So We Can Glow - Stories - Leesa Cross-Smith Page 0,51

turned to lock the door behind him and looked around her living room, inspecting things in the Christmas-tree light.

* * *

On the elevator, Sierra doesn’t want to seem interested in Brooks. That would be the worst. He is arrogant, a womanizer. She’s heard too many stories from her brother, from her friends. He hasn’t always been a gentleman. Fuck that. He’s a douche. The emergency lights are too harsh on both their faces and she half wishes they’d go off again. The elevator is even hotter now. Her phone no longer has reception.

“Is your phone working?” she asks him.

“Nah,” he says, shaking his head.

“This place is too nice to have a jacked-up elevator.”

“Ain’t that the truth.”

If she doesn’t say anything else, maybe he’ll be quiet until they get the elevator fixed. The thought annoys her. Is it too much to ask for him to not be an asshole for once? Is it too much to ask for him to initiate conversation?

And Doug? Doug won’t worry about her for at least a day. He never takes the elevator unless he has to. He is one of those freaks who takes the stairs unless he’s carrying a ton of stuff. He’ll never know the elevator is stuck and he isn’t expecting Sierra to text or call him. She’d said she’d call him later, but Doug is irritatingly chill about things. To him, later could mean a day or a week. She’d lied when she’d said Doug was her boyfriend. She doesn’t even want him to be. They are whatever they are to one another. Doug would be worried if he knew she was stuck in the elevator, though. She is sure of it.

“Were you pretending like you didn’t know me?” she asks Brooks after some thin silence.

“Pretending like I didn’t know you? Wow, really? You think that little of me, huh?” Brooks answers. He is sitting in the corner of the elevator, cattywampus to her, his legs stretched out.

“I don’t know,” Sierra says, laughs a little. Nervous. She doesn’t want to talk to him, but also, she wants to talk to him. Who knows how long they’ll be trapped in there and thinking of the word trapped makes her feel on the verge of a panic attack. Water usually helps. She feels for her water bottle in her purse and gets it out. Chugs some. Lukewarm and plasticky, but it roots her quickly. “I don’t know! Seemed like it,” she says as friendly as barbed wire.

“Sierra, I wasn’t paying attention. I was busy looking at my phone,” he says.

Hearing her name in his mouth again makes her feel drunk. Five tequila shots deep.

“You’re still a fancy lawyer?”

“Mmm-hmm, I’m still a lawyer, yes,” he says.

“Right. Okay.” Sierra nods.

Big shot. He will pretend like he doesn’t remember what happened at her apartment. When they lay down on the floor together underneath her Christmas tree and looked up.

* * *

“Did you come over here thinking you’d get laid?” she’d asked him as they sat on her couch, sharing the last of her whiskey from a small glass.

“No, Sierra, I did not. You always say the craziest shit to me, by the way,” Brooks said, throwing his head back and laughing. He held his stomach.

“It wasn’t that funny,” she said.

“You’re bonkers.”

“You’re bonkers,” she said, taking the whiskey from him.

“Are you still dating that…guy?”

“I’m always dating some guy.”

“I guess I’m always dating some girl too,” he said. He leaned against the armrest, made himself even more comfortable.

“I used to be obsessed with you. Obsessed.”

“You were not.”

“I was! When I was in high school. When I was a freshman. You and Tyler were seniors,” she said. Her brother, Tyler, and Brooks had an extreme best friendship. Spending the night with one another everysingleweekend, alternating between their houses.

“You were not obsessed with me. You throw that word out there, but that’s not the word you mean,” he said.

“How are you trying to tell me how I felt? I was obsessed with you! I was!” Sierra said. She finished the whiskey and put the empty glass on the floor, tucked her feet underneath her. There was music playing: a folksy Christmas playlist. She didn’t recognize any of the artists and she loved it. Everything happening in the moment was new. Brand new.

“Ah. You were too young for me anyway.”

“No shit, I used to write fanfic about you. I made up stories where we would make out and you’d tell me you loved me,” she said.

“Sierra!” Brooks said so bright and