Page 11 of Man Cuffed
These are my thoughts as I unlock my own door. Whatever fire is trying to ignite between me and Trouble is not important. I should just blow that shit out.
Of course, now I’m thinking about blowing.
Those legs, though. And that smile. If my dick had any say in the matter, I’d already be peeling those jeans off her.
I open my own door and remind myself that I have a fuck buddy already. It’s casual, of course, but we’re a good fit. I close my eyes and think about her for a second. Nicole Nicole Nicole.
Maybe I should call her. I mean, she just left my apartment a few hours ago. So that would probably be weird.
A cold shower it is, then.
Grumpy for no reason, I step inside my apartment. It’s clean and orderly, just the way I like things. I tug the mail out of my back pocket and toss it onto the countertop. I pull a beer out of my refrigerator, open it, and then sort the mail so it doesn’t become clutter. There’s a cable bill and a postcard offering me a free tire rotation with purchase of an oil change.
But the third envelope is the one I really don’t want to open. It’s fancy, which is the first clue that I’ll hate what’s inside. It’s also made from paper with little bits of flowers and seeds trapped in the weave. I didn’t even know that was a thing.
My name is swirled across the front in calligraphy, which seems like a waste. My own sister paid someone to write my name so that I look like the king of England. MACKLIN JAMES MAGUIRE.
She even middle-named me. And everyone knows that when your family uses your middle name, there’s no getting around them.
With a sigh, I use my thumb to tear open the fancyass envelope, ripping it open to reveal two fancyass cards and yet another envelope inside. The cards are edged in gold, too. There are villages somewhere that could eat for a week on what this piece of mail cost.
And none of that would offend me at all, except for one simple fact: I really do not want to attend my sister’s wedding.
Don’t get me wrong, I love my sister. I see her every week for lunch. I don’t know much about this guy she’s marrying, but he isn’t the problem, either.
It’s the rest of my family. Ten years ago I excused myself from family holidays and events. That was necessary to save my own sanity. But now that Rosie is getting married, I will probably have to show up to this thing and be civil.
My beer is half gone already. Huh.
The wedding date is in a couple of months. That gives me a few weeks grace period to pretend like it isn’t happening. Or does it? There’s a reply card, which I will probably fail to fill out. Rosie knows I won’t blow off her wedding. But aside from the “will attend” and “won’t attend” boxes, there’s a line to enter the name of my date.
I don’t have a date.
Christ, Ineeda date.
I cannot show up to this thing alone.
In addition to a date, I also need a new suit, a promotion at work, and probably a new personality.
The first thing is doable. The second is possible. The third is a nonstarter.
There’s one more slip of paper in the envelope, containing instructions.Place your seed paper on soil, and cover with 1/8 inch of additional soil. Give it a good drink of water! After that, make sure it’s always moist and in a sunny spot. You should see sprouts within 7–10 days!
Fuck me, now I’ve seen everything. This wedding invitation is inviting me to bury it in the ground. I scoop it up—including the response card and its envelope—and carry it out onto my deck. There’s a pot of dirt there already from last year’s petunias.
Good enough.
Two minutes later I’ve buried the wedding invitation. After draining my beer, I refill the bottle with water and soak the whole business.
That was seriously therapeutic. Now if I could also repurpose my asshole brother the same way…
My phone rings in my pocket. The caller is Nicole. That’s a little weird. We don’t know each other very well, and we don’t usually call each other. “Hello?”
“Hi, Maguire,” she says. “I’m really sorry to bother you. But I’m having a bit of a crisis.”
Uh-oh. I do have a weakness for a damsel in distress. “What’s the problem?”
“When I got home I found that my apartment is flooded. A pipe broke upstairs.”
