I frown. “For a straight dude, you are unnecessarily obsessed with nut sacks tonight.”
He shuts the fridge after fetching a slice of pizza. “I am gonna teach you confidence. We’re gonna make you brave enough to face any damned interviewer. After you and I are done, no one will be able to say no to you—not even a hot-shot barista at a coffee shop.”
I consider West for a while—perhaps too long of a while. Then I swipe the last bite of my sandwich off the plate and pop it into my mouth. “Sounds like it’s time to start class, Brofessor.”
5
Ghost Boners
“Griffin James, they’re ready to see you.”
My feet quiver as I walk the hall, one foot in front of the other, my tie flat against my ironed dress shirt, suit jacket crisp and impressive, hair immaculate. I feel my heart knock on my chest with every step I take, as if to warn me of my impending terror.
The door opens. I’m ushered inside. A man in a suit twice as stiff as mine sits in a chair next to a large desk, behind which is seated a woman with a tight bun of red hair, the president of Pixelomenon Multimedia herself.
“Mr. James,” she greets me, sounding intrigued as she rests her elbows on the desk as she observes me. The man, whether a partner or assistant or whoever the hell he is, remains silent, watching me critically.
I lift my chin. “Hi. I’m among those you let go.”
“Yes, of course, our incoming batch of new hires,” she says with a nod. “I was informed of who you are.”
“And I’m here to tell you why letting me go was a mistake.”
The president and the man sitting near her stare at me, curious. All the breath in the room seems to be held in frosty anticipation.
And then I go for it.
“Holy shit!” I cry out as I burst through the doors of my apartment. “West! West! Where are you? Where the hell are you, you fucking genius, where are you?” I stop by the candle. It’s gone out. “Oh, right.” I grab a match out of the drawer, strike it, and—
“BRO!” cries out West, appearing by the window. “You got the job?? They gave it back to you??”
“Yes! It worked! I start next week! November 3rd!”
West pumps his fist in the air. “Fuck yeah! Take that, corporate decision-making dickheads!”
I laugh, overcome with merriment, then drop onto the couch, a happy, drunken smile spilled over my face. “I mean, the looks on their faces …”
“Oh, man, I wish I could’ve been there.”
“You practically were. It was like … this fire inside me … this swirling, bursting energy I’ve never felt …” I eye him teasingly. “You sure you didn’t possess me?”
West chuckles, coming up to the back of the couch and leaning on it with his elbows. “Nah. You would definitely know if I was inside you.”
I quirk an eyebrow. “Uh …”
West glances down at me questioningly, then hears what he said again in his head. “Bro.” He snorts. “You know what I meant.”
“Hey, you said it.”
Suddenly he finds it funny, then leaps over the back of the couch and drops down next to me. “I’m really proud of you. I knew you could do it. And hey! Now you’ll get the dough to pay rent, you don’t gotta leave, and we can be buddies for real!”
I smirk at him. It’s like he only remembers all the good things from last night and none of the bad. In my currently euphoric state of mind, I find myself less committed to pointing out that fact. “I don’t gotta go,” I agree, clinging to that point of his instead.
“So, uh …” He shrugs. “I would keep up my end of the bargain. Y’know, cleaning up the place and looking out for it and stuff. But …” He peers over the couch back at the kitchen. “… we may have to find a candle that stays lit longer first. That fucker keeps putting itself out. The wick is too short or something.”
My brain, like an overclocked CPU, has been doing a lot of background processing itself. “That reminds me. I’ve got questions for you.”
“Questions?”
“Yeah. Like, first off, is it any candle I light in here that makes you appear? Or just that specific one?”
“Uh … any candle, I think.”
“And if you can pick things up, such as that pizza, why don’t you just keep relighting the candle yourself?”
“Dude, I tried! Something about the act of striking the match doesn’t quite—”
“Also, does Queen have anything to do with it? The first night we met, my Spotify randomly played Queen, and Mrs. Shaheen said you loathed that band—”
“What?? I love Queen!”
“—and that I should avoid opening the fridge after midnight because you have some weird obsession with late-night snacking.”
He opens his mouth to protest, then thinks about it. “Actually yeah, that last one’s accurate. But why—?”