Page 70 of So Not My Thing
But this was Miss Mary’s space. I couldn’t pass up a chance to give my two cents.
I made sure to dress down so it wouldn’t look like I was trying to impress him. I wore running shorts and a tank and laced up my sneakers so I could hit the river trail when I was done downstairs.
I wasn’t sure if I should go through the kitchen door like usual, so I walked around front and went in the main entrance. The club—the hull of it, anyway—was empty except for him. The crew probably got off at five every day.
He smiled when I walked in. “So I guess that’s a yes, you’ll give me your opinion?”
“Full-service leasing agent here,” I answered.
“You’re the best,” he said, smiling slightly.
I liked that smile. It was his smile when he was thinking things he wasn’t saying, and it always made me want to know what else was going on in his mind. He had so many layers, and I—
I was staring. I blinked. “You wanted me to look at something?”Besides your lips?
“I wanted to get your opinion on this wall over here. I’m thinking about bricking it over, giving it some Chicago blues club credibility.”
“Or...?”
“Well, right now it’s slated to be a plaster wall.”
I raised my eyebrow. “Are you opening a Chicago blues club?”
“No.”
“Does New Orleans need any kind of credibility when it comes to music?”
He cut his eyes toward me, and a small smile tugged at his lips. “No.”
“Then it sounds to me like putting up a fake brick wall would be trying too hard.”
His eyes slid back to the wall. “It sounds obvious when you put it that way.”
“Yep.” This one was definitely a no-brainer. “Exposed brick and fake brick facades are very different things.”
“Fair enough.”
“Great. I’m headed out for a run. See you around.”
The next day he texted me at lunch.Want to offer an opinion on light fixtures? Because that might be the decision that finally kills me.
After work, I changed into my running clothes to give me an excuse not to stay and met him downstairs.
“Show me what you got.” For the next twenty minutes, I looked at different fixtures on his phone.
Friday afternoon, shortly before I planned to leave work, it was,There are more styles of chair legs in the world than I’m emotionally equipped to handle. Help?
I laughed.Feel their vibe.
There are no vibes through the phone screen.
Of course there are,I answered.
He called. “I always thought I was a leg man, but these chairs are making me a liar.”
I fought not to blush even though he couldn’t see me. I had great legs, and I’d been parading them past him in my running shorts two days in a row. I hadn’t meant to. I’d just been trying to give myself a reason to literally run out of the club every day.
“Ellie?”
