The Tension's Like a Fire

Jodi was so frustrated, she could scream. First, her roommate Ali had brought a guy home the night before without telling her, so she’d walked out of her bedroom in an oversized t-shirt and nothing else, thoroughly mortifying herself. Then, her favorite lipstick broke, so she wasn’t able to complete her makeup the way she wanted it. And after dropping her iPod, successfully shattering the screen, and wiping out on the sidewalk in front of at least ten people, she had to forget to watch where she was walking and ruin her brand new sweater by slamming into Jay McGuiness.

With her arm wrapped around Jay’s, she blinked away the new stream of tears threatening to surface. She should have been thankful, with the strange foreign man dropping whatever plans he had to take her back to his apartment and make her a new coffee. But instead, she just felt wary and cautious. And she felt very cold, with the now-chilled drink making the already form-fitting sweater cling to her body like a second skin.

The two stayed in a comfortable silence until they finally reached the building they were looking for: an apartment building overlooking one of Jodi’s favorite beaches in the area. Her jaw almost dropped open with surprise, knowing how expensive the units in the building cost from when she was doing her own house-hunting the year before, but Jay quickly explained before she could express her shock. “I share the flat with four of my friends,” he told her.

She nodded, although she couldn’t help but figure that it would take at least fourteen of her friends living with her for them to afford it. But she didn’t want to put him on the spot and asked what the hell he did for a living, so she just kept her mouth shut and followed Jay into the elevator.

The second he opened the front door, a surprisingly tidy house was exposed. With five men living in one apartment, she figured the space would be a disaster area, but clearly, she’d been a little off-base.

“Before I make your coffee, I’ll just grab you a shirt,” he told her, glancing down briefly at the sweater that was starting to harden against her body like armor. She instinctively crossed her arms in front of her chest and prepared to make a witty remark before he hurried off into another room to fetch the clothing.

He returned a minute later with a plain black t-shirt. “It’ll be a bit big on you, but it’s the best I can do,” he explained sheepishly, shrugging his shoulders apologetically.

“It’ll be fine. Thank you.” She looked down at the fabric in her hands before glancing up at him.

He took the cue immediately. “Oh, sorry! The bathroom is down the hallway on your right. You won’t miss it.”

“Thanks.” She glanced at him one more time, but he’d already turned back around to ready the coffeemaker. So she went on her way, her fingers playing across the soft material of the t-shirt until she found the bathroom.

Instead of taking time to admire the cleanliness of the bathroom like she had the living room, she immediately shed her sweater, dropped it to the floor, and tugged the t-shirt over her head. She glanced at herself in the mirror for a second and sighed. As Jay had predicted, the t-shirt was too big and made her look like a little girl wearing her father’s clothes. But it was the best she was going to get.

After quickly tying up her hair into a bun to hide the drenched ends, she made her way back out to the kitchen, where Jay was firing up the coffee maker. “It’ll be a few minutes,” he explained when he saw her before smiling. “So I guess you’re stuck with me for a little bit.”

“I have mace. I’m just throwing that out there,” Jodi stated plainly, but the British man just laughed.

“I’m really not a serial killer. I promise! If any of the other guys would here, I’d have them defend me. But since they’re not, just rest assured that there are people occupying the flats around us, and they will for certain hear you if you scream. You have nothing to worry about.”

Jodi blinked, trying to figure out if he was kidding. Because his statement did absolutely nothing to soothe her natural suspicion.

Jay seemed to realize that he’d said the wrong thing and cleared his throat, his cheekbones coloring slightly. “So, Jodi, tell me a little about yourself.”

“Um,” she stuttered, tucking a lock of loose hair behind her ear. “I go to UCLA, and I’m a senior.”

“What do you study?”

“Film/Cinema Studies. Movies have always fascinated me.”

“That’s brilliant,” Jay congratulated. “Do you want to be a director or something?”

“That’s the goal. But for now, I just work in a record shop downtown, mostly cashier stuff and sorting the discs.”

“Records? Isn’t that a little outdated?”

“Some people dig the classics,” Jodi defended, since she was one of the people who preferred the imperfect sound of vinyl over remastered mp3s. “And we sell CDs, too, for the less-cultured.”

Jay chuckled as his eyes lit up. “So does that mean you know-?”

His question was cut off by the sound of the coffeemaker beeping to alert that it had finished brewing. He shot her a sympathetic look, as if he were sorry their conversation had been interrupted, before pushing away from the table and heading into the kitchen.

“How do you like your coffee?” he asked as he poured the coffee into a travel mug.

“Medium brown with the cream, two sugars.”

He followed orders before popping the top on and handing it over to her. “So, as I was saying-”

“Look, Jay, I’m sorry. It’s been really nice meeting you, but I can’t stay. I have class in twenty minutes, and if I don’t leave right now, I’m not going to make it in time.”

His face fell ever-so-slightly before perking up again. “Well, can I at least have your number?”

She raised her eyebrow questioningly and took a small, almost unnoticeable step back before Jay hurried to continue, “So we can meet and you can give me my mug and t-shirt back, of course.”

“Oh, of course.” The corner of her mouth pulled up in a smirk as she hurried over to the counter and pulled over a little notepad and jotted down the digits she knew by heart. “There. But text me for business only, right?”

“Whatever else would I text for?” he replied with wide, innocent eyes.

She let out a small chuckle and shook her head as she headed toward the door. “It’s been nice meeting you, Jay. Thanks for the shirt and the coffee.”

He started to say something else, but she didn’t have the time to listen, and the apartment door closed on his words before he could say anything intelligible.