Page 59 of The No Touch Roommate Rule
The scratching comes again.
Closer this time…
“Mack,” I whisper. My voice rasps from too much cheering at crawfish races. “Hey, Mack.”
She mumbles something that sounds like “five more biscuits” and burrows deeper into my armpit. Her hair tickles my chin. Any other time, I’d be thrilled about the full-body contact, but something definitely just moved near our feet.
I reach for my phone, trying not to jostle her. The screen blinds me for a second—3:27 a.m. The witching hour.
That doesn’t seem good…
“Makena.” I shake her shoulder gently. “Wake up. We’ve got company.”
“Mmph. Tell them we’re closed.” Her leg slides higher across mine, and now I’m distracted for entirely different reasons.
But then, suddenly, she goes from unconscious to airborne in half a second, her knee barely missing my balls as she scrambles upright. “Holy shit, what the fuck was that?”
“I think there’s a?—”
“Oh my God! My foot! Something touched my foot! With its creepy little legs!” She grabs my arm hard enough to leave marks. Her voice drops to a rough whisper as she hisses, “Parker, there’s something in here.”
“I know. That’s what I was trying to tell you.” I finally get the flashlight on. The beam cuts through the darkness, illuminating our chaos—tangled blankets, the cooler down by our feet, Makena’s hair wild around her face. She’s wearing one of my old t-shirts she stole for sleeping and not much else.
Looks like those shorts she had on when we went to bed vanished sometime in the night…
“There!” She points toward the corner near our feet. “Shine it there!”
I angle the light, and we both freeze.
A massive crawfish sits next to my tote bag, claws raised like it’s ready to start something. It’s got to be one of the racers from yesterday, bred for size and speed, ‘cause it’s way bigger than any wild crawfish has a right to be.
“How…” Makena breathes. “How did it get up here?”
The truck bed is a good four feet off the ground. I eye our uninvited guest with new respect. “I don’t know. Climbed? Flew? Teleported?”
“This isn’t funny, Parker.” But her voice cracks on a laugh. “There’s a fucking lobster in our bed!”
“Crawfish,” I correct. “Louisiana lobster, if you want to get fancy.”
“I don’t want to get fancy. I want to get it out!” She releases my arm to grab my flip-flop from beside the mattress. “What if there are more? What if they’re organizing?”
The crawfish starts scuttling toward our pillows, including the separation pillow that’s now just another casualty of a sleep gone awry. Its claws click against the truck bed liner—a weirdly menacing sound in the dead of night.
“Oh no, you don’t!” Makena lunges, flip-flop raised like a club. She swings and misses, her momentum carrying her forward until she face-plants into the separation pillow with a muffled “Fuck!”
“You okay?” I start to sit up, careful of my knee. I took the brace off to sleep, a decision I’m beginning to think was a mistake out in the wilds of Louisiana.
“No, I’m not okay! There’s a monster in our bed!” She pushes up on all fours, my t-shirt riding up to reveal those La Perla panties that have haunted my dreams since the flood.
She shakes her hair out of her face and glares at the crawfish like it gave her restaurant a shitty Yelp review. “Come here, you little shit.” I move to help her, but she points a warning finger my way. “No, Parker. You stay there. Keep your knee safe. I’ve got this.”
“My hero,” I say, only half-joking.
She’s pretty magnificent right now—fierce and ridiculous and sexy as fuck.
“Stop staring at my butt and hold the light steady.” She army-crawls forward, trying to corner the crawfish between the cooler and the wheel well.
The campground is mostly quiet around us. Someone snores in a tent nearby. A dog barks in the distance. The night air hangs thick and humid, making everything feel like we’re moving through warm soup.
