Page 18 of Mostly My Boss
Ethan left to fetch pie and ice cream, and I looked at Daniel. I’m not sure why I had this sense I had to defend Ethan, but it was there.
“He’s a little awkward sometimes. Socially. But he’s a good guy.”
“Please. I was just messing with him.” Daniel laughed. “That’s a fucker you got to keep on his toes. I could tell that just by looking at him.”
That much was true. When Ethan came back, he had pie and ice cream. And he’d snagged a few Hersey’s Kisses he pushed in my direction.
Kisses were my favorite. Had I told him that?
“Everyone needs something sweet,” he said.
Yeah, I thought. And getting me my favorite chocolates was just that, whether he knew it or not.
* * *
A mall in Boston
Julia
“Tell me why I’m here when I can’t afford anything.”
This was another Ethan brainstorm. With a new start came new looks for both of us. It was a Sunday in late September, and he’d showed up at my dorm room with the idea that we should go shopping. An cab later we were in the Burlington Mall in downtown Boston staring at Nordstrom—a store I knew of peripherally, but had never put my toe inside.
A Nordstrom Rack had recently opened in Cedar Rapids. Beyond that, all Iowa had were Nordstrom distribution centers. Places that held the fancy clothes that were sent out to other places in the country for people to wear. Not for Iowans.
“You seem to know what looks good on guys,” he said.
“Three brothers,” I reminded him.
“And I know what looks good on women. So I find your best look and you find mine.”
“Except you can afford your best look and I have to leave mine on the rack.”
“Not true. As part of you agreeing to do this with me, I’ll front you one full look. We’ll break your Nordstrom cherry. But it’s not about a couple of pieces of clothes. It’s about knowing what works for you. You find that here with quality merchandise, then you can extrapolate that all the way to Target. Trust me.”
I crossed my arms over my chest. “I don’t need your charity.”
“I’m a visionary entrepreneur. I don’t believe in charity. I believe in investments in the future.”
Well, if he was going to say it like that.
“Okay. Let’s shop.” I headed toward the men’s department and thought about Ethan’s body. That is to say, I didn’t think too hard about his body. Just how clothes would look on it.
Because we clearly weren’t doing anything like that. Thinking about each other’s bodies. In fact, Ethan liked to spend a lot of time discussing the girls he was interested in sexually. Could he get them? How would he approach them on campus?
Based on what I knew, if I believed him, he’d already hooked up with two different girls, much to Nicki’s dismay because she was clearly developing a crush on him.
Thankfully, I wasn’t.
Ethan was simply…Ethan.
When he asked me why I wasn’t spending time worrying about who I might hook up with, I had an easy answer. School trumped everything. Parties, guys, fun.
The truth was, I wouldn’t know how to pick up a guy if I fell over him. I reached around my head and checked that my ponytail was still intact. It was getting cooler, so I’d switched to long-sleeved T-shirts and short ankle socks under my Keds.
I found the casual men’s section and started pulling out things I liked. Colors that would work with his russet coloring. He wasn’t a full-on ginger, but there were dark reddish-brown highlights throughout his hair. Something girls would pay a fortune to add to their own hair but that obviously came naturally to him.
His eyes. Green sometimes, but mostly hazel. Which meant if he wanted to highlight that, he might do well with some jewel tones. I pulled out some emerald-green shirts. Another one that was basically eggplant. He’d probably hate it.
