“You’re not cleaning my room,” he declared.
I shook my head. “Too late. It’s half done.”
That wasn’t exactly the truth. His room was really filthy. I still had a lot of work to do. Also, I had to cart his stuff to the Laundromat but I had a shift so I’d have to do that the next day. Therefore, I wouldn’t be completely done until tomorrow.
“I don’t want you goin’ through my stuff,” he kept at it.
I felt warmth creep up my neck but I ignored it and what he said, and returned, “Speaking of your stuff. I found an envelope full of money in a pair of your jeans that were on the floor in the bathroom. It’s there.” I motioned to his dresser. “And I’ll, uh… commend you on your obvious commitment to safe sex. Though, the unwrapped prophylactics are now in the drawer of your nightstand, not scattered among the wrappers on top. Easier access since you won’t have to sort through the wrappers to find a new one.”
At that, he looked fit to be tied, or fit to tie me, and he leaned slightly toward me.
“That right there is why—”
“I’m doing it, Joker,” I whispered. “You can be all scary and scowl at me and get angry, but I’m doing it. I’m doing whatever I have to do to feel better about what you’re all doing for me. I have to.” I drew in breath and finished, “And I’m asking you to let me.”
His jaw flexed again.
I watched his jaw flex, thinking two things.
One, for some reason, I found that appealing.
Two, I didn’t feel even a little bad about lying by omission by not including the fact that I was there to do other things as well. Those including being around him, attempting to flirt with him, and doing everything I could to get him to kiss me again and/or ask me out on a date (with that last, I was hoping for and).
Of course, I did want to give back to him and the Club. Definitely.
It was just that I wanted other things too. We stared at each other, and this lasted a long time. Long enough for me to have a strong urge to end the staring contest by running to him and throwing myself in his arms, but this time, not allowing him to let me go.
Unfortunately, when I was just about ready to do that, he broke the contest, asking, “My clothes in those cases?”
“Yes,” I answered, lifting my hand with the paper towel in it, palm out. “And I’m doing your laundry and I’m not taking any guff from you about it.”
“You got a washer and dryer at your house?”
“No, I’m taking it to the Laundromat.”
He went scary again. “Butterfly, you are not payin’ to do my laundry.”
“I absolutely am,” I returned.
“You gotta do it to make your shit feel better. Do it. But there’s a washer and dryer here. Off the side hall, at the back.”
“That’s thirty-five cents,” I told him, not sharing my relief that they had a washer and dryer. That would save me tons of time, not to mention money.
He crossed his arms on his chest. “You do know with this shit you’re pullin’ that no way in fuck I’m ever gonna stop and help a woman change her tire again.”
“That’s fifty cents.”
He stared at me.
Then he turned on his boot and stalked to the door, muttering, “Fuck me.”
“Sixty cents!” I yelled at his back.
But he was gone.
I stared at the door, wondering how that went.
There were no kisses or even heated glances (outside angry heat, but that didn’t count). He didn’t even act like he was talking to a woman he’d kissed (thoroughly) just the day before.
That was bad.
But he’d given in relatively easily to me cleaning his space and doing his laundry.
However, this could be so he wouldn’t have to be around me in order to fight about it.
That would also be bad.
But it could be he liked the idea of me hanging around because he liked the idea of me being around. It also could be, since he obviously didn’t have anyone to look after him, and didn’t look after himself, he liked the idea of someone doing that.
Before I could make my decision about which it was, good or bad, I focused on the door I was staring at distractedly.
One of the men who’d been sitting with Joker at the bar the day before was standing in it. He was older than Joker. Stockier. He had slivers of gray in his dark brown hair that was shorter than Joker’s but still messy. He had what I was approximating as nine weeks of stubble, also silvered with gray.
He also had his eyes on me.
“Uh, hi,” I called.
“Hey,” he replied.
“I saw you yesterday but I didn’t introduce myself. I’m Carissa.”
“High.”
“Um…” I tipped my head to the side, wondering why he was greeting me again. “Hi.”
“No, babe. That’s my name. High. With a g and h.”
“Oh!” I grinned at him. “High. Right, hello, High. Nice to meet you.”
He didn’t return that sentiment.
He gave me a look that made me brace and said in a quiet voice, “Don’t give up.”
I felt my head jerk in confusion. “On Joker’s room?”
“On Joker,” he stated.
I felt my eyes go round.
He disappeared.
*
The next day, I walked to the door of the Compound wondering if I’d made the right decision.
I’d come before my shift at LeLane’s, and after I did what I had to do, I had to go straight to LeLane’s. So I was in my LeLane’s uniform of polo, khakis, and Converse (though, LeLane’s didn’t require Converse, that was my nod to style because everyone knew Converse rocked).
Joker had mentioned he’d thought my dress was cute and my heels were sexy. I didn’t have an excess of cute dresses and shoes (well, I did, but none of them fit me anymore), but I was a cute-dress-and-heels type of girl. I had more than just the butterfly one that fit me.
But this was me. The new me. A single mom, grocery store clerk in khakis and Converse. And if he asked me out on a date and eventually kissed me again, this would be the woman he’d be kissing.
I hadn’t been about me. Not for a long time. Maybe never. I had been coasting in life for so long, I actually didn’t know who me was.
I just knew right now most of me was being a mom and a grocery store clerk.