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“ U m. I can’t recall at present. “I have been blessed with an infinite improvement to my life.”

This girl is killing me.

How have I never seen her on campus? And how the fuck has someone as cute and sweet and innocent as her, never had a guy send her flowers? What the fuck is with my generation?

I stand behind Lotte at her door, trying hard not to look at her round ass or sniff her soft-looking hair, while actively avoiding the gaze of my sister. She one hundred percent knows what I’m thinking and has every right to be threatening my life with her crazy eyes.

Reputations are not always fairly assigned, especially when it comes to the fairer sex, but mine? Let’s just say, Pinocchio could call me a slut without the slightest growth in his nose.

Hence Claire’s Spreader joke earlier.

To be fair, living life as a decent-looking, college hockey captain comes with certain … expectations. Tapping as many chicks is as much part of the game as slapping a puck is. Lotte, though. Lotte is never going to be another name added to and crossed out in my little black book. I knew that at first glance.

No matter how cute she is, or how she piqued my curiosity, or how my heart seems to thud that little bit harder when she smiles, it’s strictly look but don’t touch.

Being the, um, gentleman I am, I pause looking and reach out and take the flowers she’s juggling in her elbow as she struggles to find her keys.“Here, let me help with that.” I offer. It’s an innocent enough thing to say, but Claire glares at me like I’ve threatened to dry hump Lotte against the door. “What?” I mouth.

“Hands off.” She mouths back while sliding her thumb across her throat.

Lovely.

“Thank you,” Lotte replies, looking over her shoulder. She can’t see the death threats I’m receiving, which is just as well. I can’t have her freaking out anymore. Not when I’m so close to seeing inside her place. I was trying to picture it the whole way here. In my mind, it’s going to be only one of two things, a complete mess - I’m talking Hoarders TV show - level mess. Or, immaculate - bleach touches every surface at least five times a day. Plastic covers all furniture. There is no in between, and until I step over this threshold nothing will convince me otherwise.

Seeming to be holding her breath as much as me, Lotte opens the door. “I had a bit of a toothpaste emergency this morning, so excuse the mess.”

Right, so, we’re going with Hoarders.

I’m dumbfounded.

“Lotte, truthfully I mean this as a compliment … did Willy Wonka and Rapunzel collaborate to decorate your apartment?” The cutest chuckles rumble from Lotte, but I can’t stop my brows from knotting together when she slaps her hand over her mouth to stop it. She did it while being serenaded with happy birthdays, too.

Who told this girl she can’t be happy? I’m going to kick their fucking ass.

“It is a little bright,” she concedes, “but it’s home.”

Bright doesn’t capture it. If a wall is not pink, green, or yellow, it’s covered in multicolored flowers. My instant favorite? A blush wall with the word HOME painted in chunky white lettering running floor to ceiling. Clouds are on the ceiling for fuck’s sake. It’s neither a mess nor a medical lab, and when I think of her reaction to the cake and the flowers, I know it’s perfectly Lotte.

“Perfectly Lotte? What the fuck,” I mutter to myself. “What the hell is going on? You met this chick five seconds ago?” I catch up with the girls, already chatting in the kitchen and again come face to face with color. They’re calmer shades in here, though. Still bold but more pastel. Come to think of it, one of the pinks is reminds me of the glow emanating from Lotte’s cheeks as I lumber up beside her.

“Would you like some coffee? Or tea? I think I even have some soda in the fridge?” she asks.

Neither Claire nor I answer. We’re both too busy studying the walls. Every surface is different, and there’s a mural painted on the far-right. “It’s like you have a garden in your kitchen,” Claire says as she runs her fingers over the velvety petals of a particularly beautiful rose. While I’m focused on the almost 3D effect that’s been used on its thorns. “Lotte, who painted all of this?”

“Me and Gran started it, but she passed away before most of the murals were done. She only finished the big HOME in the living room the day before she died.”

Claire winces, “So you’ve done almost all of this by yourself?

Flushing a deeper red, Lotte buries her face in the fridge, “Uh huh.”

“And when did she pass away, again?”

There’s a short pause, some muttering, then. “Five years ago next May.”

In real time, I watch Claire’s eyes bounce around in their sockets while she does the math. I’m doing the same, and get the answer first. “Shit, Lotte. You’ve lived here alone since you were seventeen?”

“Don’t tell the feds.” It’s her attempt at a joke but as she emerges from the refrigerator with cans of Dr. Pepper and Mountain Dew that appear to be from 1985, she looks anything but amused. And she’s blinking again. Before I ask if she has allergies, she drops her head so her long hair hangs over her eyes then squeezes between Claire and me as she rushes from the room. “You know what? I feel kind of sick. I think I ate too much cake, but just in case it’s a contagious stomach flu you should probably leave.”

Seemingly unable to stop myself, I follow, “You didn’t eat any of the cake. I never even cut it.” Claire slaps my bicep with the back of her hand then steps in between me and Lotte like she needs to be protected from me.

“Don’t worry about him, Lotte. He’s a baboon. Let’s go, monkey boy.” The latter is directed at me as Claire fists the collar of my shirt.

“Monkey boy? What?” I get no reply, instead I’m dragged out the open-door Lotte is now standing by. “Seriously, what’s going on? I feel like I’ve missed something. Can I at least have the Dr. Pepper?” Like she’s manning an unhealthy water station at the world’s slowest and oddest marathon, Lotte holds out the can as Claire pushes me again. My eyes drop to take the can, but catch on something sitting by the door. A bag. A sports bag. An unzipped sports bag. Inside it, a pair of white skates. Lady’s skates. The kind figure skaters would wear.

Hmm.

“We hope you enjoy the rest of your birthday, Lotte,” sings Claire as we hit the hallway and spin to face our evictor, “See you tomorrow.” Without further fanfare, the door is shut in her face. Mine too.

“Well, that’s just lovely,” I huff, opening the can and taking a low pull. Yup. Tastes like it’s from 1985, too. “What’s with the mood swings? This chick is all over the place. I’ve got whiplash.”

“Stop calling girls chicks . I know your new teammate is Australian, but it’s disrespectful … and mind your own business.” Again, Claire latches onto my shirt and drags me towards the stairs.

“I do believe you made this my business when you demanded I leave the gym and bring your new weird friend a cake.” We make it into the stairwell, the heavy iron door swings open and closed and Claire shoves me up against the wall. If it was any chick, sorry female, other than my sister, it would have been hot AF. I shake that thought away and stare down my opponent. “For real, Claire. What the fuck is going on?” Claire releases and pops her hip. She means business.

“Look, Lotte is really shy, and timid and kind of socially awkward for a reason. She has Tourette’s syndrome and I have the feeling a whole lot of baggage and trauma is packed in there with it.” My mind skips the baggage and trauma and goes straight to stupid.

“Tourette’s? You mean she screams fuck and dick and barks like a dog?”

I genuinely fear my sister might kill me.

“Did you get hit in the head with a puck, today?”

“Hey, not nice.” I pout.

“Oh, but what you said is?” Once again, I am genuinely confused, and it must be written on my face, cause she sighs and sets off down the stairs. “Some people with Tourette’s Syndrome do have vocal tics like you see on TV, but not all of them do. I think the majority don’t actually, but people like Lotte aren’t as easy to make the butt of the joke.”

“I wasn’t meaning to—”

On a sigh, Claire nods and rubs the vein at her temple, the one that appears whenever I’m being me. “I know you weren’t. And I don’t know enough about it, or Lotte to give you more details than this. She seems to have facial tics. Maybe humming as a verbal one too, but it looks like she blinks, stretches her fingers, and rolls her eyes. All subtle stuff that some might miss, but plenty won’t. Someone has made her feel ashamed and I’m going to make her feel … um … the opposite … unashamed. Yeah.”

We make it outside and Claire almost breaks into a sprint as she storms back towards her new workplace.

“This has to be a record,” I call from behind her. “One day of employment and you have a new project. Wasn’t the point of leaving the doctor’s office to stop your over-empathizing-self from getting too involved in other people’s problems?”

“Yes, it was. But a girl’s gotta have a hobby. Interfering is mine. Now hurry up, I have to get to work, make sure it still is my work since I keep disappearing, and then buy something nice for Kel, cause I am totally taking Lotte in, and we are totally going to fix her.”

It’s said in one over-stimulated breath because Claire’s doing what she always does. Romanticizing what she can do for this girl. Contemplating ways to save her like she couldn’t save the blind cat with a heart murmur, the three-legged dog allergic to grass, the duck that couldn’t swim. Or … or Mom.

There’s a litany of reasons why I should argue. Tell her to focus on her own happiness, to remind her that the hole she fell into last time was so deep and dark it almost cost her marriage. But it’s too late. She has that unfocused, glossy, dreamy look she gets in her eyes when she fixes her mind on a new project. Nothing I can say will stop her now. She’s invested.

Unfortunately. I think I am, too.