Chapter 5
CHLOE
I had to sit there, just cooling off for a minute. I couldn’t believe that guy.
“Ugh!” I plopped down on the couch, staring at the ceiling.
There was definitely something wrong with him. If I wanted to survive the summer, I should probably keep my distance. I shuddered, remembering the pure hatred in his eyes when he looked at me. Seriously, what had I done to piss him off so badly? It didn’t make any sense. Was his resentment all because of his stupid bike?
British guys would never have reacted this way. They actually have manners, something that seems like a foreign concept to Adam.
I let out a sigh of exasperation before I turned back to the telly, resuming my episode of Doctor Who. At least Henry had BBC as a part of his cable package or I would have died from watching America’s horrible excuse for entertainment. They thought that violence and sex were all they needed to make a good show. Plot lines barely even mattered.
***
After a while, I got bored of sitting in front of the television all day. So, I got up and grabbed my rucksack from my room and headed for the kitchen. It was the brightest room of the house, making it an ideal reading spot.
I settled into one of the bar stools along the island, breaking open War and Peace.
Soon, I was lost in the tale.
I only looked up when I heard someone entering the kitchen.
Adam had a sour expression on his face when he saw me.
I half expected him to retreat out of the room, but instead, he silently walked up to the fridge and opened it.
He stuck his head inside, poking around, looking for something to eat. “The folks are going to be out late. Dad just texted me.”
“Oh,” I said. “I’m surprised you even told me. I thought you would have jumped at the opportunity to starve me to death.”
“Yeah, but you have a point. If anything happens to you, then I’m the one that gets in trouble.”
I grinned triumphantly. “I’m glad you’re finally seeing things my way.”
“Whatever.” He shrugged, closing the fridge door and heading for the pantry. As he did so, I couldn’t help but admire his body. He was shirtless, his muscles rippling under the skin of his back. Along his right shoulder blade was a deep scar that nearly ran to the hollow of his spine. I wondered, for a moment, what had caused that scar.
“Do you want to order take away?”
“Subtraction?” he asked.
“What? No.” I furrowed my brow together in confusion. “You know, when you call a restaurant and they deliver your food to your house. Come on, America probably invented that.”
“You mean… delivery.”
“Sure. Whatever. Does it matter what we call it?”
“Of course it does,” he said, leaning against the counter. “Take away is subtraction.”
“How is take away subtraction, anyway?”
He held up five fingers. “Joe has five watermelons. He takes away three to the fair. How many are left? Oh, wait… don’t answer that… You probably haven’t graduated from the first grade yet.”
“I’ll have you know that I’m matriculated at Oxford University. I start in the autumn.”
“Oxford, huh? They must have been asleep when they saw your file.”
This guy was really getting on my last nerve. “Do you want delivery or not?”
“Fine.” He opened up a drawer and pulled out a couple menus, throwing them in front of me. “Pick whatever you want.” He grabbed an apple from the fruit basket and took a bite out of it. How ironic.
I glanced through the menus, noticing that each one had certain items circled or crossed out. “What’s up with all these markings?”
“I’m allergic to peanuts. The circled ones I can eat. The crossed-out ones would probably kill me.”
“I see.”
“Don’t be getting any ideas,” he warned through a mouthful of apple. “If you kill me, I’ll be sure to haunt you and I’ll be a thousand times more annoying in ghost form.”
“Yeah. I’m not taking my chances.” I handed him the menu for Chinese. “I guess I’ll go with the General Tsao’s.”
“Alright, call it in. I’m not going to do it for you.”
“My phone doesn’t work in the US yet. Mum’s bringing me back a SIM card tonight.”
He sighed. “Fine. Do you want the platter or the dinner combination?”
“Dinner combination.”
He nodded, heading out of the room to place our order. The floorboards squeaked underfoot as he kept walking around. If I had to guess, he was one of those people who hated phone calls. Good. He deserved to suffer a little bit after everything he’s put me through.
Eventually, he came back, chucking the core of his apple in the trash. “They’ll be here in forty-five minutes.”
“Grr.” I rubbed my stomach, consoling it.
“Hungry?”
“You could say that.”
“Why don’t you eat an apple or something?” he suggested, tossing one at me.
I caught it, rubbing the skin with the sleeve of my sweater. “You know I’m not Eve, right?”
“And you know I’m not religious, right? Besides, I’ve heard that joke a thousand times. I’m sure the nurses at the NICU were already teasing me about it.”
“Wait, why were you in the NICU?”
“I was a premy,” he said offhandedly like it was no big deal.
“Why?”
“Why would I tell you?” his voice took on a sharp edge and his body tensed. I sensed that I had ventured into sensitive territory.
“Sorry. I didn’t mean to pry.”
We were silent for a moment, neither one of us looking the other in the eye. The air around us grew heavy with awkwardness. Usually, I wasn’t the kind of person who bothered by the silence, but this was getting suffocating.
“So… um…”
He raised an eyebrow in question. “Yeah?”
“What do you do?”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, all I know is that you don’t go to university. So, what do you do instead?”
“Not much.”
“So, what, you just lounge around the house all day, gawking at your bike?”
His lips pressed together in a hard, unamused frown. “Very funny.”
“Seriously. What do you do?”
“I told you, not much.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“You’re annoying, you know that?”
“No one is forcing you to talk to me. You’re here because you want to be.” I pointed out, feeling smug when I saw his left eyebrow twitch. I felt like I was slowly getting to him, breaking through that bad boy personality of his.
“What are you reading?” he asked abruptly, trying to change the topic of conversation.
“War and Peace.”
“Tolstoy?”
“You know him?” I was actually a little surprised. Adam didn’t seem like the academic type.
“I might not have gone to university, but I graduated high school. Third in my class.”
My eyes widened.
“Don’t look so surprised.”
“Sorry. It’s just, baffling. If you’re so smart, why didn’t you continue with your education?”
He shrugged. “I didn’t see the point. You spend so much money and then half the time you end up in a cubical, hating your life,” his tone sounded off. There was something he wasn’t telling me. Then again, he hated me, so why would he tell me anything?
“What about you?”
“Hmm?”
“What are you studying?”
“Biotechnology.”
“And you're reading War and Peace? “
“I’m taking a Russian Literature class for fun.”
He scoffed. “You have a whacked out definition of ‘fun,’ I see.”
“Oh yeah? What do you do for fun? Ride your motorcycle all day?”
Adam grinned deviously before he grabbed a knife from a drawer.
“Um… What are you doing with that thing?” I asked, about to book it out of the room if he came any closer. I knew he was crazy… but I didn’t think he was this crazy.
“Relax. I’m not going to kill you.” He flashed me a smile that was actually pretty attractive. Deep set dimples appeared on his face, softening his overall expression. For a fleeting moment, he looked like a friendly human being.
“So… what are you doing?”
“Playing a game. It’s fun.” He twirled the knife in his fingers before he pressed his other hand down on the counter. He spread his fingers apart and looked up at me, his eyes shining mischievously. “Have you figured it out yet?”
“You aren’t playing that stupid game, are you…?” I asked starting to get nervous. “Five finger fillet…”
“I’ve never heard it called that before. I kind of like it.” His grin deepened as he rested the knife’s point between his thumb and index finger. “Don’t worry, I’ll go slow.” But, that’s the exact opposite of what he did.
He moved so fast that the knife became a blur.
I cringed, terrified that he would cut his finger off or something. “Adam! Please don’t do that! You’re going to hurt yourself.” I didn’t know why I was so concerned. The jerk probably deserved to get hurt, but at the same time, a part of me ached at the thought of him in pain.
Knock, knock!
Adam stopped. “Must be the delivery guy,” he said, placing the knife on the counter and walking away.
I quickly grabbed the knife and put it away. I didn’t want him to play that game again.
I didn’t want him to get hurt…