Page 47 of Yours to Lose
“Huh?” His voice is full of a humor that’s so unlike him that it takes me a minute to catch up.
“You brought a literal suitcase with you.” He points to the rolling carry-on bag at my feet.
“Oh! No, definitely not moving in. I brought movie night supplies.”
“I took care of dinner and snacks. That was part of the deal.”
“I know, and I’m holding you to it. I meant the other kind of movie night supplies.” I carry the suitcase over to the coffee table and unzip it, flipping the top open and unpacking some of its contents. “I didn’t know what you had in the way of blankets, so I brought some. I also brought pajamas and my favorite pillow. All my movie night non-negotiables.”
“Did you think there would be a freak June snowstorm or something and there would be a chance we would maybe freeze to death?” he asks, a little wonder in his voice as he studies the pile of blankets I toss on the couch, along with my flannel pajamas.
I giggle, zipping the suitcase closed and setting it on the floor before plopping on the couch next to my pile of stuff. “Nah, I just think movie night should be an experience, and experiencing it properly requires the appropriate accessories. And speaking of accessories for movie night…what’s for dinner?”
He blows out a breath and looks down at me. The look on his face is different. He looks almost…
“Are you nervous?” I ask incredulously.
“Shut up,” he mumbles.
“Oh, my god, you are. Okay, I swear whatever you picked, I’ll like. I was mostly just kidding about my bestie knowing which of my favorite foods I would be in the mood for.” I pause dramatically. “Except no I wasn’t, and if you picked wrong, this friendship is doomed.”
“You’re such a little shit.”
I laugh and kick my legs up on the coffee table. “Okay, I really was just kidding. But not when I asked what’s for dinner because I’m starving.”
He perches on the arm of the couch. “It’s possible I thought a little too hard about this.”
“There is no such thing.”
“Okay, so the theme is disaster movie, right? So, I started thinking, what would you be in the mood for if there was an impending disaster and, like, the entire world was about to be encased in ice or something. And I decided you would be in the mood for all your favorites, so I ordered that.”
I narrow my eyes at him. “You ordered what?”
“All of your favorites. Or, as many of them as I thought we would reasonably eat.”
“I need more details.”
“I placed four different orders. We’re doing chicken fingers, tacos, pizza, and hot dogs, because the night of the scavenger hunt, you told me you thought they were the superior barbeque food. It’s, like, an end of the world smorgasbord. And for dessert…well, maybe I should just show you.” He turns toward the kitchen and motions for me to follow him, which I do, wordlessly, because I think for the first time ever, I have no words—a situation that does not get any better when I walk into the kitchen to see a huge stack of Oreo packages.
“Dessert is an Oreo taste test. I got every flavor in the store and we’re ranking them. I figured if we were going with a theme oflet’s eat all the things, we might as well carry it into dessert too, and you love an activity so…dessert and an activity. How’d I do?”
His gaze bounces from the stack of Oreos to me, and the look on his face is so earnest. He picked the most Jo dinner and dessert of all time, and my heart literally stutters.
It’s possible I may be in a tiny bit of trouble.
He furrows his brow as he looks at me. “You’re not saying anything. Did I choose wrong?”
I shake myself out of my infatuation fog. “J, if I was choosing dinner and dessert for us myself, I could not possibly have chosen better. These are literally the most perfect choices you could possibly have made, and I love them all.”
“Yeah?” His face breaks out into the most dazzling grin I have ever seen. It’s so gorgeous and so shocking that it knocks me back a step. When I said infatuation, I think I may have been under-selling it a little. This is full-blown crush territory.
I lean back against the counter to try and pull myself together. “Absolutely yes.”
“Okay, I’m glad. We probably have, like, half an hour before the food comes. Should we build a dinosaur habitat first and then start the movie when dinner comes?”
I smirk at him. “Looks like someone is a little excited to give Dippy a brand new home.”
He shrugs and reaches into the fridge, grabbing a couple cans of Dr. Pepper and handing me one. “Once you got the idea of a home for him in my head, he started looking all lonely sitting on my dresser.”
