Page 36 of Space Junk: Houston, We Have a Hottie
“What?” Trish shakes the shopping bags off her wrists and hurries over to Rose, who has now walked into the room.
Great. Just great. I follow after them.
When I moved in, I’d known it wasn’t the best apartment. But it was close to work and the landlord had seemed to like me, which could be because I paid a year’s rent in advance. One less thing to have to think about and all that. This in turn had made my landlord deliriously happy. Happy enough to let me redecorate a bit.
With his permission, I’d set out to make my bedroom my haven. My nerdy, hopelessly romantic haven.
Almost everything is white. White walls, white curtains, white pillows, and the fluffiest white down comforter I could find.
“They let you paint the ceiling?” Trish asks.
I shrug.
Everything is white but the ceiling. That I painted black, swirled with the darkest, deepest midnight blue I could find, with a hint of burgundy and a light swirl of silver. Then splattered with high-end, glow-in-the-dark paint. It took a week to get the colors melded the way I wanted. And another to get all the glow-in-the-dark paint out of my hair.
Research proves that people who get a solid night’s sleep have a stronger memory recall. When your brain rests, regions for making and storing memories talk to each other. Good sleep promotes consolidation, the process of transferring memories from temporary memory storage in the hippocampus to long-term storage in the neocortex. All of which is why I spent so much energy on my bedroom.
And maybe also because the all-white color pallet makes it easy for me to pretend that I’m an astronaut up in the International Space Station, staring into the abyss of space.
Rose is looking over the multiple stacks of books I have around the room. Besides the ceiling, they are the only splash of color in there. I have books stacked into the shape of a nightstand next to my bed, as well as the large, floor-to-ceiling bookshelf along one wall. Trish comes up beside her and I start to sweat while they peruse my book collection in silence.
This is the one place I let my nerd flag fly free. I love books. I love learning new things. A lot of my books are on topics like astronomy, math, and engineering. But mostly, I love all the dirty, sweaty, cowboy sex fantasies between the pages of my romance novels.
Trish’s fingers linger over one of my favorite romance series by Audrey Cole. She looks back at me, hand still on the romances, and winks. I can’t decipher Rose’s expression. She may be young. She may look country sweet. Though I have a feeling all of that is just a façade, and Rose is the architect of many machinations.
“Damn, girl.” She kicks the side of her mouth up into a grin.
I let out a breath I didn’t know I’d been holding. I’m not used to having anyone in my apartment. In fact, I’m pretty sure no one has been in my apartment since I moved in over a year ago. And no one on this green Earth knows about my romance novels. Jules doesn’t count, as she’s currently in orbit.
Rose looks at me in that calculating way again, but as I brace for whatever she might say, she spins away and heads to my closet.
“Let’s see what we have to work with,” she says, opening the doors. She throws me a look over her shoulder and shakes her head. “Seriously?”
“What?”
Trish moves next to Rose. “Oh, sweetie, this is so sad.”
“What?” I repeat. I have clothes. Good clothes. All my T-shirts are in my dresser. The closet is reserved for work apparel. I’ve spent a good amount of money on some of those dress pants. I even have a nice shift dress that the lady at Joseph A. Banks called “classic.” I mean, I’ve never worn it, the tags are probably still on it, but Rose and Trish don’t know that.
“It’s like a cross betweenWorking GirlandRevenge of the Nerds,” Rose whispers.
Trish leaves the room and returns with the shopping bags. “No worries—we’ve come prepared,” Trish sings, all sunshine and roses as she dumps the bags on the bed.
“Makeover!” Rose and Trish exclaim together, like they’ve practiced or something.
My immediate reaction is to hide. Literally walk into my closet, close the doors on myself and wait for them to leave. But that would be weird. Right?
I force myself to I think about Operation Social Life. Then I look at the pile of sequins, boots, cosmetics, spaghetti straps, and is that... yes, that is a thong.
I flex my sore thumbs, plaster a smile on my face and manage, “Yeah. Makeover. Whoo hoo.”
Death row inmates have sounded more chipper, I’m sure.
* * *
“So how doyou feel about blow jobs?” Rose asks.
I cough on the sip of rum and Coke I’ve just taken.
