Slowly, I opened the door to the cage. He jumped down from the top of the log house, and there was a moment’s stillness from the both of us.
We were feeling each other out.
Why had I agreed to this?
Because I was in love with my roommate and he wanted me, and I was weak as fuck?
Ding ding ding, we have a winner!
Ugh.
I put the can of food in my right hand and tucked it into the cage. Mr. Prickles’ nose twitched, and no sooner had I dumped half the meat into his bowl than he was making his way over the cage to where my hand was.
Where.
My.
Hand.
Was.
I froze.
Legit froze.
Mild panic streaked through my veins, the adrenaline holding my body hostage.
What’d I been thinking when I offered to feed this animal? Was it my heart? I bet it was my heart. My stupid-ass heart was overriding my brain as it so often did.
I didn’t sign up for this, okay?
I didn’t sign up for having a roommate who I was in love with who had a spiky pig for a bet. I didn’t sign up for being in love with my brother’s best friend, who apparently had feelings for me.
The only obstacle was my brother.
You know what? If he wasn’t that good a person, I’d probably remove him from the equation.
I could.
I’d read enough serial killer Wikipedia articles to know how to dispose of a body without getting caught.
But was anyone worth murder?
Eh.
If you wronged my best friends… Yes.
If you were my blood brother with a lifetime of memories that included a few unsavory ones?
Tough question.
I tapped the rest of the food into the bowl and quickly withdrew my hand from the cage. Mr. Prickles sauntered up to his food, his fat, prickly ass waddling as he reached it. His wet little nose was a quarter the size of a cat’s, and he wriggled it as if he were testing his food.
Like a human sniffing wine.
But I didn’t sniff wine. I just drank it. I was no connoisseur.
Mr. Prickles shoved his face into the food. His furry little ears twitched as he munched his way through the stinky mess in the bowl.
It was no lie.
Cat food smelled like shit.
I stepped back and perched on the edge of Ethan’s made bed. The cover was soft beneath my underwear-clad ass, and I gripped the fabric as I watched Mr. Prickles.
He ate. And ate. And ate. A bit like the hungry caterpillar in that book.
The little munching noises he made were adorable. Tiny little nibbles that were not at all like humans chewing with their mouths open—little clicking tsh-tsh noises that were too cute for their own good.
Crap.
Did I like this animal?
It wasn’t bad enough that I was already in love with its owner, but now I liked his animal, too?
This roommate situation was going to shit.
I still needed to fill the water bowl, so I quickly took it out, secured the cage, and headed to the kitchen. I filled it quickly and returned it to Mr. Prickles.
Huh.
He was kinda cute.
Damn it. Ethan was right. All it took was spending a little time with him, and I liked him.
I sat back on the bed and shuffled back to the wall, drawing my legs up to my chest. I could see Mr. Prickles doing whatever it was that hedgehogs did to amuse themselves, and the gentle snuffy noises that came from him were weirdly comforting.
I wrapped my arms around my legs and watched him for a while. He alternated between playing with a small plastic ball that had some kind of bell inside it and running in and out of a wooden tunnel.
I didn’t know hedgehogs played with toys.
You really did learn something new every day.
I’d learned a lot this week, and I was about maxed out on education now, thank you very much.
Sitting in Ethan’s room was weird, but it was comforting to watch Mr. Prickles. I’d get out before he came back from work, but then what did I do?
Did I hide in my room? There was no way I could see him. I didn’t know how to talk to him now. It was easier when I thought he hated me.
Knowing it wasn’t true complicated everything.
I’d been as honest with him as I could have been, in the end. There was no way I was going to tell him the true extent of my feelings. If I had, it would have just made it worse than it already was.
How were we supposed to live together?
Everything had changed. Were we destined to avoid each other like the plague until he ultimately decided he was leaving town again? That was what would happen. Ethan wasn’t made to settle down in one place.
After all, he’d only moved in with me so he wasn’t tied to an actual lease.