CHAPTER FIVE
Addison
Look at me. So firm, juicy & mayoral. You want this.
A vote for Du Pont is a vote for this sweet, sweet junk, girl.
—Twitter @DuPontBadonk
I heft the sack of puff paints and ribbons onto my shoulder and lumber up the stairs, attempting to slip my apartment key out of my shorts. There is one thing I didn’t consider when I took over Jingle Balls from my grandmother. Eventually we would run out of merchandise. Including myself, there are two employees. I take the weekday shifts. Darlene, a college student transplant from Virginia, does nights. And an elderly gent named Terry with a fondness for mesh tank tops handles weekends.
When the supplies started to run low, I called everyone in for a meeting, only to be informed my grandmother did all of the designing herself. Where? I’d asked, in a hysterical, high-pitched voice. To which I was greeted by identical shrugs. I returned home that same evening to find the guest room closet packed to the rafters with tubs of glitter, hooks, bulbs, paint, ceramic statues and price tags. An entire vocation crammed inside an advertisement for the Container Store. Of course this is the one closet I hadn’t opened yet.
As I sat in the wobbly metal chair in Jingle Balls, inventory thinning around me, I had to make a decision. Do I shut the operation down and bail? Go back to Brooklyn and hope my stabilized apartment hasn’t been rented out yet (keep dreaming)? Or do I get my ass in gear and start making some fucking decorations?
Sitting on the floor of my bedroom learning how to operate a hot glue gun on that first night, I started thinking. My grandmother was an ambitious woman. A woman who wanted the whole wide world decorated for the happiest time of the year twelve months out of twelve. It surprised me that she was happy confining those dreams to Jingle Balls. What if she hadn’t been happy with it, though? What if she’d wanted to expand and never got the chance?
That question has remained with me all week and the more I create, the more I’m infected by the holiday spirit I used to have—in grudging teenage fashion—when my grandmother was still alive. I’ve even started having these crazy, ridiculous daydreams about a decorating business. Store windows, residential houses, municipal buildings. December would be a mad rush, but wouldn’t it be satisfying to decorate an entire town?
Whoa there, I’d told myself. Learn to operate a glue gun first.
Once I did that, the rest came easier, until creating the decorations became fun. And before I knew it, there was enough inventory to last another two or three weeks at the market. Meaning…I would be staying at least another two or three weeks.
But my decision to stay in Charleston had nothing to do with Elijah.
Nothing.
I haven’t seen him since the morning I dropped him off at the storage locker, anyway, and the message is loud and clear. We were a one-night stand. Of friendship. Even though I expected nothing from him, his impromptu press conference outside City Hall set loose a little bubble of hope inside me. It floated and floated for days, before popping. It turns out he wasn’t that glad he met me, after all.
“Need some help, Goose?”
I lurch to a stop and lose my balance, the heavy bag stealing my center of gravity. Oh God. Trying to compensate for the sudden lack of stability, I drop my purchases, but that doesn’t stop me from falling backwards down the stairs.
Wow. That was fast. I’m going to die.
Only I don’t, because I land in a pair of strong arms. The man they’re attached to doesn’t even budge. But when I tip my head back to look at his face, he’s white as a ghost. “Ah, Addison. Sugar, you okay?” He throws a glance over his shoulder. “I thought you saw me when you pulled up and you were just ignoring me.”
“I didn’t,” I rasp. “I d-didn’t see you.”
His mighty exhale blows my hair around. “I’m sorry.”
How long am I going to lie here like a stoner watching infomercials? It’s just that…he looks so handsome. And tired. There’s weight underneath his chocolate eyes I don’t remember from before. The circles do nothing to detract from his innate sincerity, though. Too long. You’ve been staring too long. Plus you haven’t heard from him in a week. “Um.” I wiggle until he sets me down. “No, I don’t need any help. Thanks.”
I stoop down to pick up the fallen bag, but Elijah beats me to it. “You’re cross with me.”
“No, I’m not.” Ignoring his tilted head and furrowed brow, I turn and stomp up the remainder of the stairs. “In order to be cross with you, you would have to disappoint me in some way. Which implies I had some kind of expectation. And I.” Insert apartment key. Jiggle it. Open the door. “Did not.”
Elijah follows me inside, setting the bag down on the kitchen table. “Cross.”
“Don’t smile when I’m frowning at you.”
“I can’t help it. It confuses me, too.”
God, I can smell him on me. Different from his wedding day. Less menthol aftershave, more eucalyptus and masculine bite. Like he’s been outside in the sun and his sweat wore off the freshness of his morning shower a little. It’s annoyingly amazing. Addictive. They could bottle the aroma, call it Eau de Elijah and it would fly off shelves. “What are you doing here?”
“Explaining where I’ve been.”
“I didn’t expect you to come back.”
“Yes, you did.” He pulls a newspaper out of his back pocket and tosses it on the table. “I’m about to be one hundred percent truthful with you. It might make you even angrier—”
“That’s a safe bet.”
“But I’m not going to lie on top of cutting and running.” My throat is too tight to respond, so I just shrug and wait for him to continue. “There was a lot of curiosity about you, Addison. It’s not typical behavior from me to jump into a car with a stranger. They wanted to know the timeline of our relationship. And I didn’t want them bothering you, so I nudged them in the right direction. New York. My whereabouts since you arrived. They spent a lot of time trying to put us in the same place at the same time, but they couldn’t.”
For the last week, I’ve been positive he never thought about me once. I guess I was wrong. This man—one of the most influential, powerful men in Charleston—is standing in my cheesetastic holiday-themed apartment, taking up space with his big personality and bigger shoulders, looking totally contrite. He’s spent the last week tidying up a clusterfuck I sent into motion by playing his getaway driver…and he’s worried about my anger? A girl whose career path now includes the manufacturing of reindeer testicle ornaments. “I’m waiting for the part where I get upset.”
“There’s an article in today’s newspaper titled ‘The Captain’s Getaway Girl.’ It could have been worse. If they’d found some proof we’d been…”—he clears his throat, hands tucking into his pants—“…messing around, it would have made the front page. As it is, there’s only a short interest piece on page three. Somehow they’ve missed the family connection between you and Naomi—I’m guessing because of the different last names and the fact that your two sides aren’t close. Unfortunately, they do know you work at the market now.”
I snatch up the paper and flip to the correct page. “Oh wow. I should have listened to my teachers. The internet really is forever.”
“For what it’s worth, Goose, you look very nice.”
“Elijah, I’m doing limbo in stripper heels.”
“I guess at one time you had more than four pairs of shoes.”
I shoot him a look and go back to the article. “This is insane. They even interviewed my landlord in Brooklyn.”
“It’s a good thing this place is still listed under your grandmother’s name or they would have tracked you here. Still could happen, too.” He scrubs at the back of his neck. “I’m sorry.”
“I’m the one that picked you up,” I mumble, setting the newspaper down. “It’s fine.”
A smile tilts his lips. “I like it when you forget to be mean to me.”
My words are horrifyingly breathy when I say, “I never forget. I’m just keeping you on your toes.” I swallow a golf ball. “And anyway, since they mentioned Jingle Balls, this whole thing kind of scored me some free advertising. Joke’s on them.”
He laughs, casting a glance down the front of his body. “Guess I didn’t need to wear my protective cup, after all.”
“Oh, you were expecting a knee to the nuts?”
“More than one, in fact.”
Flipping my hair back and cocking a hip comes as natural as breathing. “That’ll teach you to try and predict me next time.”
“I want to move in here.” When I start to choke on a cough, Elijah raises an eyebrow. “You’re not the only one who’s unpredictable.”
What is happening here? Am I being pranked? Yes. That has to be it. This rich, future mayor of a major city does not want to live in my prehistoric two-bedroom. “Very funny.”
He opens his mouth to say more, but closes it and drops into one of the dining room chairs. “I know it could never work, but damn. I’ve only been here a few minutes and…”
“And what?”
A few beats pass as he regards me across the table. “When I spent the night last week, that’s the most normal I’ve ever felt. No pressure. No campaign talk or reminders of the greatness that came with my father and must come after. It was like I shed the job for just a little while and it was easier to concentrate the next day. To see this path in front of me clearly—the way I want it to look.” His head lifts, dining room light caressing his shoulders, those deep brown eyes holding me hostage. “You’re part of it, Addison. You treat me like what I am, not what you think I should be. I appreciate that kind of friendship.”
Oh God. I need to tell him. He needs to know being his friend isn’t as easy for me. I have a fascination with him that definitely wouldn’t go away if he was sleeping across the hallway. Tell him. Or…I keep my mouth shut. I don’t utter the truth, because the prospect of him showering in my bathroom and eating in my kitchen is being paired with your crush in science lab, multiplied by one thousand. What if his laugh was a fixture inside these walls? There wouldn’t be any more uncertainty if I’ll ever see him again. Or if he’ll remember me.
He wants me to be his friend, though. After what he just said, it’s obvious he really needs one. I find myself wanting to be that for him. Almost as much as I want him to lay me across this table, unzip his pants and fill me. “It wouldn’t be a good idea,” I say, skirting around the table to sit down beside him, firmly ignoring the electricity that races over my skin. “If the press lost their minds when I gave you a ride, imagine if you moved in here. There would be a riot. Especially when they find out I’m related to Naomi.”
“And you’d be the target. That’s what’s stopping me.”
“That, and I haven’t invited you.” I look down my nose at him, as if my heart isn’t fluttering in my ribcage. Was he this protective of Naomi when they were together? If so, how could she have left him? I shake the thoughts free and focus on the improbable conversation. Elijah wants to live here. “What would be in it for me?”
In what seems like an unconscious move, Elijah leans back and loosens the knot of his tie, a smile playing around his mouth. “Hadn’t thought about it, but I suppose I could help you carry heavy bags up the stairs. You have to admit, you’re a little clumsy.”
I gasp. “Only when scary politicians leap out of the shadows.”
“I think you mean charming.”
My laugh won’t stay put. It comes flying right out of me. “It’s just as well it could never work, because I’m turning your room into a Christmas ornament assembly line.” I gesture to the bag. “Today’s haul from the craft store is only the beginning. Turns out, I can’t just show up and be a market vendor. I need things to vend.”
His attention shifts to the closest Christmas tree. “Your grandmother was making everything by hand?”
“That’s the long and short of it.”
“Better write that down.” He winks at me. “There’s a balls joke in there somewhere.”
“Oh, just move in,” I blurt.
Elijah tilts his head. “What was that?”
This is his fault. He had to go and be smart and gorgeous and funny, all at the same time. I was doing so well, enumerating reasons why him sharing my apartment would never work. But right now, in the perfect ease between us, I can’t imagine him leaving. Especially now that I know this place makes him happier. That…I make him happier. As a friend. Only a friend. “I was just thinking…maybe we could get around the press if you only stay occasionally. When you need a break from everything you have going on.” I roll a shoulder. “No one has to know you’re here. They don’t know you’re here now, do they?”
“No.”
“There you go.”
Wheels crank behind his narrowed eyes. “We shouldn’t have to keep a friendship secret, dammit.”
His hand is resting on the table and I want to slide mine beneath it, so I tuck it under my thigh. It’s symbolic of what our relationship will be like. Hiding. Such a perfect parallel to the past, to my mother, I want to scream.
For the first time in my life, I understand her actions. I understand common sense taking a back seat to literally everything else. Pulse, heart, scents, sight. A week ago, I didn’t think there was a person alive on this planet capable of making me humble myself. He more than exists, though. He’s telling me he wants to exist with me. Not in the way my body and heart are craving, but it’s something. It’s something where nothing was before.
I’ve been living in the shadow of my mother’s poor choices. Men are a novelty to me. With every one I’ve enjoyed and discarded, I’ve been proving to myself I’m not her. That I’m better and smarter. My eyes are open. I didn’t realize how empty my actions left me until Elijah spent one single night in my apartment. He filled a space I didn’t know was available. Maybe it wasn’t available at all until I saw him standing at the altar. Whatever the timing, the idea of letting this chance pass leaves me anxious, the specter of emptiness opening a pit in my stomach. This situation is going to hurt no matter what I do, isn’t it?
“There are reasons you staying here would have to be a secret and you know it. They won’t believe we’re friends. And I’m not Naomi. I’m already seen as the tipsy girl in the newspaper wearing six-inch heels. Not suitable for the potential mayor. Ergo, potential mayor makes bad decisions.”
“No.” His jaw is harder than I’ve ever seen it. “That’s hogwash.”
“Watch your mouth.” We share a flat smile and I stand, throwing my hair back. “You don’t have to decide now. But if you’re staying tonight, you’re cooking. I’m not running a charity.”
My heart is in my throat as I leave the room, taking the bag of supplies with me and stowing it under my bed. I stand in the still, dark room for long seconds, listening, listening so carefully I can hear the dull thread of buzz in the silence. I don’t realize I’ve been holding my breath until I hear the clink of pots and pans coming from the kitchen.
I’ve either just made the best decision of my life or the worst.
Only time will tell.