“I guess she doesn’t recognize you,” I say.
“Man, this place is ruthless.”
“It’s okay. We’ll wait for the next one.”
The lady looks at me, goes back to her clothes, then turns back in my direction and stands to her four-foot-eleven stature. “Sierra Sanders?”
I look around the room. How many other people will circle around us because they think I’m some popular celebrity before they realize I’m not? “Yeah.”
“I watch you every night.” She takes out her clothes and nods in Adrian’s direction. “Is he yours?”
I can’t stop the smile as I look at Adrian and back at her. “Kind of.”
“What the hell does kind of mean?” she says with a scrunched up face that highlights her wrinkles.
“It’s complicated,” I answer.
“Truth is she put me in the friend zone,” Adrian leans in and stage-whispers so the entire laundromat hears him. I elbow him and he fakes hurt. “She’s brutal, I tell you.”
A few people laugh around us.
I roll my eyes at him. “He’s messing around.”
“Take the dryer,” she says, wheeling her cart away. “I’m sure you have to get to a new story. When you unveiled that social security scam, the entire floor was in awe.”
“No. Please.” I lead her back to the dryer.
“Nonsense. I don’t have anything but my crosswords to do.”
I eye Adrian and he puts her clothes in the dryer. She catches me looking at him and quickly snatches her bra out of his hand.
“I appreciate it, but you can’t be touching my delicates.” After she’s put a few items in the dryer, she looks at him. “That was sweet of you though. She’s pretty and all, but she’s not very smart if she’s letting you stay out in the wild.”
A few more snickers from the other patrons.
“I treat her like a princess,” Adrian carries on with a shit-eating grin. “I have a jet plane to sweep her off to my big castle, but she doesn’t want any of it.”
Little does this woman know that it’s true.
“She’s foolish. You two would make some beautiful kids,” she says.
“I think so too.” He stares at me as if he’s proposed and I’ve turned him down.
The woman shuts the dryer door and Adrian quickly puts change in the machine. “That’s for trying to convince her to snatch me up.” He gives her his prince smile again.
I shake my head because we agreed that we’d be friends. In less than two months, he’s leaving on his jet plane back to his big castle. It’s not like me going with him is even a possibility. Uproot my life just to have to rebuild it again when things fall apart between us? No, thank you.
She pats his cheek. “Oh you. I’d marry you if I was fifty years younger.”
“What’s age but a number?” Adrian says.
Laughter at his not-funny jokes from the people around us once again commences.
“That’s what I say all the time. But…” She crooks her finger for him to come closer. “Have sex as much as you can when you’re younger. The hips lose something after the first replacement. So do the Kama Sutra stuff when you’re young.”
Adrian tries to fight his smile because she’s dead serious. “Will do.” He nods at her.
A dryer opens up and I hurry to get our clothes inside it.
Adrian comes over and helps me. “What do you think about her advice?”
“I’m curious as to why you threw me under the bus.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean we both agreed to do the friends thing. You made it sound like you’re ready to get down on bended knee.”
A look I can’t decipher crosses his face before it vanishes with the emergence of his cocky smile. “I haven’t been shy that I want you.”
“You want me for two months, and then you’ll take your jet plane home. Where does that leave us?”
He’s silent because he doesn’t have an answer either.
“So from now on, no throwing me under the bus.” I grumpily shove the last of the wet clothes into the dryer.
He holds up his three fingers.
“Do they have Boy Scouts in Sandsal?”
“We sure do.” He lowers his hand. “But I was kicked out in Webelos.”
I laugh. “How does the prince get kicked out of a group?”
“Because I was a terror. I’ve never been good at following rules.”
“Still, I thought the prince would get special treatment.”
He closes the door and puts change in the dryer. “Not always.”
“Ice cream?” I change topics because I need to get out of here and into the fresh, crisp air before I suffocate and make a bad decision by sleeping with Adrian again.
“My treat for you helping me.” He takes my hand.
The old lady winks at him when she sees our physical contact.
We’re not even a week into this thing and I’m already halfway to convincing myself that I’d be fine with sleeping with him for two months and saying goodbye.
It’s been three weeks since Adrian moved in. I come home from work, exhausted from the game of who will get Georgia’s position. I passed Kay getting coffee for Jack once again, then I spotted them returning from lunch in his car.
Probably went to make out somewhere.
Gross.
I hear the television as I put my key in the door, which puts a smile on my face because I forgot this was Adrian’s day off. He’s really become used to normal life lately. We frequent the laundromat together every week. He even baked a cake with Rian the other day. It might’ve been lopsided and a little dense, but he gets an A for effort.
I open the door to find Blue Bloods on. Adrian isn’t alone.
My stomach sinks as the two of them turn around to face me.
“Blanca?” I ask.
“Hey, I caught Adrian on my way home from work this afternoon. I took a half day because it’s… you know.” She looks down at herself. Her period. Got it. “And we were talking about how we both need to catch up, so we figured an afternoon of watching Blue Bloods was in order.”
There’s a pizza box on the coffee table, and they’re both dressed in sweatpants and T-shirts. I close my eyes for a moment to quiet the jealousy. She has Ethan. This is a friends things. I wouldn’t care if she was here with Dylan, Seth, or Knox.
“Oh, that’s nice. How far did you get?” Acting as if I’m not freaking out isn’t working.
“Not far.” Blanca comes over to the kitchen. Adrian pauses the television and picks up the pizza box. While he’s distracted, she runs her hand down my arm. “We were just watching television.”
“I know,” I whisper, not looking at her.
And I do, don’t I? I can’t be jealous. The man flirts every chance he gets. I’ve had to stop myself so many times from kissing him, knowing he’d kiss me back.
“Okay. I should get home anyway. I had a fun day, Adrian.”
He waves goodbye. “Me too. Next hooky day, me, you, Donnie Wahlberg.”
“Definitely!” She slips out and shuts the door.