Page 41 of Some Things Never Change

Andy raised his brow curiously at me as one of his hands pushed back his loose lock of hair back with the rest of his hair. “It sure isn’t, but I guess I’m your sweetheart now, huh? I don’t think I’ve ever heard you calling anyone that before. Not even your ex-boyfriends.”

Had I never? I honestly couldn’t remember even if I tried.

“Well, you are a really sweet guy, Andy, and deserve to be called one.” I poked him in the chest, right over his heart. “At least you're not someone’s sugar daddy after buying them a single cup of coffee.”

He let out a chuckle as he shook his head.

“So, what’s your usual here?”

“Nothing special. Just a regular oat milk latte.”

“I didn’t know you drink oat milk.”

He shrugged. “One of my friends wouldn’t shut up about it so I tried it out and got hooked.”

I laughed. “I’m not surprised.”

His brows shot up. “Why not?”

I quickly eyed his lean and muscular build from head to toe. Although his well-fitting suit looked good on him, it didn’t show the definition of his muscles the way I saw them every other morning when I went to the gym with him.

His well-maintained body obviously wasn’t built out of just early morning workouts, but from a lot of discipline and dedication as well. Living with him for a month now made me realize that he wasn’t super strict with his foods, but he did like to watch and control the portions he ate.

“You act like you’re not health conscious, but you are.”

Andy shook his head. “I’m not.”

“You are. You eat popcorn that you pop yourself.”

“Regular microwave popcorn is filled with preservatives, dyes, and?—”

I laughed. “And a bunch of other chemicals. I get it.”

“Do you really? Because you keep bringing it up.”

“I just like butter popcorn, okay? Not olive oil and salt. Just simply salted butter.”

“Your favorite microwave popcorn isn’t just butter and corn kernels, Tink.”

“Enough!” I laughed. “I’m tired of your popcorn spiel!”

“I’m just saying! It’s good to eat healthier. Good thing you’re living with me so I can feed you healthier options.” It was his turn to pin me with his gaze as he eyed me from head to toe. “Now that I think about it, you have lost a little bit of weight since you started living with me.”

I looked down at myself. My pants had been a little looser. “I think it’s all the walking I do on the treadmill.”

“It’s the free weights I’ve been helping you with and all the good protein and veggies I feed you.” Andy smiled proudly.

“Yeah, that too. I think I’m losing weight because you’ve also made me start eating more intuitively now.”

Well, aside from his spaghetti and meatballs, I haven’t been overeating as much as I used to. I sure didn’t feel as stressed as I used to, too, despite the many new clients I’ve received. Maybe it was because Andy and I always made time to wind down and destress together after long hours at work. Building his Lego projects had proven to be a lot more therapeutic than I expected.

“That’s good. It’s good to know how to eat intuitively, which I wish I knew how to do back when we were teens. I probably wouldn’t have had to train so hard to see the results I wanted, especially for basketball. I guess that’s what I got for eating nothing but pizza and Doritos back then.”

I felt my face contort in confusion. Before my brain could stop me, my mouth opened and muttered the first thing that came to mind. “What do you mean? You and Anthony were literally the hottest boys during high school.”

I watched the way Andy’s expression morphed into a look of surprise. He seemed stunned for a second too long as he stared back at me with shocked, bewildered eyes. He swallowed thickly, causing his Adam’s apple to bob.

“Y-You thought I was hot in high school?” Was he blushing?

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