CHAPTER 1
EROS
“No, Matty, I’m not going on a double date with you.” I flip through the television menu. Why do I subscribe to five hundred streaming services and have nothing to watch? I settle on a documentary about vampire myths. It seems like the right sort of background noise for my conversation with my teammate from the basketball pickup league we have on Wednesdays.
“Why? It’s not like you have anything else going on.”
“I’ve got dishes to do.” Huh, Romanians don’t like the vampire stories. I was not aware of this.
“What dishes? You have a dishwasher. Besides, you can’t cook for shit. The only dishes you have are the ones you use to feed Gremlin. You live on takeout and your mom’s mercy.”
My cat, who resembles one of those furry creatures from the movie, twitches his tail at the mention of his name.
“Exactly. I have takeout boxes to dispose of. That takes time. And effort,” I add in case he doesn’t get my point.
“I’m swinging by at six. Wear something with a collar. We’re going to a restaurant that has tablecloths.” Matty hangs up.
I send a baleful glance toward Gremlin. “Do I look like I own something with a collar? I’m an artist, for fuck’s sake. I live in ratty, paint-splattered T-shirts and joggers. Also with paint splatters. Speaking of paint…” I pinch the end of Gremlin’s tail. “I see you have some marks on you, too.” He jerks his tail out of my grip and whips it across my palm a few times to chastise me for touching him. I think that my naming him Gremlin set us off on the wrong foot. Maybe.
I give the surly cat a pat that earns me a hiss in return and then push to my feet. The truth is I haven’t been painting, not in a long while. I’ve dabbled here and there. I’ve had a brush in my hand every day, but nothing I’ve done is any good. In my studio space that runs along the entire back of the house, I stare at the giant canvas hung on the wall and wait for inspiration to strike. What am I painting here? What am I feeling? I bang open a can of paint, dip my brush inside, and then…I don’t move. The brush hangs at my side, and paint drips off onto the drop cloth at my feet.
A bell rings overhead, rousing me from my stupor. I check my phone and am surprised to see a half hour has passed. If it wasn’t for the doorbell, who knows how long I would’ve stood here. I toss the brush down and go answer the door.
My mom pushes past me the moment I turn the knob. “Gosh, you took so long. I could’ve been mugged out here,” she calls over her shoulder.
I peek outside but see no one on the street. “It’s a gated community,” I remind her as I follow her to the kitchen.
“People die in gated communities all the time.”
“When was the last time?”
“That we know of?” She puts four glass containers on the kitchen table and then pulls the fridge open.
I inspect the dishes. Lasagna, pork belly, roast beef, and some kind of chicken meal. All of the food groups represented.
“I haven’t noticed anyone missing.”
Mom stops rummaging in the fridge to give me an Are you kidding? roll of her eyes. “Name one neighbor.”
Instead of answering, I restack the glass containers.
“Exactly,” crows Mom. “You’ve lived in this house for five years and can’t name a single neighbor, so they could be murdered and you wouldn’t know.”
“The smell would give it away.”
“Only if the bodies were decomposing.”
“You might need to stop watching those true crime shows.”
“I have.”
“Because you’ve run out or because you aren’t interested?”
“Can you believe that they aren’t putting any new ones out? I had to resort to watching fictional crime dramas, although I will say Selena Gomez has some wonderful chemistry with Steve Martin and Martin Short.” Mom slams the door shut. “Anyway, as I was saying, I’m going to set you up with this nice girl whose dad is a detective. I met him at a book signing the other day and he was—”
“No.” I shudder. The last setup that I had was with an actual cop, and she took out her phone and showed me crime scene photos. I didn’t need to see that. I’m an artist! I’m sensitive! I like to paint with color! I ended up using black for an entire month as if I was Jackson Pollock in his 1950s era.
“Yes.” Mom is adamant. “You’ve been alone too long. It’s probably why you’re blocked. You need to clean out all your chambers.”
I grow queasy. “Please stop talking about my sex life.”
“What sex life? I know you’re celibate. It’s all anyone can talk about these days. Eros Flynn, the genius painter who pours all of his passion onto the canvas. I didn’t name you Eros to have you live the life of a monk!”
“No one calls me Eros, Mom.” I finger my broken nose. Not since the fourth grade, at least. Peter Rozniak made fun of my name as we were getting off the bus. I punched him in the nose and then later that night, his sixteen-year-old brother came to my house and cracked me across the face with a bicycle pump. Mom wanted to call the police, but Dad wouldn’t let her. Later that night, he took me over to Pete’s house, and I stuffed eggs into all the holes of his older brother’s car. I don’t think he ever figured out why his car smelled like a whole football team held a farting contest in there, but he wasn’t able to get another girl to date him his entire high school career.
“I’m not calling you Jack. That’s boring. Now about this girl—”
“I’m actually going on a blind date tonight, Mom. With Matty. We’re doubling.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah.” I nod enthusiastically. “In fact, I better go change. He’s going to be here soon.”
CHAPTER 2
MORGAN
“I can’t believe Blake talked you into a blind date.” My grams chuckles. She’s finding this hilarious. At least someone is enjoying my predicament.
“I didn’t have much of a choice. I still owe her for the whole getting her arrested thing.” I roll my eyes. I don’t think it even counts as being arrested. I might have punched some frat boy who was making catcalls at Blake. Of course, being my best friend, Blake jumped in, trying to break it up. We all ended up in handcuffs in the back of a police car. “It’s bullshit,” I mutter.
Those frat boys always underestimate what they are getting into with me. I think it’s the pink hair and the blue eyes. Blake has compared me to a feisty fairy before. Talk shit, get hit. At least that’s my policy when it comes to boys.
“She is being a bit hard on you about it. A lot of women enjoy being cuffed.”
“Grams!” I burst into laughter. We were cuffed for a total of about five minutes. Once the cops started running our IDs, I was uncuffed the second they realized who my father was. I couldn’t say I was surprised. My father’s name carries a lot of weight. At least the name he inherited. It was my grandparents that really made what some would call the family’s legacy.
I have no clue if Dad ever heard about the incident or not. We don’t chit-chat much. He and Mom stay in their fancy high-rise in the city while I stay on the Hoffman estate with Grams because she is awesome and doesn’t have a stick up her ass like the rest of my family. It’s just the two of us here, and Alfred, of course. It’s not really his name but he lets me get away with calling him that. He’s our butler. Alfred sounds so much cooler than Stewart. I started calling him that a while back, and now it’s stuck and no one calls him by his given name.