It probably wasn’t phobia-level as I liked to dramatize—I saved that for the inability to be in deep water and that shit was actually no joke at all—but it was strong enough that seeing a rat was enough to render me catatonic.
All right. There was the drama.
I screamed like a little bitch.
I wasn’t going to do it now, though. I was going to be brave. I was going to rule the hedgehog world with cat food and mineral water.
Take that, tiny spiky pigs.
Hiiiiiii-yah.
Cue ninja stance.
I was no ninja. I definitely identified as more of an upside-down turtle.
I pulled the ring on the cat food Ethan insisted on buying for Mr. Prickles. I wasn’t sure what a spiky pig was doing eating cat food, but it wasn’t my pet, so I would do as I was told.
Holding the can tightly, I carried it into Ethan’s room. It felt weird to be here knowing he wasn’t. His bed was made—which was more than I could say for mine—and his room was perfectly tidy.
It was a bit annoying, actually.
Mine wasn’t tidy.
There was a bra here, a questionable pair of shorts there, and at least three hair ties, twenty bobby pins, and a long-lost phone charger under the bed.
That was before you counted all the rogue hairs that’d escaped my head and my hairbrush and inevitably got sucked up by the vacuum.
Hmm. I needed to vacuum today.
I stilled in front of the cage.
Mr. Prickles was on top of a small log house, and he froze when he noticed me.
If this were a TV show, a ‘whoosh’ noise would accompany a lightning bolt across the screen to signal a stare down.
His beady black eyes followed me. Maybe. It could have been the reflection from the sun streaming through Mr. Morning Lover’s window, but there was something unnerving about the way the hedgehog watched me.
I couldn’t believe I was having a staring contest with a hedgehog.
I needed a new hobby.
Any hobby.
I wasn’t fussy.
I blinked, ending the one-sided contest, and reached for the opening to the cage. Mr. Prickles was still staring at me. I got the feeling he didn’t trust me any more than I trusted him, and I was okay with it.
Slowly, I opened the door to the cage. He jumped down from the top of the log house, and there was a moment’s stillness from the both of us.
We were feeling each other out.
Why had I agreed to this?
Because I was in love with my roommate and he wanted me, and I was weak as fuck?
Ding ding ding, we have a winner!
Ugh.
I put the can of food in my right hand and tucked it into the cage. Mr. Prickles’ nose twitched, and no sooner had I dumped half the meat into his bowl than he was making his way over the cage to where my hand was.
Where.
My.
Hand.
Was.
I froze.
Legit froze.
Mild panic streaked through my veins, the adrenaline holding my body hostage.
What’d I been thinking when I offered to feed this animal? Was it my heart? I bet it was my heart. My stupid-ass heart was overriding my brain as it so often did.
I didn’t sign up for this, okay?
I didn’t sign up for having a roommate who I was in love with who had a spiky pig for a bet. I didn’t sign up for being in love with my brother’s best friend, who apparently had feelings for me.
The only obstacle was my brother.
You know what? If he wasn’t that good of a person, I’d probably remove him from the equation.
I could.
I’d read enough serial killer Wikipedia articles to know how to dispose of a body without getting caught.
But was anyone worth murder?
Eh.
If you wronged my best friends… Yes.
If you were my blood brother with a lifetime of memories that included a few unsavory ones?
Tough question.
I tapped the rest of the food into the bowl and quickly withdrew my hand from the cage. Mr. Prickles sauntered up to his food, his fat, prickly ass waddling as he reached it. His wet little nose was a quarter the size of a cat’s, and he wriggled it as if he were testing his food.
Like a human sniffing wine.
But I didn’t sniff wine. I just drank it. I was no connoisseur.
Mr. Prickles shoved his face into the food. His furry little ears twitched as he munched his way through the stinky mess in the bowl.
It was no lie.
Cat food smelled like shit.
I stepped back and perched on the edge of Ethan’s made bed. The cover was soft beneath my underwear-clad ass, and I gripped the fabric as I watched Mr. Prickles.
He ate. And ate. And ate. A bit like the hungry caterpillar in that book.
The little munching noises he made were adorable. Tiny little nibbles that were not at all like humans chewing with their mouths open—little clicking tsh-tsh noises that were too cute for their own good.
Crap.
Did I like this animal?
It wasn’t bad enough that I was already in love with its owner, but now I liked his animal, too?
This roommate situation was going to shit.
I still needed to fill the water bowl, so I quickly took it out, secured the cage, and headed to the kitchen. I filled it quickly and returned it to Mr. Prickles.
Huh.
He was kinda cute.
Damn it. Ethan was right. All it took was spending a little time with him, and I liked him.
I sat back on the bed and shuffled back to the wall, drawing my legs up to my chest. I could see Mr. Prickles doing whatever it was that hedgehogs did to amuse themselves, and the gentle snuffy noises that came from him were weirdly comforting.
I wrapped my arms around my legs and watched him for a while. He alternated between playing with a small plastic ball that had some kind of bell inside it and running in and out of a wooden tunnel.
I didn’t know hedgehogs played with toys.
You really did learn something new every day.
I’d learned a lot this week, and I was about maxed out on education now, thank you very much.
Sitting in Ethan’s room was weird, but it was comforting to watch Mr. Prickles. I’d get out before he came back from work, but then what did I do?
Did I hide in my room? There was no way I could see him. I didn’t know how to talk to him now. It was easier when I thought he hated me.
Knowing it wasn’t true complicated everything.
I’d been as honest with him as I could have been, in the end. There was no way I was going to tell him the true extent of my feelings. If I had, it would have just made it worse than it already was.
How were we supposed to live together?
Everything had changed. Were we destined to avoid each other like the plague until he ultimately decided he was leaving town again? That was what would happen. Ethan wasn’t made to settle down in one place.
After all, he’d only moved in with me so he wasn’t tied to an actual lease.
Talk about commitment issues.
I blew out a long breath and leaned my head back against the wall. How could we normalize our relationship again? I’d meant what I’d said when I’d told him that there was no way we’d be the same—there was absolutely no chance I’d be able to sit on a sofa with him without wanting to curl myself into his side.
We had to communicate, though. We still lived together, and that meant we had to be civil to one another. We had to get along.
Rolling my head, I looked around his room. Despite the stuff he’d moved in, there was little to no personality in here. It reflected him perfectly—not because he had no personality, but because it made sense that he didn’t settle in anywhere.