He pointed a shaking finger at me. “Don’t lie to me, Corey Ellis. I saw you get out of a yellow Jeep. The only people in this world who own yellow Jeeps are blonde sorority girls with loose morals and crop tops who say things like, ‘Hit me up on Snapchat later, zaddy.’”
I set the bottle down on the counter and crossed my arms over my chest. “Were you spying on me?” I asked dangerously.
His eyes widened. “I… I just was waiting for you to come home. I wanted to see you.”
His bottom lip was trembling.
God, how had I let it get so far? We used to be so much more than this. Why, I remembered a time Sandy had made me coffee on my first day of work. It seemed like only yesterday when in fact it was just this morning. I scrubbed a hand over my face. “I’m sorry. I… I’m just really stressed. You know how it is. Things at the office are busy, and I let it get the best of me. Tell you what. Why don’t you put on something nice and I’ll take us out for dinner.”
“Really?” he asked hopefully.
“No!” I shouted at him. “Of course not! I’m broke! I literally have ten dollars in the bank!”
“You’re tearing us apart!” he wailed.
And just because this was the most ridiculous thing we’d ever done, I laughed.
Which, of course, caused him to break character. He grinned at me. “That was fun. I have no idea where that came from, but go us.”
I shook my head. “You’re so stupid. God, I love you.”
He shrugged as he pushed himself off the wall and walked toward me. “Of course you do. I’m perfectly loveable.”
He stood next to me against the counter and wrapped an arm around my shoulders. I laid my head against him. It was good to be home.
“Big day?” he asked quietly.
“You have no idea.”
“Code Orange Banana.”
I groaned, turning my face into his neck. “We really need to come up with a better system.”
“Probably,” he agreed. “But we got there. Eventually. You want to talk about it?”
“Not really,” I muttered. “It is what it is.”
“Is that right? So we’re not going to talk about how the blonde sorority girl with loose morals and a crop top was actually a certain professor-turned-boss?”
“Nope. We’re not going to talk about that at all.”
He kissed the top of my head. “Okay. If that’s what you want.”
I had no idea what I wanted. “Thank you.”
“Any time, baby doll. But if you ever want to talk about anything, you just let me know.”
“I will.” Then, “What the hell is a zaddy?”
“Oh!” he said. “That. Well, I’m not quite sure, exactly. But I think it’s like a hot, older dude who’s not quite a daddy, but almost. So. Zaddy.”
“I hate everything about that.”
“Of course you would,” he said. “I hated myself for even saying it out loud. How about that steak?”
I pulled my head away and looked over at him. “Steak is gross.”
“I know. All that chewing and the payoff isn’t that great. We could always order in and watch trashy reality TV and make fun of the people who are faker than the two of us.”