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Somehow, though, my feet refuse to take me inside. It’s not warm, and the balcony’s chill sinks through my fuzzy socks. I’m not sure how Ozzy manages to run around with so little clothing on.

He comes rushing back like the ocean waves he loves so much, waving a black Sharpie. The cap is AWOL, and notes of ink and alcohol waft toward me.

He poises the marker tip above the bare skin of his muscled forearm. “Tell me what would make you happy. I take direction well.”

He scrawls letters on his skin, draws bold loops and tight curves, thick and sure. I’m sure this is some kind of deviant metaphor for his penis. Or for how he would be in bed. Ask for kisses , an ill-behaved part of my brain suggests. Or a date! Take him up on that coffee offer!

He notices my distraction, and his mouth curls up in a wicked smile. “You’ve thought of something.”

“Go away,” I say. “Please.”

The adverb feels like a weakness. He hasn’t earned my politeness.

A frown puckers his forehead. “Your love language is not quality time spent together. Noted.”

He ostentatiously strikes through something he’s scrawled on his forearm.

He’s all muscles and a light dusting of blond hair beneath the loopy all-caps manifesto he’s written himself. He’s out of room. Can he write on his abs next?

“We can’t be friends,” I say.

He hums a whisp of melody. “Pretty sure that’s a country music song, but I can’t remember how it ends.”

“That’s not the only thing you don’t remember,” I say.

He nods, looking chastened. “It was something important. The thing I forgot. I apologize.”

It’s ancient history. It doesn’t matter. “You have a nice day now. Please get off my porch.”

I march myself back inside. Then I go hide in the bathroom with my laptop.

“Is now a bad time?” Rosie leans over the wall of my cubicle. “Am I intruding? Is something wrong?”

She ogles the enormous fruit basket that is taking up far too much space on my desk. She’s on a spy mission, sent to find out who my secret admirer is. My work life and my nonexistent personal life have collided and I’m off balance.

I take my ire out on the fruit basket. It’s huge. The size of a hamper. Maybe even bigger than a wheelbarrow. Entire orchards have been denuded to fill it.

“Yes!” I snap.

“Problems in Shondaland?” Rosie snags a grape and chews happily.

“Nothing I can’t handle.” I walked-ran away from Ozzy yesterday in a righteous huff, fully prepared to hide out in my bathroom for the remainder of the weekend.

After a few minutes, however, he’d ceded the field to me and vacated my balcony.

From the banging and off-key singing that filtered through the wall, he’d spent the rest of the night working out.

This explains why I’m haunted by dreams of his muscles (which are impressive).

When I left for work this morning, there was a note taped to my front door.

A big, yellow smiley face grinned at me with tears coming out of its eyes.

Maybe it’s the crying-with-laughter emoticon?

I have no clue; I’ve achieved the emotional maturity of an octogenarian.

A bold Sorry! had been scrawled beneath the smiley face.

I’d crumpled the whole thing up into a ball and left it in front of Ozzy’s door.

That balled-up note now sits in the center of the fruit basket, perched on one of those little plastic sticks for floral enclosure cards.

“Is it my code?” Rosie swallows mock-dramatically.

Plucks another grape. If she leans any farther over the wall, she will crash-land into my cubicle.

“I knew I should have code reviewed before I committed, and I’m sorry I broke the nightly build.

But Noah promised me he rebooted the server, and no one noticed because you’re the only one who codes at dark o’clock, and I backed my changes out.

” She pauses to consume more fruit. I don’t think she’s truly chastened.

Also, I hate office life. And teamwork. And pretending that I’m absolutely fine with rogue server reboots. I miss my space geodes.

Rosie gives me sorry puppy dog eyes. She is the best intern ever.

“I had a run-in with a neighbor yesterday.” I debate asking for more details about her coding fiasco, then decide that I don’t want to know. “He and I had words.”

“Was he mean? Inappropriate?” She hurls an indignant glance at me. She’s my white knight defender in yoga pants. “I can come over and kick his butt!”

“I told him off.” Mostly. Rosie looks impressed. And slightly skeptical. She knows that my backbone is made of marshmallow.

“Shonda would be proud. Sometimes the best answer is, ‘Yes, yes I can kick your ass.’” She trots around the cubicle wall and perches on top of my desk. “Let’s debrief.”

“And then he sent me this fruit basket.”

We both look at the basket. Ozzy’s fruit basket is to baskets what a transatlantic shipping container is to an aluminum can.

You’d think he was trying to make a point with all this rambutan and dragon fruit.

A pineapple perches on top of Fruit Mountain, its rough skin covered in sharp spines.

I have so many questions. How does he know where I work?

What if I had a citrus allergy? Did he poison it?

How can he motivate fruit delivery people to show up so early on a Monday, and can I apply that lesson to my software team?

“It’s very…generous?” Rosie tries. She must sense my rage because she hyper-focuses on peeling a banana that has been lurking beneath its spinier companions in the basket.

“How does he know where I work?” I grumble. “Is he a stalker? Did he follow me? Track my phone?”

Rosie hypothesizes wildly (Bing! Drone surveillance! A clairvoyant consult!) while I check my email.

I ruthlessly break into her brainstorming. “Mystery solved. He sent me a LinkedIn request.”

She deflates. “But at least you made an impression? I’m sure he respected you standing up for yourself.”

“Sure.” She fishes out the crumpled-up ball of paper. Smooths it out. Snorts. “What?”

She turns the paper so I can read Ozzy’s addition: To my dearest, darling ogre.

I hate him so much.

“It’s like he knows you!” she crows.

“He absolutely doesn’t.” If he did, he’d a) know that ghosting a person you kissed is a recipe for revenge and b) know that I am a competitive person.

I hate to lose. I click over to the local plant nursery site and send an orange tree to Ozzy.

I’ll see his fruit basket and raise him a baby orchard.

“Fresh fruit!” Noah skids to a halt. He drops his scooter to the floor.

“Help yourself.” I’m making plans to get even.