leaving?â
âSorry. Need my beauty sleep.â
âAw, no you donât,â Max said automatically, before realizing the implied flirtation and subsequently panicking. âI mean, I guess we can all be a little
more
attractive, relatively speaking, but itâs not like youâre any
less
attractive than anyone else. Like, youâre not
ugly.
Your face has all the requisite features, and none of them are any larger or smaller than they should be, everything is in proportion, and you donât have any irregular moles or growths, soââ
Youâre doing it again,
he thought.
Have we learned nothing from the veal incident?
âI like your last name,â he finished weakly.
Lore blinked at him. âBeg pardon?â
âNedry. Like Dennis Nedry, in
Jurassic Park
? Sorry, Iâm sure you get that all the time.â
âNo. This is a first.â
He shook his head, trying to hit the Restart button. âYou canât leave. What am I supposed to do about . . . him?â
âLook, I think things could be a lot worse,â she said in a breezy tone that, to Max, sounded just a little too breezy, as if she were forcing it. âI mean, heâs just some dude. An asshole, to be sure, but just a dude. He likes snacks. So give him snacks.â Her voice turned bitter. âYou got off pretty easy, if you ask me.â
Max felt that the best response to this was some massive sputtering. âBut Iâm also supposed to find him a house!â
She was definitely agitated now. She got up and walked toward him. âI donât know what to do about that. Youâre absolutely right, you shouldnât have gotten me involved. You made your own mess,
you
clean it up.â
It wasnât until Maxâs tailbone hit the kitchen counter that he realized heâd been backing up as she spoke. He brought a hand up to his face, and it felt hot, flushed. Loreâs face was red tooâhe could see this because it was only about a foot away from his.
Her mouth was trying to form too many different words at once, twitching, trying to escape from her face. Finally, instead of saying anything more, she whipped her head aroundâbrushing Maxâs face with her ponytail in the processâand stormed out the kitchen door.
Max stood there, stunned.
âWhat just happened?â he asked the empty room.
As if arriving specifically to taunt him, Ruckus sashayed into the room, rubbed his cheek against the cabinet, and let out a meow that sounded suspiciously like
Ha, ha!
âShut up, you,â Max said. He looked out the window and saw Lore struggling to pick up her bike and put on her helmet all at the same time. Finally clicking the helmet strap shut with an angry
snap,
she pushed off and disappeared down the street. Max opted not to chase after her.
As if you could catch her, noodle legs!
Ruckus implied with a disdainful arch of his back.
Max gave his head a hard shake.
I really need to stop imagining cat dialogue.
He picked up the tray, vowing to salvage the only good deed he could accomplish on this awful, accursed day. He stood outside his motherâs door for a moment and attempted to compose himself. The trembling in his hands started to go away, but the ill feeling in his stomach remained.
At least his mother had been watching
Adultery Cove
at full volume, which meant she probably hadnât heard any of the escapades in the kitchen. âQuiiiiiche!â she cried, hitting the Mute button and clapping, though she stopped once she saw how little of it there was. âGeez, Max. You bulking up for the winter?â
âI . . . guess I got a little carried away,â he said, trying not to let her see his face.
But mothers always know. âWhy are you all red? Hon, look at me.â
He turned his head. âItâs nothing. I was moving around some stuff in the basement and it was really hot down there.â
Even Max was
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