“Wanna hear about how a dredging company fucked up an endangered reef in the study I did today?”
Jackson looked at me blankly for a moment, and then he burst out laughing. “Hit me with it.”
An hour later, we’d just finished talking in-depth about our schoolwork, and I looked at the screen of my sterile phone and saw the time.
“Damn, it’s getting late. What do you want for dinner?”
I had a rule that I didn’t eat after seven o’clock. It’s one I’d grown up with, with my dads preferring for us to eat between five and six because your digestive system apparently slowed down after seven. I’d been surprised and relieved to discover that Jackson was the same way the first night I was here. His body was his temple, and he looked after it.
In fact, that was the one major difference between us.
On the whole, I ate healthily and looked after myself, but I did have a sweet tooth that I let loose when it reared its ugly head. Jackson didn’t have a sweet tooth, so he hadn’t had any junk food in his place aside from potato chips. Now, those I could take or leave, I wasn’t really into them, but sweet stuff? I needed that to survive like I needed oxygen.
Had he argued against them, though? Not even a little. He’d just asked me what ‘shit’ I liked, and had brought it home after a trip to the store. It was as simple as that.
“Wanna go to Chi-Chi McGee’s?”
Those damn butterflies started swarming again at the question.
Chi-Chi McGee’s was a bar and grill that mainly served barbecue and Mexican. It was the hot spot for students because it catered to so many tastes and was situated near the college.
Him taking me in there would link our names together and get people talking. I didn’t have an issue with it because I didn’t know that many people here yet, but I knew he had a large group of friends, especially the ones he played basketball with once a month, so the effect of the link would be heavier for him.
“Are you sure? You know people will talk, right?”
Tilting his head to the side, he asked, “Why would that be a problem?”
I didn’t know how to put into words what I was thinking, so I replied breezily, “It wouldn’t be. I just thought I’d point it out.”
Looking down at what I had on my legs—my shaved legs. Well, what areas I could get to on one of them, at least—Jackson frowned.
“You might want to change. I don’t mind seeing this, but I’m not sure you want other people seeing them.”
Looking down at the clean pair of short shorts I had on, I had to agree. Every pair he’d brought back bar one were sleep shorts that barely covered my ass, so these would be indecent outside the apartment.
Pushing up until I was braced on my good leg, I bent to pick up my crutches, aware that he had his hands out to catch me if I lost my balance as always. This courteous side of him had shocked me initially, but now I saw it as part of the man he’d become since we were kids.
Once I had them and was leaning on them as best I could, I gestured with my head toward the bedroom.
“I’ll go and get changed. It’ll only take me five minutes maximum.” Then I thought about my eyebrows and the fact I wasn’t going out without doing at least something to not look like shit. “Make it twenty minutes.”
Rolling his eyes, he got up with Milkshake in his arms.
“I’ll feed Fugly. I bought this new cat food for him yesterday because he was almost out, and I want to make sure he likes it. If he doesn’t, we’ll need to stop on the way home to pick him up something else.”
See? He was such a freaking good guy.
As I made my way to the bedroom—the one I still shared with him—I thought back to the little shit he’d been as a kid, the aloof but mischievous boy he’d been as a teenager, and all of the times I’d wanted to punch him in the balls for being a pain in the ass. It was hard to put the younger version with the older one and them be the same guy, but whatever changes he’d made and decisions he’d come to worked.
Once I was changed, I hobbled through to the bathroom and washed my face before putting on a minimal amount of makeup. Yes, I sometimes went full blown diva, but I preferred to have a natural look and less muss and fuss. My hair was fuss enough, trust me.
While I did it, I thought about what I’d been like as a kid and had to concede he probably had the same issues putting me as the little bitch I likely came across as, to the adult I’d become.