Total pages in book: 114
Estimated words: 111165 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 556(@200wpm)___ 445(@250wpm)___ 371(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 111165 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 556(@200wpm)___ 445(@250wpm)___ 371(@300wpm)
I give her a wave without even looking at her and hurry across the lawn to the car.
“You know, I’d love to meet her one day,” Laz says to me as I climb in the passenger seat, nodding at the windows where the blinds are moving.
“Barbara?” I ask. “Good luck with that.”
“You said she enjoys handsome men,” he says with a waggle of his brows.
I roll my eyes. “Yes. She did. In the forties and fifties. She says you scare her.” I wave my fingers at him. “You know, the piercings and the tattoos and all.” With his aviator shades and leather jacket, he looks particularly badass today.
“She doesn’t know about my dick piercing, does she?”
I punch his arm, trying not to think about his dick. It’s hard with the pants he wears sometimes and I will myself to keep my eyes from drifting down to his crotch. “Grow up.”
In July I’ll be at the two-year mark of living at Barbara Sullivan’s place. For those that don’t know, Barbara Sullivan was a semi-famous actress from Hollywood’s golden age. She’s pretty much Gloria Swanson’s character from Hollywood Boulevard, all reclusive and living in the past, dressing up in old fancy gowns and piling on the pancake makeup from ye old days. She usually played the woman in B-movies that someone like Clarke Gable cast aside for someone else.
But despite Barbara’s borderline agoraphobia and quirks, we get along really well and I love living there. The property consists of the main house, the pool, the guest house, and the garage, on a half-acre backed onto the dry craggy hills of Coldwater Canyon. She’s owned the house forever, and because of that, the rent I pay is pretty cheap too.
Plus, she gets companionship and honey out of the deal. That’s when she feels like talking. Most of the time she watches old clips of herself and smokes a carton of Camels. After my mother died, I really missed having someone older to talk to on the regular and offer advice. I can’t talk to my dad, so Barbara is a pretty good substitute with some amazing stories to keep you entertained.
She has yet to meet Laz, though, or any of my friends. Like I said, she has her quirks.
“So, are we going to talk about it?” Laz asks as we start cruising down the street. It’s May and the jacarandas are in full bloom, one of my favorite times of the year. I roll down the window and hang my head half out, closing my eyes, focusing on the smell of the flowers above all the smog.
“I take it that you don’t want to talk about it,” he says. “That’s cool.”
I bring my head back in and glance at him.
It’s one of my favorite things to do. Just take him all in.
My friend, Lazarus Scott, is extremely hot. He was hot when I first laid eyes on him at his band’s show four years ago, and he’s even hotter now. I don’t know what it is about men, but they honestly only get better with age, and even though Laz is still super young at thirty, he just gets more handsome every day I see him.
He knows it too, the jerk. He’s cocky but thankfully not in an obnoxious way, and he’s quick to point out his faults. But even so, he’s got this cool confidence that I wish I could siphon.
I sigh and lean my head back against the seat. “I wish it was as easy as this.”
“As what?”
“You and me. Talking. I wish the guys I dated got me the same way that you get me.”
He grows silent for a moment and I look over at him. He’s frowning, his attention focused on the road. “Maybe you’re just dating the wrong guys,” he finally says.
“You think?” I laugh. “I thought everything was going fine with David as the night started. He took me to this nice Italian place in Calabasas, and yeah, I was a little jumpy with the caffeine and then a little drunk with the wine, and then I…well, it doesn’t matter. But even before disaster struck, I could tell that he thought I was a weirdo.”
“What the hell are you doing on these dates anyway?”
“Nothing! I’m just being me.” I stare out the window as we cruise down Ventura. “But I guess that’s the problem.”
“I refuse to believe that.”
“I appreciate your loyalty,” I tell him as a current of warmth runs through me. It always makes me feel extra good when Laz lays on the compliments. Sure, I get them from Naomi or when I’m messaging with Jane, but when it comes from a guy, especially an extremely attractive one, it means a lot.
“I always have faith in you, Bumble,” he says softly, with just a bit of a smirk to his lips. He loves calling me that, I have no idea why. I think it’s because he thinks it bothers me, but honestly, I find it really cute.