Page 21 of Love.V2 (Occupational Hazards #2)

“That was incredible.” He sounded a little breathless as he handed over my latte. I popped the top to blow on it, giving me something to look at aside from his eyes as they skimmed across every plane of my face.

“I feel like I just completed a task without putting it on the list to begin with. Will I still be able to check it off?”

“You were going to put ‘be a creative badass’ on our list?”

My face heated. “More like, ‘do something you should have done a long time ago.’”

“Oh, yeah. We’re gonna let you check that one off.”

***

“How are you even doing that?” Meery scowled, mashing her fingers into the lump of clay in front of her.

To her credit, she didn’t seem to mind the gray mush as it smudged into her long nails and shiny bracelets.

She looked sideways at the beginnings of my pinch pot mug like it had wronged her. “You’ve done this before.”

“A little. I took a pottery elective in college.” I’d adored the class, but it had been so different from my usual medium of pencils and paintbrushes, I’d been too scared to sign up for the intermediate course.

Every time I walked by a pottery studio, I had to stifle a little voice inside me that said, what if?

It hadn’t taken much thinking on my part to book a seat at an introductory class at a nearby pottery studio, Glazed.

“Well, next time you do an artsy thing, maybe bring someone who won’t embarrass you.” We both looked at the lumpy, uneven pot under her fingers.

I nudged her. “It’s not that bad. Most of the artistic process is failure.”

Meery hadn’t been my first choice in pottery partners, but Jasmine had just recently given birth and Lainey was tied up starting a new job and making goo-goo heart eyes at Sam now that they’d gotten back together.

We’d planned to hang out soon, but then our group chat went silent, and I wasn’t sure how to revive it, or if that would be welcome.

While I enjoyed the occasional work lunch with Meery, our interests didn’t always overlap, and I sometimes felt a little bored listening to her gush about the latest celebrity scandal, or whisper about some office drama.

But she had been one of the first people to befriend me at Jinx, and had come with me to R 3 that first time.

I’d thought about inviting Dylan, but that felt like breaking an unspoken rule of the list. We were supposed to be finding out who we were as individuals, not as a couple.

“You’re a trained artist, though. I never even went to college.” Meery sighed, now playing with her clay more than actively molding it. “Just out here living the dream, scraping by with a limited skill set.”

Her nose wrinkled when she said it, like she was making a joke at her own expense, but I frowned. “I don’t think anyone who’s met you would say that. Jinx would fall apart without you.”

“Yeah, we’d run out of coffee pods pretty fast. There’d be a revolt.”

“No, I mean it.” I put my muddy hand out to get her attention.

I didn’t like the rounded curve of her shoulders.

“You aren’t just Eric’s assistant. You keep all the break room snacks and office supplies stocked.

You run the office happy hours and onboarding stuff.

Aren’t you the one who pays all the company bills?

Sounds to me like you’re running office operations and HR and finances. I couldn’t do that.”

“When you say it like that…but I don’t know. Sometimes I feel like I want to do more, you know? Like, is managing his calendar and the coffee deliveries really what will make me happy?”

“Hmm.” I was surprised. My conversations with Meery mostly revolved around work, or chatting about lunch places to try.

I’d assumed she was happy with her life and her role at Jinx.

Her unfailingly bubbly personality gave her a bit of a ditzy vibe, and I was instantly ashamed I’d fallen for it. “What do you think you’d do? ”

With a snort, she mashed her clay into the table. I realized she was uncomfortable. Self-conscious, even. “It’s not like I can do much. All my friends and coworkers have these impressive degrees and internships.”

“Degrees aren’t everything. You’re very organized, and you’re kind.

You have a big heart. That means something.

” On my first day at Jinx, I’d planned on eating lunch alone in my office, but Meery had insisted she take me out.

When I’d mentioned I wanted to try a workout at R 3 , but was too nervous, she’d said, “Bump that, let’s go together!

” , then showed up at 6 a.m. the next morning.

“A big heart can only get you so far. Sometimes it feels like I started out behind everyone else. We didn’t have a lot of money growing up, not a lot of opportunities.”

“Same.”

Meery whipped around to stare in astonishment. “What?”

“Sure,” I responded, rolling a little pillar of clay for my mug handle. I’d made my peace with my rough upbringing a long time ago. “There were times my family struggled to put food on the table. There were some days that I wasn’t sure where I was going to sleep at night.”

“Wow, Tess, I didn’t realize. I guess you always look so put together and…aloof. Fancy.”

A sound like a scoff mixed with a snort escaped my lips. A few people at the surrounding tables glanced over. “Meery, I’m a mess. I have anxiety up to my eyeballs, and the only reason I’m in Chicago is because I’m running full tilt away from a twelve-year-long relationship.”

Her eyes narrowed. “Yeah, you still never gave me the deets on that. ”

“I…we’re not done with you, yet.” Meery was a kind person, and I had written her off as silly.

She deserved me taking her seriously. “I’m the only person in my family with a college degree, and the only reason I got that far was because when I was young and stubborn, I found the thing I loved most and refused to settle for anything less.

So…tell me. If you could do something else, anything , what would it be? ”

Meery pursed her lips and scrunched her nose, like she was physically holding the words in. I glanced up at her every few seconds while I rolled my handle some more, quiet.

“I want to do social media,” she blurted, clay squishing out the sides of her fingers.

“Cool. In what way?” When I didn’t immediately laugh at her, or tell her she was ridiculous, her shoulders lowered a little from her ears.

“Well, I’m on there all the time. I see what’s trending and what’s working. I have a decent following on my personal pages, and I feel like I’d be good at doing that for other people.”

I’d been surprised by the number of followers on Meery’s pages when she’d friended me. Her content was good, and she always did the trends and dances before everyone else caught on.

“You know, Worther’s social department has, like, ten staff members completely devoted to social trendspotting.”

“What?” Her squeak was shrill. “That’s a thing ?”

“Sure. And you’re right, I feel like you’d be good at that.

” I attached my handle, picking up a needle tool to draw some feathered lines across the surface of the mug.

“We have a new social campaign we’re doing for that bookstore chain.

Maybe you can sit in on some of those meetings.

If you want, you could take a first stab at writing some of the copy. ”

“Are you shitting me?” Meery’s strangled shriek made more heads turn. We were making quite the impression at beginner’s night.

“Of course. I can put a word in. Eric will probably be cool with it, as long as that’s something you want to try.”

“I want.” I stilled my hand as her fingers wrapped around my wrist. She looked up at me with amazed, slightly glassy eyes. “Tess, you would…do that for me?”

My muddy hand topped hers, mixing and squishing together.

It was messy, scary even. I wasn’t used to getting so open and vulnerable with other people.

But I shrugged. This felt right. “Like I said, you have a good heart. And a passion. Most of the time, that’s all you need.

You deserve to take a chance on yourself, Meery. ”

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.” My cheeks heated, and I used the excuse of my mug to look somewhere else.

“Okay, enough about me. Tell me about Mr. Twelve Years. It’s Dylan, isn’t it?”

The tool slipped as I jerked, ruining the flowing line of the peacock feather I was freehanding. “What? How…how did you…?” I stammered, pulling my hands away from my work to stare at her.

She rested her hand on her cheek, unconcerned about the clay smudging her skin. “He buys you so much coffee. And treats. And sometimes when he looks at you, it’s like he’s trying to set you on fire with his eyes. Not like in a laser-y way, but like in a sexy way.”

“Do you think anyone else has noticed?” Jinx didn’t have a policy against interoffice dating, but Victoria would have a field day if it came out that Dylan and I were together .

“No one else does, trust me. They’re not paying attention. So, it is him? You were with Dylan for twelve years?”

“Yes.” I resigned myself to this conversation.

If she could be candid with me, I would be with her, too.

Besides, it might be nice to get a neutral third-party opinion.

Vanna had exploded when I told her I was seeing him again, and I was still conflicted about it.

Ecstatic that he was here and attentive and wanted to try again, but terrified we’d end up the same way we were before.

“And you two never got engaged or anything?”

“We talked about it, but the timing was never right.” The words came out smoothly, with the practiced skill of a line repeated countless times.

“Hmm.” I didn’t look up from my mug, but I got the feeling Meery was narrowing her eyes, scowling.

Maybe she was more perceptive than I’d given her credit for, too.

I needed to re-think how I stereotyped people.

“You left Nashville, and now he’s here. He followed you, didn’t he?

” she asked with the same enthusiasm someone else might say, “He gave you a million dollars, didn’t he? ”

I felt my mouth curve into a smile before I could stop it. “He did.”

“And how do you feel about that? It’s not a stalking situation, is it? Because I will fuck him up.”

My smile advanced into a full-out laugh. Even though Meery was five-foot-nothing, I had no doubt she’d throw down if she thought she needed to. “No, not like that. I feel…good about it. We’re working on some things, and we haven’t really told anyone yet, so could you keep it quiet? ”

“Obviously, I’m the literal embodiment of low-key.” She grinned, and then the smile slid off her face. She wrapped her hand around my wrist again. “You deserve to take a chance on yourself, too, Tess. I hope it works out, if this is something you want.”

“I think it might be,” I croaked around the lump in my throat. Maybe she hadn’t been my first choice, but something told me inviting Meery to this pottery class was one of the best decisions I’d made all year.