The Roommate Problem

by Mariah Ankenman

  “My parents are kind of…” She wrinkled her nose. “Hippies? I guess that’s the best term to describe them.”

  Now that he could believe, seeing as who their daughter was.

  “They never felt the need to cement their love for each other with a piece of paper. But they’ve been living together for decades, so by now they’re common law married anyway.”

  “And they’ve never separated? In all that time?” What was holding them together? He knew a marriage license wasn’t set in stone, but it kept his parents together long after they should have separated. How did two people stay with each other for so long if they weren’t legally bound to each other?

  “No. They love each other.” Mo stared at him as if he had two heads. “They’re soul mates. Why would they ever leave each other?”

  He shrugged. “Married people get divorced all the time. Even when they claim to be soul mates.”

  What a silly word. What did it even mean? No one really knew what a soul was, so how could it have a mate? Never made sense to him.

  Mo’s teeth came out to worry her bottom lip. Her eyes soft, she asked, “Is that what happened to your parents? They got divorced?”

  He shrugged. “Yeah.” Not like he was the only kid in the world to have parents who split. “It’s not a big deal.”

  She placed her hand on top of his, squeezing gently. “I think it is. How old were you when it happened?”

  “Ten.” He used his free hand to reach into the bag and grab some popcorn. Not because he was hungry, but because he needed something else to focus on while he told this story. “They’d been fighting for years, so it was more of a relief. For them anyway.”

  “Oh, August, I’m sorry.”

  He shrugged off her sympathy. He didn’t need it. It happened a long time ago. He was over it.

  “It was a pretty amicable divorce.” He tossed a few kernels in his mouth, chewed, and swallowed. “I spent half the week with Mom, the other half with Dad. A few weeks in the summer with Gran.”

  Those had been the best weeks of the year, his one-on-one time with Gran.

  “You home hopped?” Her jaw dropped open in shock. “That must have been so hard for you. And your parents.”

  “I was fine,” he lied. “Besides, they both got remarried within a year, and their spouses already had kids with full custody, so they had their core family and an extra kid every few days of the week.”

  Suddenly, the popcorn bag was tossed onto the coffee table, and August had an armful of Mo. She wrapped her arms around his neck, hugging him tightly, her face buried in his neck.

  “You’re not an extra, August.” She sniffled. “You’re a person who matters. If your parents ever made you feel like a spare or superfluous, that’s on them. And quite frankly makes them bad parents. No child should ever feel unwanted.”

  He wouldn’t say he felt unwanted as a kid. Second fiddle to his stepsiblings was more the feeling he got. Dampness hit his skin. He tugged softly, pulling Mo from his arms to see a few tears running down her cheeks.

  “Hey,” he said, brushing away her tears with his thumbs. “What’s all this?”

  Was she crying for him? No one had ever cried for him. He wasn’t sure how to feel about it. He didn’t need her tears. He’d been out of his parents’ houses for a long time now. And it wasn’t as if they were abusive or anything, just sort of wrapped up in their lives and new families. He wasn’t neglected so much as…forgettable. A second thought to their primary families.

  “Don’t cry, Sunshine.” He bent his head, placing a kiss to her lips. “I’m fine.”

  The tears stopped, but she shook her head. “You’re not fine. How could any child be fine after being sent back and forth between homes like a gravy boat?”

  Gravy boat? Weird analogy. It wasn’t like his parents didn’t want him at their new homes or resented him or anything. They just kind of…didn’t know how to fit him in their new lives.

  “It wasn’t that bad.” He tucked her into his side, finding it kind of hilarious that he was trying to comfort her about his crappy childhood. “They provided for me. I never lacked anything.”

  “Except love,” she interrupted.

  He shifted on the couch. “They loved me.” In their own way. “I was just left out of a lot of family decisions since I lived at each home part-time.”

  “That had to be hard for you.”

  He lifted a shoulder. “I got used to it. Ended up making a lot of my own plans.”

  “But families are supposed to talk about things, agree on them, include everyone,” she argued.

  They were supposed to, but life rarely did what it was supposed to do, he’d learned.

  “My family always keeps each other in the loop about our lives.”

  “Really?” He had a hard time imagining a family dynamic like that.

  “Yes.” She nodded. “It’s how I know my oldest brother and his husband are thinking about adopting a second baby, and my mom hates hot flashes more than she hates creamed spinach. And she really hates creamed spinach.”

  Wow, okay. He wasn’t sure he wanted to be that close to his mom. Some things a son didn’t need to know. But it made him wonder just how much Mo had shared with her family about him. About them. He wanted to ask, but he also wasn’t sure he would like the answer. No matter what it was.

  “The only person who’s ever included me in everything is Gran.” He smiled. “Whenever I came to stay with her in the summers, she always asked what I wanted to do, always gave me her schedule for the day, and made adjustments if I needed something. She never made me feel like an outsider in her life.”

  Which was why he so desperately wanted to take care of her now. She provided him the only space he truly felt at home as a kid. He wanted to give her a home now. One where she’d always be taken care of. By him.

  “Your grandmother tells you everything?” her soft voice asked.

  “Yup.”

  “What if…what if she kept something from you? For your own good? To keep you from worrying?”

  He glanced down at her. “That would be lying, and lying isn’t good for anyone. Besides, Gran knows I don’t worry about problems. I take care of them.”

  Mo pulled away, shifting on the couch, her demeanor changing, closing off. She grabbed the bag of popcorn, now empty except for a few unpopped kernels at the bottom. She stared intently at the bag, brow furrowed as if the answer to some complex math problem lay in the emptiness of the popcorn vessel. He wondered what he’d said to cause her to pull back, but before he could ask about it, she tore off a piece of the paper bag and stuck it in her mouth.

  He reeled back in horror. “What are you doing?”

  She glanced up at him, pulling the bit of paper out, scraping her teeth along it as she smiled and popped the paper out of her mouth.

  “Licking the salt and butter off the bag,” she said as if it was the most normal thing in the world. “It’s delicious. Try it.”

  She held the bag out to him. August leaned back so far the arm of the couch cracked his spine. “Moira, that is disgusting.”

  She arched one eyebrow, ripping off another small piece and repeating the process. “No, it’s not.”

  It was. He’d seen the woman eat some pretty strange stuff, but sucking on an empty popcorn bag? Who did that?

  “Come on.” She threw a leg over his lap and straddled him, tearing off another small part of the bag and holding it up to his lips. “Just one little lick.”

  Hell no. He might be willing to branch out of his comfort zone a bit for her, but this was crossing a line. He did not eat literal trash.

  “It tastes really good, I promise,” she insisted.

  Plucking the paper from her fingers, he tossed it on the coffee table. He grasped the back of her neck in a gentle hold, tugging her closer to him. Their lips were
a breath apart.

  “I can think of something that tastes even better.”

  He felt her smile as he pressed his lips to hers, thrusting his tongue inside when she opened for him. Yes. Nothing tasted as good as Mo. The woman was quickly becoming an addiction. He craved her, needed her. And not just to warm his bed. More and more he was finding he liked spending time with her, whether they were in bed or sitting around watching TV. And how the hell had she got him to open up about his childhood? He never shared that with anyone.

  Somehow, Mo made him feel…safe. He could tell her anything, and he knew she wouldn’t judge. She’d give her opinion loud and clear, but it came from a place of wanting to help. And she had. The tears she shed for him, the anger she voiced over his upbringing, validated his own feelings on the matter. And somehow that made him feel like he could start letting some of that resentment go.

  How did she do that?

  Mo pulled back, a warm smile on her face. “Mmmm, you’re right. That was more delicious.”

  “You’re amazing, Mo.”

  Her eyes widened, shock filling their golden depths. August froze. He hadn’t meant to say that. It’d been in his head and just sort of popped out. Now he didn’t know what to do. He could take it back, but that’d be a dick move. And he didn’t really want to take it back. He meant it. She was amazing. But he shouldn’t have said it. It implied things he wasn’t ready to admit.

  Now or ever.

  He sat there, mouth slightly open like a fish out of water for a solid minute.

  Come on, you ass, do something before she starts asking questions you don’t want to answer.

  Mo smiled, laughing softly with a shake of her head. She bent down to kiss the tip of his nose. “Unfreeze, August. It’s okay. I’ll take it for the compliment I’m sure it was meant to be and not add any feelings into it.”

  She slid off his lap, grabbing her empty ice cream bowl, the empty popcorn bag, and the shreds of paper.

  “I can take care of those,” he said, standing and grabbing the items from her hands. If he was going to act like a jerk, the least he could do was clean up. He’d have done it anyway because Mo usually just stacked everything on the counter instead of throwing trash away and putting dirty dishes in the dishwasher. He wondered if her old roommates had cleaned up after her, too, or if she just did it to mess with him?

  He tossed the trash, stacking the dirty bowl into the top rack of the dishwasher. When he turned around, Mo had disappeared. Fearing he had hurt her feelings, he started to head down the hallway to the bedrooms.

  “Mo?”

  The squeak of a floorboard sounded before her bedroom door opened. She stuck her head out with an impish smile.

  “Hey, August. Catch.”

  His hand went up in surprise as her arm rose and tossed something directly at him. Luckily, he’d been on his high school varsity baseball team. He caught the item, which turned out to be a large, pristine white softball. Looked like it hadn’t gotten lots of use. But there did appear to be some writing on it. Black and fresh from the looks of it. He read the words scribbled on the ball.

  Feelings.

  Glancing up, he saw Mo holding up a black magic marker in her fingers, leaning against the wall to hold herself up as she doubled over with laughter. “Oh no! You caught them.”

  He shook his head, chuckling along with her, but inside his heart raced and his stomach cramped.

  Because he was terrified it might be true.

  Chapter Seventeen

  “Is that the rental agreement for the Poehler-Scott wedding?”

  Mo glanced up at Lilly’s question. She’d been so focused on the paperwork in front of her she’d almost forgotten she was at work. Quickly slipping the papers under a folder on her desk, she shook her head. “No.”

  Lilly squinted, causing her glasses to slip down her nose. She pushed them back up with a finger as she asked, “Then what is it?”

  Good grief, somebody was in a nosy mood this morning. Mo grabbed another file from her inbox and held it out. “It’s nothing work related, but here’s the venue rental agreement you asked about. All signed and ready to be filed.”

  Lilly rose from her desk and headed toward Mo. Pru gave a soft whistle when Lilly passed her desk, whispering under her breath, “You’re in trouble now, Mo.”

  Nah. It wasn’t like Lilly was the boss or anything. Sure, Lil took point on most of their weddings, but that was just because she handled the majority of the client interaction. They were all equal partners in Mile High Happiness. Lilly couldn’t fire her.

  But her friend could give Mo a stern talking to if she felt the need. And Lilly always felt the need.

  Lilly held out her hand. Mo passed over the rental file, but when her friend simply tucked the folder under her arm and waited, she sighed.

  “What?”

  “Don’t what me, Moira Rossi.”

  “I think she wants to know what ‘not work related’ stuff had you so preoccupied,” Pru said from the corner of her mouth.

  See, this was the problem with working with your best friends. They didn’t let personal stuff drop the way normal coworkers would. Normally, Mo was all about sharing, but the whole August-Agatha situation was a bit complicated. More so since she and August were sleeping together.

  Not that her friends knew about that little tidbit. If they did, she’d be in for the mother of all sit-downs. She knew what they would both say, and none of it would be anything she wanted to hear. But since Lilly could out-stubborn anyone, she sighed and pulled the paperwork she’d been studying from under the folder she’d placed over it.

  “It’s just some loan paperwork I’m going over.”

  Lilly’s eyes widened in surprise. “Loan? What do you need a loan for?”

  “It’s not for me.”

  Pru stood up from her desk and headed over to Mo’s. Now both her friends were standing in front of her, concerned expressions on their faces. Oops, she hadn’t meant to worry them. Better explain so they didn’t start freaking out. Pru could be a worrier, and Lilly liked to solve problems. Neither of which Mo needed at the moment.

  “Agatha is thinking of buying a small plot of land on the edge of town and setting up a grow house on it.”

  “Grow house?” Pru wrinkled her nose. “Agatha’s getting into the marijuana business?”

  Mo burst out laughing. Even though those kind of grow houses were legal in Colorado, the thought of sweet old Agatha running a weed empire was the funniest thing she’d ever heard. Once she got her chuckles under control, she clarified, “No. A grow house for flowers. Her grandson August wants to buy some land far away from the city to start his own flower farm. He wants Agatha to sell the shop and come live by him.”

  “Oh no.” Pru placed a hand over her heart. “But we love Agatha. We’d miss her so much.”

  Lilly nodded in agreement. “And she’s one of our best vendors. We’ve never had any issues with her.”

  Mo agreed with them both. If Agatha left, it would devastate her, and not just because they would lose a fantastic vendor. Plus she knew Agatha didn’t want to leave. August knew his grandmother didn’t want to leave. The stubborn man was just being pigheaded about everything.

  Lilly leaned over the desk to peek at the loan agreement on Mo’s desk. “So Agatha is applying for a loan to buy a plot of land so August can have a flower farm in the city?”

  Mo nodded. “Yup. This way August can still grow his flowers and he can directly supply to the shop so the profit margin will be greater, since she won’t have to go through other growers anymore. Win-win.”

  Her confident glow dimmed as she glanced at the skeptical expressions on her friends’ faces. What? This was a great idea. She’d been so excited when she thought of it, she’d texted Agatha right away, and she’d agreed with Mo. Unfortunately, Agatha didn’t have enough money to
purchase the amount of land needed. Mo had offered as much help as she could, but Agatha refused, insisting on calling her bank for a business loan instead.

  “Moira,” Lilly said.

  Uh oh. She was using her warning tone. The one she used when Mo did something wrong, like borrowing her clothes without asking. But the joke was on Lilly, because Mo hadn’t done anything wrong. And she couldn’t borrow any clothing now that the women didn’t live together.

  Though she might still have Lilly’s green silk top in the back of her closet from that time she borrowed it and accidentally forgot to return it.

  She blinked up innocently at Lilly. “What?”

  “Why is your name on this loan application?”

  “What?” Pru exclaimed, grabbing the paper off the desk. “Mo, you’re co-signing for Agatha’s loan?”

  Nosy friends. She grabbed the paper back, shoving it into a folder and stashing it in her desk drawer.

  “Yes. Agatha couldn’t get the loan on her own.” And since the sweet older woman wouldn’t directly ask for help, Mo insisted on co-signing for her. “Agatha’s credit history isn’t as good as the bank wanted, and the shop’s profit margins aren’t quite as high as they would like, I guess, but that’s why this plan will work so well. Once August has his flower farm up and running, she’ll get her flowers at cost from him.”

  “And he agreed to this?” Lilly arched a brow.

  Mo shifted in her seat. “Technically, he doesn’t know about this plan, but—”

  “Moira!” Pru gasped.

  Great, and now both her friends were scolding her. They were only two years older than her, but sometimes they acted more like big sisters than peers. Annoying big sisters who thought they knew everything.

  “Look.” She pointed to her friends. “August knows I’m trying to come up with a plan to convince him and Agatha to stay.”

  Lilly shook her head, sighing heavily. “Convince, Mo. Not take over.”

  She wasn’t taking over. Not entirely. It was Agatha’s plan to take out the loan; she just offered to help by co-signing. Besides, he promised to be open to her suggestions. She’d admit applying for a loan was a bit more than a suggestion, but it was what Agatha wanted. Mo was simply doing as her friend wished.