Page 48 of Infatuated as They Come
“Why?”
“Because.”
“Because I’m a girl and you’re a guy?” I asked. “Because of what genitals we have?”
His eyes narrowed slightly. “I need you to never say genitals ever again.”
I huffed. “Will you take this seriously please?”
“You just made me really uncomfortable.”
“Fine. I won’t ever say it again. Will you be an adult about this now?”
“You can say cock,” he said, hand cupping my cheek while his thumb ran across my bottom lip. “It’s hot when you say cock.”
“Stop!” I cried out. “Stop joking around.”
“Okay, okay.” Laughing, he held his hands up. “Holly, look, you just don’t get it.”
“What’s there to get? Call your boss up right now and quit and I’ll pay rent for the rest of the lease. I can do it in five minutes.”
“You can’t do that,” he said firmly.
“What do you mean?”
“It’s illegal to pay more than a month’s worth of rent in New York.”
I frowned at him. “No, it’s not.”
“Yeah, it is. I looked it up ‘cause I knew you’d pay for the whole fuckin’ thing if that was an option.”
“That’s not even true…” I quickly grabbed my laptop from the couch and looked it up and God, of course he was right. “Damn it.”
“Well, what does it say?”
I snapped my MacBook shut. “It doesn’t matter.”
He laughed, head shaking as he twirled some of the spaghetti on his fork. “Holly, what do you want me to do? I can’t not work. Even if I let you pay for rent, what would I do then? Just sit around all day and paint?”
“Yes.”
Pausing, he raised an eyebrow up at me. “And you think I’m gonna make a heap of money straight away or something?”
“Uh, yeah. You’re the most talented painter I know.”
“How many do you know?”
“Will you please take this seriously? I just want good things for you,” I said, eyes on the table. “You deserve good things.”
“And I appreciate that. I do. Everything’s already good, though. I’ve got you, don’t I?” he said, one hand landing on my thigh. “And I’m pretty sure you’re all I need to be happy.”
“Don’t you wanna do other stuff? Stuff that doesn’t revolve around me?”
“Not really.”
“Don’t you want to paint?”
“I do paint.”
