. . . .
“Okay, well,” I said after I’d cleared my head. “When I was nine, my mom shut a bat in the closet door. She beheaded it.”
“Jesus,” Owen said. “How did that happen?”
“She opened the door, the bat squeaked and started to fly, she freaked out, slammed the door, and the bat wasn’t fast enough. It was really sad. Not to mention gruesome.”
“I bet,” he said, nodding. “So the image of a halved bat has haunted you ever since.”
“I literally don’t see bats the same way. They’re just disconnected heads and bodies.”
“I get it,” he said. “I one hundred percent get it. I don’t even think this warrants further discussion.”
“You asked,” I reminded him.
“And now I totally wish I hadn’t,” he said. We smiled at each other, and this time he was the first to duck his head. It was one of those moments when, if we’d been dating, we would have curled up together or kissed or something. But we weren’t, so instead there was awkward space and silence between us.
“Well,” I said, clearing my throat and pushing back from the stool. “I guess it’s time for me to return to my duties.”
“Be off with ye, scullery maid,” he said drily.
“Shut up.” I turned to the door as another uncomfortable silence fell. If I didn’t leave right that minute, what had been a fun hour together was in danger of spiraling downward very
quickly. But I couldn’t help dragging my feet. It was the best time I’d had since I’d moved to Marin County. Unable to delay further, I gave Izzy a scratch behind the ears and headed for the door with Owen trailing behind me silently.
“So, this was fun,” Owen said as he opened the door for me.
“Yeah,” I agreed. “Thanks again for the milkshake. Best milkshake ever.” I gave him a wide smile, hating myself for being so weird.
“Okay, see ya around.”
“Yep. Bye! Later Iz,” I said with a final rub to the dog’s head. I was almost halfway down the front walk and five seconds into an angry internal monologue in which I chastised myself for being such a coward when I heard Owen’s voice behind me.
“Annie!” he called out. “Wait up.” Then he was jogging toward me.
“I forgot to get your number,” he said, like it was the most natural thing in the world. “I don’t want to have to come knocking every time I want to talk to you.”
“Oh, right,” I said, like I’d forgotten too. “Hold on a sec.” I had to dig my phone out of my pocket and scroll to the section under “Contacts” that listed my number. “I still don’t know it by heart,” I explained. “They just gave it to me yesterday.”
“Here, we’ll do it this way.” He took my phone from my hand and began dialing another number—his own—and a second later his phone started ringing.
“Perfect,” I said, but he wasn’t relinquishing my phone. I peered at him pointedly, but he was busy fiddling with my interface. Was “interface” the name of the phone display? Who knew. “So whatcha doing over there?” I asked.
“One minute,” he muttered. “Okay,” he said a second later, extending my phone toward me. “Now you have both my number and the most spectacular game ever to grace the smartphone. So now we can play each other.”
“Cool,” I said, trying to be casual, even though our interaction had effectively ended even better than I’d hoped, with the promise of continued communication! “See you soon.” I jogged back to the house, willing myself not to look back. He couldn’t know how excruciating leaving him had felt, or how ecstatic I was now. I ran right up to my room, sure I was sweating and flushed enough to warrant an interrogation from Libby if I didn’t clean up first. My body was fireworks. It was rapids. It was the Grand Prix. It was racing ahead of me and I couldn’t control it, but I didn’t want to.
• • •
I SPENT THE REMAINDER of the evening playing Owen in Words with Friends, the Scrabble-like game he’d downloaded to my phone just after programming his number into my contacts. I never thought I could feel such profound ardor for a cell phone. If there was a better feeling than the one I felt then, I wasn’t sure I could live to handle it.
CHAPTER
SEVEN
RIGHT AFTER ZOE’S oatmeal and strawberries, I broached the subject of sidewalk chalk. “Do you have any?” I asked Zoe.
“Mommy,” she said in a slurpy voice around the lip of her sippy cup, a tiny dribble of milk rolling down her chin.
“Mommy has it?” She shook her head, yet pointed to Libby’s office. It was a mixed message, but I walked over anyway and rapped gently on the door.
“Yes?” Libby’s voice was curt. I instantly regretted approaching her.
“I thought I could take Zoe outside and play with some sidewalk chalk,” I told her. “Do you happen to have any?”
“We just moved here, Annie,” she sighed. “Do you really think we had time to stock up on sidewalk chalk, of all things?”
“Okay. Well . . . maybe we’ll play in the sprinkler, then.” I smiled over at little Jackson, who was enjoying tummy time in his Pack ’n Play. Apparently babies were supposed to lie on their bellies for a while every day in order to strengthen their necks. Jackson couldn’t stand not looking at us—it was cute to see him struggle to lift his neck in my direction.
“I’m happy to help out with Jackson more, if you want,” I said hopefully.
Libby looked up at me, her eyes suddenly suspicious. “Jackson’s fine here with me. And why do you want to spend time outside all of a sudden?” she wanted to know. “Is it the boy next door? I know you went over there yesterday,” she said disapprovingly.
“I did . . . just to thank him. But no, that’s not it. I just want to enjoy the warm weather while it lasts. Didn’t you say this is unusual for San Francisco?”
“Yes,” Libby said. “It’s usually much cooler than this.” I could tell she wasn’t completely satisfied, but I wasn’t sure why it mattered; why should I feel guilty for making a friend? Or even a boyfriend . . . if it ever got that far? Nevertheless, I felt a little uncomfortable, as though I’d let her down. “Well, you’re welcome to set up the hose and sprinkler,” she said reluctantly. “They’re both in the yard.”
“Okay, great.” I turned to go.
“Annie . . .” Her voice sounded wary, concerned. I stopped at the door and looked back at her, waiting for her to go on. “It’s just . . . we don’t know anything about that boy. I don’t want him to hurt you. You know, if you get involved with him.” She held my gaze in hers. “I know you’re vulnerable, and I don’t know if I’m prepared to help you mend a broken heart.”
I took a deep breath, forcing a smile. “I’m fine,” I said. “Really. It’s not an issue. But if it were, I’d be fine.”
“Okay,” she said, turning back to her paperwork. “Please keep Zoe far away from the street.”
A few minutes later, Zoes and I were outside running through the sprinkler. We were having so much fun that I almost forgot why I’d wanted to come outside in the first place (which of course was to entice Owen out, too). But I couldn’t get Libby’s words out of my head. Was she being protective? Or did she not think I was good enough for Owen? I tried to convince myself that she’d just been looking out for me. That she was being protective because she’d grown to care about me.
Fifteen minutes later, when Zoe and I had turned off the sprinkler and were sitting on towels eating apple slices as we dried off, I heard the distant sound of a door slamming. I couldn’t see the front of Owen’s house from where we sat, at the bottom of the hill that formed the front lawn, but I held my breath anyway, hoping it was him.
Izzy rounded the bend first, loping past the hydrangea bush. She was off-leash. Zoe froze up mid-bite, and I wrapped my arm around her protectively. Izzy came right up to me, planting one paw in my lap and licking my face aggressively.
“No!” Zoe shrieked from beside me. “Bad dog! Go away, dog!”
“Shhh,” I told her, stroking Izzy’s head. “She’s a nice doggie. See?”
“Doggies awe bad!” she insisted.
“No, sweetheart. Who told you that?”
“Mommy,” she said, looking at Izzy suspiciously. Izzy sniffed at Zoe’s apple slice and Zoe held it out, allowing the dog to take it gingerly from her palm.
“See, Monkey? Not all doggies are bad. This one’s very nice,” I told her as Owen came around the corner.
“Sorry!” he called. “She slipped out without a leash. She’s not bothering you two, is she?”
“Not at all,” I said. And I meant it: Zoe had begun stroking Izzy’s fur of her own accord. “I think somebody’s made a new friend,” I told Owen with a smile.
“Awesome,” he said. “So who’s this little lady? I don’t think we’ve ever met.”
“Really?” I asked, surprised. “Well, she’s been your neighbor longer than I have. Zoe, meet Owen. He lives next door. Owen, this is my friend Zoe.”
“Hello,” he said, kneeling on the grass. He took Zoe’s hand in his. “It’s nice to meet you.”
“Hi,” she mumbled, still transfixed by Izzy, who was now slobbering all over her face.
“Zoe, Izzy’s so big she’s almost like a pony. I bet you could sit on her back and she’d carry you around the yard.”
Zoe looked at Owen without saying anything, then turned back to Izzy.
“I think that was a no,” I told him.
> “I think she won’t deign to talk to me,” he said.
“Can’t blame a girl for having standards.”
Owen swatted my shoulder, making me blush. Something about him lit me up. He made me feel like I was about to laugh all the time whenever I was around him. I felt both prettier and more self-conscious all at once, in particular since I was wearing the red one-piece-and-tunic combo, still wet from the sprinkler.
“Where’d you go on Words with Friends last night?” he wanted to know.
“I fell asleep,” I told him. “I had to get up early today to watch Zoe. Why, did you want to further humiliate me?” When we’d stopped last night, he’d just scored seventy-two points on placate. My WWF vocabulary was mostly three-lettered.
“Nooo,” he said. “I just missed you after you disappeared.” I felt the beginnings of a serious blush spreading across my face. He cleared his throat and looked down at his shoes. “Seriously, though,” he said then, “what’s the deal? Are you babysitting for them full-time? Doesn’t Mrs. Cohen work from home? My mom said she’s an interior designer, but her car’s always in the driveway.”
“She has a home office,” I replied, a little wary of telling Owen too much. I had the feeling the Cohens liked their privacy, given the fact that they had promised to value mine. “And I’m in school. I just started at SFSU. The hours are different every day depending on my classes, but Libby promised me it wouldn’t be more than twenty-five hours a week when she hired me. She just wants to make sure she can get some work done without having to worry about the kids. And what they’re paying me is amazing—I wouldn’t be able to afford college without it.” I stopped short, worried I’d said too much. But Owen didn’t seem bothered. He was listening carefully, but there wasn’t any judgment in his expression.
“And I don’t know, Libby’s just gone above and beyond to be as supportive as possible,” I continued. “And she seems totally comfortable having me around Zoe.”
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