One
Caleb
“Damn woman, you own a lot of shit,” I say as I carry in yet another stack of extra heavy boxes. I drop them on the floor of her new bedroom with a grunt, resting my hands on my hips as I survey the scene. The very chaotic, way too much stuff scene.
“I own the normal amount of stuff,” Gracie says, sounding irritated as she enters the room behind me. I glance over at her. Yep, she looks irritated too. It’s a common emotion when she’s around me. You’d think I’d get used to it. “I think when it comes to me, you like to complain.”
“Right back at you,” I snap, just as Eli enters the bedroom, a giant smile on his face.
“Hey, hey. Roommates fighting already? This is no bueno, my friends,” he says, Mr. Easygoing. The peace keeper, which isn’t normal for him, but here he is, stuck between us. I’m tempted to pop him in the face, but that’s just me taking out my aggression on someone for no good reason.
The one I feel extra aggressive toward at the moment is the other person currently standing in this room, looking all sexy and shit, barely dressed in a pair of extra short shorts and a sports bra.
That’s it. There is way too much skin exposed and I can’t stop looking at her. Every time she catches me, there’s a sneer on her face, as if she’s completely disgusted by me, when she’s the one who’s flaunting what she’s got.
Seriously, I am so fucked this summer—and not the way I want to be, either.
“We’re not fighting,” Gracie says, her voice sickeningly sweet. “More like we’re just having a minor disagreement.”
This is something that’s going to come up time and again between us. Having “minor disagreements,” as she calls them. We clash. We always have. I’m thinking that’s half the reason she cut me out of her life around Christmas last year. She told me she couldn’t tolerate being around me anymore and she needed some distance.
Ouch.
The other half of the reason she cut me out of her life is because she’s totally hot for me and didn’t want to end up getting with me, only for it to fizzle out because that’s what we do. Not just me, and not just her, but we.
As in, we can’t make relationships last long. Yeah, I messed around with Baylee off and on for a couple of years, but that’s only because she made it so damn convenient for me. I took advantage of her. I know I did. After seeing Jackson and Ellie go through a similar struggle, only for them to end up together and completely in love with each other, I had to take a good, hard look at myself and my behavior with Baylee.
I didn’t like what I saw. I was a jerk to her—for a long-ass time. She should’ve told me to fuck off a while ago. I was preparing to go to her and explain exactly that to her, too, but the girl beat me to the punch.
Baylee cut me off around the same time that Gracie did. They both walked out of my life, and once they were gone, it was like I threw a party.
A giant, let’s see how many girls I can get with, never-ending party. I didn’t even realize what the hell I was doing. Why would it matter that Gracie and Baylee pushed me out of their lives? I didn’t need them. I was surrounded by all kinds of women. What did they matter?
Still haven’t quite figured out the answer to that…
My wild behavior only lasted about a month. Until my friends staged an intervention with me and told me I needed to stop partying and drinking and fucking girls. That I was acting a little out of control and needed to get my shit together before I flunked out of school and couldn’t play football anymore.
That straightened me up quick. Sometimes it feels like football is all I’ve got left. The last bit of glory before I end up being just another mundane motherfucker doing the same ol’ thing, different day.
Couldn’t risk losing that, so I immediately agreed with my friends, which shocked them. I can still have a good time, but I just need to have a good time in moderation.
Jesus, I sound like my dad. He’s been preaching moderation to me since I was fourteen and he caught me stealing a pack of smokes out of the carton he kept in the cabinet over the fridge.
“Caleb. Buddy. Let’s go outside,” Eli practically yells at me, pulling me out of my head.
I glare at him, realizing he’s probably been talking to me for a while, but I was too lost in thought. I send Gracie a look as she crosses her arms, her expression hard to read.
Exhaling roughly, I exit her bedroom, following Eli out of the apartment and into the parking lot.
“Are you two going to be able to get along? Because this is going to be a really shitty year for me, living with you two fighting all the time,” Eli says the moment we stop by Gracie’s car.
“She always starts it,” I immediately say, but Eli shakes his head, cutting me off with a firm look.
“You say shit too. And sometimes all you have to do is look at her and she’s pissed,” Eli says as he runs his hand along his jaw, his gaze narrowing as he contemplates me. “This was probably a bad idea on my part. You’re both pretty awful. But only together. Get one of you alone without the other one around? You’re fine.”
“And we’re living together. How the hell is this going to work?” Frustration ripples through me and I tell myself to calm down. We can totally make this work. And we need the other roomie.
Well, Eli doesn’t. He can afford whatever, because that mofo is rich. His dad the video game designer bleeds money. Me? I’m from a nice, middle-class family who makes just enough to take a couple of vacations to the central coast every year in their old travel trailer, and Dad buys T-bone steaks to barbecue a couple of times over the summer. To him, that’s extravagant living.
I want more than that. But how? I was recently forced to declare a major and I chose business, like my friend Tony. That guy is smart as shit. Plus, his dad bleeds even more money than Eli’s, and Tony is probably going to take over the family business one day. Why wouldn’t I follow in Tony’s footsteps?
Though I have no business to take over. No family fortune to inherit. I am on my own and I know it. This is why I work at Mitchell’s Landing every summer, and I have them schedule me for as many hours as possible. If the tourists don’t tip me in beer—true story—they tip me in cash. And sometimes, if they’re hot and female, they tip me with a blow job.
Again, true story.
“You have to make it work,” Eli says, reaching out and clapping me on the shoulder in an extra brotherly way. His gaze is intense as it locks on mine. “Just…try to get along with her. Stop always saying things that piss her off.”
I send him an incredulous look. “Eli. My friend. Everything I say pisses her off. You know this.”
Eli laughs. “Can you believe you just called me your friend? We used to hate each other. I still remember that night I caught you flirting with Ava in the parking lot after a game.”
“You were on our turf,” I defend, remembering that night too, when Eli and the rest of his football team—they were our biggest rivals in high school—came to watch us play on their bye week. My flirting with Ava at that time was completely harmless. I knew I could never get with her, no matter how hot she was. Her brother is one of my closest friends.