Page 5 of The Arrangement

As I was busy smoothing the conditioner through my hair and going over the errands I needed to accomplish before the end of the day tomorrow, I barely noticed the water pressure becoming less of a spray and more of a drip. Until I opened my eyes to the pipe above me shuddering violently against the wall. My heart raced as I jumped out of the tub, narrowly avoiding slipping on the damp tile as I shrieked.

A thud on my front door echoed the beat of my heart, my fingers fumbling with the knobs to stop the pipe from bursting from out of the wall or cracking the antique tiles. The frantic pounding on the front door continued as conditioner streamed into my eyes. I ran, towel barely covering my wet, naked body, to throw it open.

"What?!" I exclaimed, only one eye opened as I rubbed desperately at the other. I straightened immediately, pulling my towel up higher as Sebastian Quinn stood in the hallway. His brows were furrowed in concern, his chest heaving as he looked at me in confusion and then over my shoulder into the apartment.

"Are you okay?" He asked, his deep voice a mix between anxiety and puzzlement. "I heard a crash and screaming."

"Yes, I'm okay!" I snapped, finally clearing the conditioner from my eye and blinking rapidly to regain focus. "My water just turned off, and the pipes were banging and?—"

"Did you pay the bill?" He asked, and I looked at him with undisguised astonishment.

"Quinn, I am twenty-six years old. Of course, I paid my water bill," I retorted, but silently, I was counting in my head if I actually had. No, I had. I was 89% sure. Paying my bills and my grandmother's did sometimes get mixed up.

"Okay, well, if you're okay…" Sebastian murmured, pushing off from the door frame and shaking his head slightly as he walked the few paces back to his unit.

As soon as I slammed the door, I grabbed my phone, hastily brought up the bill payment app, and breathed a sigh of relief. Of course I had paid the stupid bill. So, why was my water off?

Groaning in growing frustration, I turned on every single faucet to nothing besides shuddering drips. It became annoyingly clear that I had no water in my apartment. That was a real problem, especially with the fact that I was dripping puddles by my feet, and my hair was still slick with conditioner.

"Shit," I hissed, slapping the kitchen counter and startling the ragdoll cat from her napping spot on the table.I was already shivering, refusing to turn up the thermostat because I really didn't need a high gas bill that month.

I knew what I had to do, and I didn't like it—not one bit. But I have no relationship, not even a strained one, with my upstairs neighbors besides delivering a random package once in a while.

Tip-toeing around the puddles that followed me, I found myself back in the bathroom, throwing off the worn, once-white towel onto the floor and grabbing a faded beach towel from the closet. Was it in much better shape? Absolutely not. But was it longer than the knee-length one I had usually used? Yes, and at that moment, that was all that mattered.

Taking the time to rub the raccoon eyes my pooling mascara had created in the shower, I wrapped myself in the towel, deciding that tomorrow I would pick out a robe because God forbid this ever happen again. My skin itched where my body wash still clung to my skin as Iwalked across the apartment and picked at my thumbnail before closing between my unit and unit two.

The cold night air whispered between cracks of the old door frame, the tile chilling my bare feet.

"Why didn't I put on slippers?" I berated myself quietly. But I was already here, too late to turn back now. So I knocked. Quietly, timidly. Part of me hoped he just wouldn't hear, and I would just have to figure something else out.

With my heart thundering in my chest, I waited two beats before I went to turn around…when the door opened.

"Clark?"

I bit the inside of my lip so hard I might have tasted blood. But I had come this far. So I turned around.

"My water's off," I said simply, shivering in the cold of the hallway and clutching my towel to my chest. Quinn raised an eyebrow, looking me up and down. I rolled my eyes and all but whined, "Jesus, don't make me ask this."

Sebastian crossed his arms, sucking on his teeth as he leaned on the doorframe. The warm air from his apartment had goosebumps running up my arms. "Ask me what, Clark?"

I screwed my eyes shut and blurted out, "Can I use your shower?"

Silence.

Jesus, what was I thinking? Just as I was about to open my mouth to say that I was joking, or never mind (I wasn't quite sure which yet—maybe a nice blend of both?), Sebastian closed the door.

I stood there for a moment, dumbfounded. I hadn't been expecting that. So there I stood shivering in the mid-October night, barefoot on the tile floor outside my neighbor's door in a towel. I moved to bolt back to my apartment, already deciding to order a delivery of water bottles or maybe a gallon jug?—

I heard the sound of the Unit 2 door opening, its handle wiggling as it turned.

"You coming in or what, Clark?"

Chapter 3

Georgia

Iwas in Sebastian Quinn's house. The first thing I noticed when I walked into Unit 2 was how clean it was. Like, suspiciously neat and organized. While it was the mirror layout of my unit, instead of second-hand furniture and warm lighting, the living room had a black L-shaped sofa facing the fireplace, which had a large flat-screen TV mounted over it. In the hallway hung meticulously curated art pieces that looked like they could be worth more than my car.

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