Page 15 of A Lab Rat’s Guide to Fated Love

Seven

Alfredo Sauce and Thermochromic Cats

Vir

N ori sat hunched over her laptop at her routine spot in the living room. Her keyboard’s furious click-clacks traveled all the way to the partly cracked bedroom door, where Vir hesitated, his hand hovering over the handle.

He knew the exact scenario that would play out once he walked out the door: He’d step into the living room, take a seat, and watch Nori spring from hers as if on cue.

She’d then politely excuse herself and escape to a different area of the house—the study, the bedroom, the garden.

Anywhere, as long as it was away from wherever he was.

It had been an entire week of this, whatever this was. Nori seemed hellbent on avoiding him for some reason. But she was also frustratingly polite with her pretense of suddenly needing to be somewhere else as soon as she spotted him in her periphery. Every. Single. Time .

She’d also become more guarded with her emotions since she’d found out about his ability to read them, making her otherwise vibrant inner workings nearly as stoic as her carefully poised facade.

She barely tolerated his company during their late afternoon walks, but only because he needed the mandatory daily quota of movement and sun.

And even then, her silence was too loud to leave room for conversation.

Vir ran his hand through his freshly washed hair, tousling the damp strands between his fingers before flicking them away from his face.

It was nearly time for lunch. Maybe he could try striking a conversation while they ate.

Before she scarfed her meal in five seconds flat and bolted to another room.

If he cooked something she’d want a second helping of—three-cheese mushroom pasta with extra sauce, obviously—and throw in questions about the one thing Dr. Nori Arya could never resist talking about… her one true weakness… her cat, Goober. Or any cat, really. But especially Goober.

Right. He could start by asking if she’d like some pasta for lunch. Only with the casual nonchalance of the most nonchalant guy in the existence of humankind.

And then, right as her thoughts begin to drift towards golden browned mushrooms in creamy Alfredo sauce, he’d swoop in with, “So, I’ve been thinking about those color changing cats you mentioned earlier…”

“You mean thermochromic cats?” she’d say before launching into the dynamics of temperature versus cat fur, complete with goo-goo eyes and animated hand gestures. The way she would’ve done a week ago, before she’d decided that Vir was the plague and was to be avoided as such.

Thermochromic cats? She wouldn’t stand a chance.

In Nori’s books, there wasn’t a single thing about felines that wasn’t a fascinating fact and downright adorable.

Right down to the way they unsheathed their needle-like claws before ripping apart an ugly couch to turn it into modern art.

Or how most of them preferred taking a dump while standing on their hind legs like a person.

With their nose scrunched up in disgust as if they couldn’t stand the stench of their own crap while they did it.

The visual of Goober standing upright, shitting in his litter box, was permanently seared into Vir’s brain ever since Nori had shown him a video of it.

The memory of her sifting through his pictures while her eyes glazed over with unfiltered fondness made Vir wish he were a cat, too. At least she wasn’t allergic to them .

He barked out a soundless laugh.

Of all the things in the world he could possibly be jealous of, Vir was jealous of a damn cat. It didn’t matter, though. His plan was solid.

Nori was going to be serving him feline facts well before he’d served her any food.

With a determined smirk, Vir pulled the door open.

Be cool, he reminded himself as he started towards her. Pasta first, then cats.

As if he’d called her by name, Nori’s head whipped in his direction.

Pasta. Cats.

Two bright spots of pink appeared on her cheeks, and her shocked brown eyes darted to his hair before dipping down to his face and quickly away.

Pasta. Cats.

But as their eyes locked, a millisecond before she could avert her gaze, a spark of emotion zapped out of her. Sharp. Unmistakably clear.

Pasta… Cats.

And it was gone as quickly as it had appeared.

That can’t be right.

Had he imagined it? He’d definitely imagined it.

That can’t be right.

Nori

P ain in the ass.

Why did Vir have to materialize out of nowhere with his stupid hair dripping water everywhere? Would it kill him to use the hair dryer for once? It was right there beside the bathroom mirror.

Nori had been excelling at avoiding him all week. And she’d been so stealthily smooth with her exits that Vir still had no idea. She’d even come up with a near-genius plan to distract herself from thinking or feeling things that she shouldn’t be thinking or feeling.

“I was asking—” Vir’s muffled words came from somewhere closer than her brain was spatially aware of him being. “—if you’d like some pasta for lunch?”

Her head snapped in the direction of his voice, and she came face to face with his dumb mascara-commercial eyes, his face a mere foot away from hers. She jumped to her feet, startled by the proximity, and lost her balance.

While Vir’s arm flung out to catch her by the waist, her own hands reflexively threw themselves on the table in an attempt to steady herself.

The impact, combined with the cord of her headphones being wrapped around her thumb, tore the jack out of its port.

And a loud chorus of Baby Shark started blaring from the speakers.

A solid heartbeat later, her horrified eyes met his amused ones, and her face flamed with raw mortification.

Vir’s mouth twitched right before he squeezed his eyes shut, clearly trying not to laugh.

And failing miserably at it. She couldn’t blame him.

She wouldn’t have lasted with a straight face if she were in his place, either.

A full-grown adult, nano-biotechnology scientist, Dr. Nori Arya, listening to Baby Shark as her work playlist. On loop. Only Baby Shark .

Ha, fucking ha.

She’d initially played the children’s rhyme because she’d been missing Goober, and it was, for some unfathomable reason, his favorite piece of music in the entire world.

But she’d quickly discovered how good it was at distracting her brain from things she didn’t want to think about.

The repetitive loop put her thoughts on mute, leaving just enough processing space to focus on a single task.

And she’d made her algorithm the single task, while avoiding Vir at all costs.

In her defense, it’d been working perfectly fine till he had to appear so abruptly next to her and ruin it all.

Now his face hovered inches from hers while his hand pressed against her back, supporting her weight.

Baby Shark playing in the background had lost its magnificent powers of distraction.

It was Vir who distracted her now, with his dumb lopsided grin and his dumb eyes, and his dumb lips that parted ever so slightly just as her eyes lowered to them and stayed there.

A millisecond later, they darted back up just in time to catch Vir’s gaze moving up from her mouth, too. She hadn’t thought it possible, but she swore his eyes grew a shade darker as they bore into hers.

“Uh… is that my shampoo?” she blurted out the first remotely sane words that came to mind.

But before she could think her next action through, she’d already leaned in with her nose in Vir’s hair, and was sniffing the damp strands like a cat sampling the aroma of a freshly opened box of crispy, human-grade chicken treats.

They were the same soothing notes she remembered from his jacket earlier. Only diluted by an annoying leafy scent—the scent of her shampoo. But the rest…

Did he smell that good?

“Yeah… I don’t have mine here,” Vir replied, grinning sheepishly as she backed away from him.

Of course, he didn’t. She had to ask as if she didn’t already know.

The song ended before looping right back, and as if on cue, Nori slammed her laptop shut, cutting the music off. She sneaked a tentative glance at Vir and found him glaring down at his feet, with the tips of his ears resembling sliced beets.

She would’ve laughed, but judging from how warm her cheeks were, she knew her own face probably looked worse. “Pasta would be great, thank you.”

“Pasta?” Vir cleared his throat. “Uh, yes. Okay then.”

Nori mumbled an excuse before retreating to the bathroom.

Sliding the door shut behind her, she stared at the crazy woman in the mirror, while the last few moments replayed in her head.

She whispered every expletive she knew under her breath as she splashed handfuls of icy water onto her face, imagining it turning into steam right away. What was wrong with her?

And what was wrong with Vir ?

The way he’d looked at her earlier… almost as if— No. Nope. No way. She didn’t even want to finish the thought. She had to talk to him and draw the line. Right now. Right away .

“Vir,” she said as she walked into the kitchen to find him sautéing mushrooms in a pan, while humming—she pursed her lips— Baby Shark under his breath.

“Nori?” A corner of his mouth stayed up in what looked like a permanent smirk.

The line. Draw the line.

“Let me help.” She padded over to stand beside him.

Later. Draw the line later.

Vir

C an you pass me the carrots?” Vir pointed towards the colander he’d just left in the sink. He made sure to keep his voice as nonchalant as he could. But his insides were a different story.

Nori brought the carrots over and placed them in his outstretched hand. He placed them on the chopping board before turning his attention back to the pan.