apartment flood had been a blessing in disguise.
During her bed-ridden stint, Olivia started talking to Sammy about nothing and everything: her mother. Her sister. Her sister’s douche canoe fiancé, whom she was pretty sure she caught staring down her shirt the last time she’d gone home. Her brilliant five-, ten-, and twenty-year life plans. Why Charmander was the best Pokémon. Why Sammy needed to stop walking around shirtless.
He listened to her ramble and took part in the conversations, even though half were absurd and the other half ended abruptly when Olivia fell asleep or lost her train of thought.
However, he took a special interest in her verbal dissertation on why Sammy’s shirts needed to stay on.
“It’s distracting.” Olivia sucked on an ice chip until it melted and the cool liquid trickled down her throat, soothing her fever. Bless whoever invented ice chips. They deserved a statue in every city and an annual bash with cupcakes shaped like their face. “I can’t think when your six-pack is staring at me.”
“Just my six-pack or any six-pack?”
She pondered the question. She hadn’t thrown up in hours, which was a good sign. Fatigue clawed at her and sweat dampened her brow, but she’d choose that over bodily ejections any day of the week. “Just yours. And Chris Hemsworth.”
“Chris Hemsworth, huh?” Sammy looked thoughtful. “I suppose I could have worse company than Thor.”
“Uh-huh.” Olivia’s lids fluttered, her breath shallow. “‘Specially not fair when you wear those gray sweatpants.”
“What’s wrong with my sweatpants? They’re my favorite pair.”
“I can see your dick through them.”
He choked. “Excuse me?”
“The outline,” she clarified. “Those sweats are like a push-up bra for your dick. Shoves it in everyone’s face without revealing anything. It’s a cock tease—literally. And when you wear them while cooking—” She licked her lips, both at the mental image and because her lips were bone-dry. “I kinda wanna jump you.”
Not kinda. Definitely. But she didn’t want to scare him away. Sammy was the only thing keeping her sane during these long, feverish eternities where night bled into day and the specter of death hung in the air.
Olivia was the teensiest bit dramatic when she was sick.
Sammy fell silent, and Olivia cracked her eyes open to assure herself he was still there. He was—hair mussed, mouth soft, eyes speculative. Her guardian angel. She wanted him by her side, always.
“That’s good to know,” he finally murmured.
He asked no more questions after that, and Olivia drifted off into sleep again. This time, instead of nightmares about a mountain of paperwork chasing her through the halls of PHC or dreams of Charmander lighting candles with its fire breath in her future home, her brain dug up a memory she’d buried deep in the recesses of her mind.
“Sammy, it’s not what you think!” Olivia followed him into the living room of their New York apartment rental, her panicked heart crashing against her ribcage repeatedly in an attempt to escape—or punish her. Like it, too, was too disgusted to stay around her any longer. “You don’t know the whole story.”
He gripped the edges of the back of the couch, his shoulders taut, his lean frame vibrating with pent-up anger. “What’s the whole story, Olivia?” His voice was colder than she’d ever heard it.
Dread coiled in her stomach.
Sammy wasn’t cold. He was warm and gregarious and the kindest person she knew—and he deserved so much better than her.
A giant lump formed in her throat. “I only said that to get my mom off my back. I didn’t mean it.”
He turned, and Olivia flinched at the hurt in his eyes.
“No? So you’re going to introduce me to your mom when she visits? How will you explain that one? ‘Oh, just kidding, Mom, I didn’t actually break up with him because I think he’s a loser who’s throwing away his future by choosing to be a baker instead of a fucking NASA scientist.”
Tears stung her eyes. “I was obviously lying! You don’t know my mom. She’s...I’m not ready for you to meet her, okay? She’s critical and judgmental, and she drives everyone I care about away. You have no idea how harsh she can be. I don’t want her to hurt you.”
Olivia had fucked up by telling Eleanor about Sammy. Technically, she’d told Alina in an ill-advised attempt at sisterly bonding, but she should’ve known her sister would tell their mom. After Eleanor learned Olivia was shacking up with a boy in New York, she’d called immediately and grilled her about said boy’s qualifications. That was the