The Magic Broom by Teegan Loy Page A

skiing with some woman
named Charlene, and then heading over to the rink to get
killed playing hockey.”
“Do you need me to come along for support or to scrape
your body off the ground when you crash and burn?” “You can do both,” he said. “But I’m warning you, it’s an
early call and it’s outside.”
She shrugged. “Maybe there’ll be some hot crosscountry guys working out, and I’m sure the hockey boys will
be wonderful.”
Cody rolled his eyes, but he was glad for the company
and that someone would be around to call the ambulance or
carry his broken body to the car.
“Someone told me that cross-country skiing requires a
lot of calories. We better carb up.”
“Carb up?” she said, just as there was a knock on the
door. “I don’t think athletes gorge themselves on pizza when
they’re in training.”
“I’m just practicing my athlete-speak,” he said. “Isn’t the
crust a carb? I know the tomato sauce is a vegetable. Plus,
you need dairy for strong bones, and protein is good too.
Pizza is very healthy.”
“You keep telling yourself that when you’re barfing up
pepperoni in the snow.”
Cody ignored her and grabbed some cash. He opened
the door and the pizza dude scowled at him, thrusting the
pizza box into his face.
“Bad day?” Cody asked.
“Dumped by my girlfriend,” the pizza dude said,
frowning. “You?”
“Work sucks,” Cody said. “Guess you win today. Affairs
of the heart trump work.”
The pizza dude and Cody had a strange relationship.
They thrived on each other’s misery, always trying to one-up
the other.
“Great,” the pizza dude grumbled and grabbed his
money, rushing down the hall before Cody could say thank
you. The guy stopped at another door and banged on it.
Cody shut his door and sighed.
He dropped the warm box on the coffee table and tossed
a handful of napkins at Kira’s head.
“What was it tonight?” Kira asked.
“Dumped by a girl again.”
“Too bad. Hey, this isn’t what we ordered,” she said,
sounding disgusted. “It’s got green peppers and onions and
other horrible things stuck on it.”
It didn’t surprise Cody. That was just how his entire day
had gone. Mix up after mix up until he felt like his brains
had been scrambled.
“He probably gave our pizza to the people in the other
apartment. He was carrying a few more boxes, and I saw him
stop at another door.”
“Well, go get ours. I’m not eating these vile vegetables,”
she said. She held her nose and closed the lid on the pizza
box.
“You coming with me?”
“Nope. They’re your neighbors, and you know when
pizza dude is upset you should check our order. You messed
up, so you fix it,” she said and flipped through several
channels, ignoring him.
“But I’m not even sure which apartment he went to,”
Cody whined.
“So start knocking. And don’t come back until you find
my pizza.”
It was way too much work to argue with her. He
grabbed the pizza box and went out into the hallway,
counting the doors. The first person shouted at him for
interrupting his viewing of some stupid basketball game, but
he did try to buy the pizza.
The next door he pounded on was a bust. No one was
home. He was going to try one more apartment, and if no one
answered, he was going home to eat a bowl of cereal. The door opened and the broad shoulders of a guy filled
the doorway. Cody forgot what he was doing, he forgot the
day, and he probably forgot his name.
“Uh,” he stammered as the loveliest pair of dark brown
eyes stared at him.
“Hey, man,” the guy said. Cody’s gaze fell to lovely
plump lips, glistening with pizza sauce that needed to be
licked off. “We already got our pizza.”
Someone tugged on the box he was holding. It snapped
Cody out of his lip-licking dream stupor.
“Um, hello, pizza?” The guy tapped the box with his
finger, and Cody found his voice.
“Oh yeah, I think you got ours.”
“Really? We already ate most of it,” the guy said, smiling
sheepishly.
Cody groaned, because