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Chapter Seven

He'd purposely hadas little contact with Kell as hecould.

The thingshe was starting to feel for Kell, he wanted to nip them in the bud. He had to avoid him in class, even if he'd wanted to be closer to him and to sit near him again and to talk with him. If he had gone over to him, then he’d just be dropping further down a rabbit hole he was scrambling to get out of. Meeting him for the project was enough. He would keep it all official. That way he could keep his feelings in check. He could keep whatever this damn feeling was incheck.

After workhe rushed to meet with William to check on a promising daycare center for Nate. It was highly rated, in a good neighborhood, and surprisingly affordable. After a tour of the place, the two of them agreed that it would be a great place for Nate—and not a moment too soon, because William had started to get responses back to the dozens of job applications he'd sentout.

"You goingto meet that dude again, tonight?" William asked when they got backhome.

"Yeah,"he said. "I'll probably be back prettylate."

"Going to that noodle place again?"

"No.I'll just be around the corner. Going to hisplace."

William's eyes widened. "Oh, really?"He imitated Parker's baritone voice. "'I don't want to make this more personal than it has to be.' What happened tothat?"

Parker sighed."Why do I tell you anything? We’ve got a project to complete. We'd save a lot of time cutting out the driving. Especially because we need to do renderings, and we can't exactly do that without a drawing tablet. It'd take forever to drive all the way toschool."

"Okay, okay,"William laughed. "Thank you for the detailedexplanation."

Parker scowled at him."I'm outtahere."

"Have fun,"William said,winking.

He gruntedand shut the door behind him, stepping out into the warm night air. Damn William, it wasn't like that. It was never going to be like that. He wasn't going to give in to anything unnecessary. Absolutelynot.

Kell's apartmentwas just a few turns down the hallway, and when he reached the front door he took a moment to brush some debris off the front his shirt before ringing the doorbell. The door opened and there was Kell—only it wasn't the same Kell he'd seen at school that afternoon. Instead of his usual paint stained jeans and old t-shirt, he wore a crisp button down and pressed slacks, his hair shining and done up with wax. Despite the smart outfit, he still wore that same awkwardsmile.

"Come in,"hesaid.

The inside smelledlike it'd been sprayed down with cologne, or something. It was pretty sparsely decorated, with the bed just a bare mattress sitting on the floor next to a disassembled bed frame. In the corner by the kitchen area was a fold-out table and two plastic folding chairs, and in the other corner was an easel and several stacks of paint stained storage bins and stretched canvas. For some reason, Kell had the place lit by a bunch of tea candles and one desklamp.

"What's with the mood lighting?"Parker asked, nodding towards thecandles.

"Oh,uh... I just like having it a little dimmer to help me, um, unwind. At the end of the day. You know?" hesaid.

"We're not goingto be able to do any work with this light," Parker said. "It's too damn dark in here. What'd you do, drop a bottle of cologne on the floor? How can you breathe in here?" He went to the window and openedit.

"No..."Kell said. "Sorry. I didn't think it was thatstrong."

Parker sighed.The guy was hopeless. "Do you have any more lights? How did you do any work inhere?"

"Ionly just moved ina couple days ago," he said. "I've got some work lights in those boxes. If it's not up to your standards, we could go toyourplace..."

"No,"Parker said. "C'mon. I'll help you set up thelights."

Kell openedup one of the supply bins and pulled a collapsible light stand and a large lamp, and the two of them set it up near the foldingtable.

"Did you just come from work?"he askedKell.

"No. Why?"

"You changed your clothes,"he replied. "You look all dressed up, like for a presentation or something." He plugged the lamp in and then turned it on. Kell's cheeks were pink. What the hell? Was heblushing?

"I'm just a retail drone,"Kell said. "I wear a uniform atwork."

"You never dresslike that at school," Parkersaid.