Page 11 of Dirty Valentine
“Sheldon, honey, there’s a difference between appreciating your work and wanting to role-play funeral director and corpse.”
My nose squenched as that unholy image flashed into my brain.
I paused in the doorway, taking in the scene.Lily sat cross-legged on the floor next to Emmy Lu’s desk, her long dark hair pulled back in a messy bun secured with what looked like a pencil.She was beautiful in that effortless way that made other women hate her on sight—olive skin that never needed makeup, dark eyes that missed nothing, and a body that belonged on magazine covers despite her diet of gas station coffee and carbs.
Today she wore scrubs the color of sea glass and looked like she hadn’t slept in a week, which was probably accurate given that finals were approaching.Medical textbooks were scattered around her like fallen soldiers, and she had that slightly manic look that came from too much caffeine and not enough sleep.Which explained the aggravation.
And then there was Sheldon.
I had to blink twice to make sure I wasn’t hallucinating.Gone was his funereal uniform of slacks and a conservative button-down shirt.Instead, he stood near the window in baggy black jeans that hung low on his hips, a black T-shirt for some band called Eternal Suffering, and what could only be described as an attempt at emo hair—his usual neat comb-over had been artfully tousled and hung across his forehead in greasy strands.
But it was the eyeliner that really completed the transformation.Thick, uneven lines rimmed his eyes, making him look like he’d either been punched or had applied makeup in a moving vehicle.
“Oh,” I said, unable to stop myself.“What happened to you?”
Sheldon’s cheeks turned bright red beneath the black-rimmed eyes.“Leena said I should try expressing my darker side.”
“Your darker side apparently shops at Hot Topic,” Lily said.
“It’s called embracing the aesthetic,” Sheldon said, tugging at the hem of his shirt.“Leena says conventional fashion is just society’s way of keeping us trapped in conformity.”
“And eyeliner is your path to freedom?”I asked.
“Don’t forget the hair,” Lily added.“I got here just in time to stop him from dyeing it black in the bathroom sink.”
Sheldon unconsciously touched the greasy strands hanging in his eyes.“The box said it was temporary.”
“It’s never temporary,” Lily said.
“You can hardly tell my hair is thinning when it’s combed down like this,” he said.“The TikTok I watched said it’s emo.I might get my tongue pierced.”
“Well,” I said, trying to find something diplomatic to say, “it’s definitely a new look for you.Maybe wait on the tongue piercing.You want to wait to put holes in your body until you know the relationship is going to last.”
“Good point,” Sheldon said.“And Leena’s not that bad.She just dabbles in the dark stuff.No one knows what they want to be when they’re twenty.”
Lily’s lips thinned into a straight line, and I knew she was biting her tongue.
“What were you doing at twenty?”I asked Sheldon.
“I was in mortuary school,” he said automatically.“But I’m an exception to the rule.Did you know the average age of when a person finds a stable job they stick with for more than ten years is thirty-nine?So by those statistics all of us could be on a different career path soon.I mean, did you ever think you’d go from being an ER doctor to doing what you’re doing now?”
He had a point, and I looked at Lily with raised brows.
“All I’m saying is just be careful,” I said.
“Careful is my middle name,” he said, adjusting his glasses again.“Not really.It’s Ray.My mom watchedGoodfellasa lot when she was pregnant with me, and she thought about leaving my dad for Ray Liotta.”
“I guess she decided to stick it out with your dad,” Lily said.
He shrugged.“Until he left with his girlfriend.”He checked his hair in the small wall mirror behind a big vase of fresh flowers.“I should’ve used the hair dye.Leena would’ve liked it.She’s picking me up any minute.”
“In what?”Lily asked, her eyes on the pathology textbook spread across her lap.“Her hearse?”
“It’s not a hearse,” Sheldon said calmly.“It’s a black Lincoln Town Car.Completely different.”
“Right.Because the color scheme is what makes it creepy, not the fact that she bought it from a funeral home in Richmond.”
I cleared my throat.“Sheldon, you know we care about you, right?”
