We were at my door before I started getting nervous. Had I really invited the sexy billionaire back to my shitty shoebox apartment? I looked back at him to confirm. Yes, yes, I had.

Taking a deep breath, I pressed the battered, poorly painted door open. There it was, in all its glory: the entire net wealth of Zoey Melissa Atkinson (minus the Civic, which was probably a liability rather than an asset).

My apartment was small. Mercilessly small. So small that being a minimalist was a necessity rather than a choice. I’d actually been a minimalist back when I could afford more than 300 square feet, but I’d really had to step it up a notch in this apartment. The upside was it was always perfectly clean because there wasn’t much to keep clean.

“Cozy, huh?” I remarked at Nathan’s obvious shock, then laughed at his expression. It wasn’t that bad. At least it had high ceilings and nice windows, plus no roommates. There was no way I could live with roommates again. After four long years in the dorms, I would never be able to cohabitate with other women again.

“Yeah,” he said weakly, stepping into my petite kitchen.

“Do you want some tea?” I asked, feeling weirdly ashamed of my little home. I turned my back to Nathan and pulled out the tea kettle from its home under the sink. He must think I was some kind of peasant.

“Sure,” he replied haltingly, recovering somewhat and moving into what passed as my dining room and office, “your apartment reminds me of the ISS a bit. It’s very efficient.”

“That’s why they call it an efficiency,” I quipped, feeling a bit defensive as my humiliation grew stale, “I guess you’re not used to how the other half lives?”

The tips of his ears turned pink.

“I’m sorry,” he replied, “I’m really not trying to be a snob. It’s bred in.”

“It’s ok,” I told him, shrugging, “at least you cop to being a snob. Most people would deny it.”

I put the electric teakettle on and pulled out some mugs from my little cupboard. Usually I drank cheap green tea, but I had some nicer loose-leaf jasmine tea in the back of the cupboard that I rationed. This counted as a special occasion. I didn’t have a lot of company over, and I hadn’t ever had a man visit me in this apartment during the year since I moved in. When Nathan saw me fussing with the tin, the pink on his ears turned a darker red.

“Actually,” he said abruptly, “I don’t like tea. I don’t know why I said that a second ago.”

Was he nervous? That was adorable. Never in a million years would I have thought he’d be intimidated by me. The idea made me quickly stifle a chuckle. He was so far out of my league both physically and economically that it wasn’t even funny. He didn’t reciprocate my smile at him.

“Oh. Ok. Is something the matter?” I asked, putting the tea back in the cupboard and moving in closer to him.

He looked at me with his blue-green eyes wide and wary. He shook his head. I wasn’t wearing high heels tonight, so he was several inches taller than me when I stepped up close to his chest. I kissed him gently, brushing my fingers down the sides of his face. He gripped my waist tightly like he had that afternoon in his office, kissing me back tentatively. He tasted like blueberries and ice cream.

Our kisses began to become more insistent, and I felt a giddy, heart-squeezing passion beginning to rise in me. Shifting out of my shoes one awkward foot at a time, I held onto his shoulders for balance. Once I was barefoot Nathan lifted my shirt over my head with increasing urgency. I pulled his shirttail from his waistband as he snapped the clasp at the back of my bra and pulled it off. But before I could start on the buttons he unexpectedly pulled away and stepped back.

“I’m so sorry, Zoey,” he said, stepping away again and then going around me so he was back in the kitchenette and out of my grasp, “I, um, I can’t do this.”

I didn’t know what to say. No one had ever put me in this sort of a situation before. Had he changed his mind in the last five minutes? Was my apartment really that ugly? Was I ugly? Did I look bad with my shirt off? I’d worn my nicest bra, which was dark purple with little rhinestones on the straps. I’d spent a long time on my hair and makeup and I thought I looked ok…

All I could do was cross my arms across my chest in an ‘x’ shape to cover myself a little bit and stare at him in confusion. Finally, since I guess he was waiting for an answer or some kind of a response, I nodded. He looked really anxious and unhappy and I guess somehow it was my fault.

I swallowed hard and put on my happy, reassuring smile. There was no reason for me to embarrass myself any further. Of course, he didn’t want me. Clearly, he’d come to his senses. When he saw my apartment he probably remembered he could do a lot better than spend the evening with a starving gossip columnist.

“Don’t worry about it,” I told him, putting on a polite expression, “it’s not a big deal. It was fun getting dessert, but it is getting pretty late, huh? We both have to work tomorrow. Maybe another time.”

“Yeah,” he answered, moving closer to the door while I continued to stand, useless and half-naked in the living room, “I’ll call you.”

He fled.

When he was gone I moved over to the door, locked the three massive locks that protected me from my awful neighborhood outside, and then melted to the ground for a good, long cry.