The Hot Mess and the Heartthrob Read online

  “Ingrid. I didn’t tell a soul.”

  “You…oh. Sorry. I—”

  “But I was dumb to show up the other night. You’re right. That wasn’t my brightest idea.”

  I sink onto my bed. The kids are arguing, which means none of them are bleeding or drowning, so I let myself have another minute. “I did like seeing you.”

  “I’m very much looking forward to seeing you again.”

  I smile so big my cheeks almost crack.

  “A secret, huh?” he adds.

  My face has been replaced with the sun and is now going to melt from the inside out. “That…wasn’t the exact word either of us used earlier, was it?”

  “No, but I like being a secret. You don’t get many when you live in the public eye. And I don’t want you having to deal with the crap that comes from your every move being scrutinized. Or with staffing and inventory issues.”

  “I’m wearing mismatched sneakers.”

  His laughter is silk and chocolate. “Pictures or it didn’t happen.”

  A noise that sounds like children chasing a baby squirrel echoes through the hallway, and I stifle a groan. “I need to go. Kids. Squirrel. Bath time. Sorry I freaked on you.”

  “Don’t be sorry. My life’s weird sometimes. But for the record—was one day of a busy store a bad thing?”

  “It was since we couldn’t take credit cards all day.”

  “Ouch.”

  “Yep.”

  “Internet problems?”

  “Software or server problems.”

  “I know a guy if you need help.”

  I laugh. “I suspect you know all the guys.”

  “All the women too.”

  “We should be fixed by morning, but I’ll keep you in mind if I need more help.”

  Piper shrieks, and Zoe yells, “Put the squirrel down!”, and Hudson moos like a cow, and I cringe.

  I think the insulation is good in the ceiling, but some days I wonder if I need to send the upstairs neighbor a fruit basket.

  “Was that your kids?” Levi asks.

  “Mm-hmm.”

  “Skippy troubles?”

  “I’m about to open the door and start yelling, and I don’t want you to hear that, so I’m hanging up now.”

  “Text me later.”

  He doesn’t ask if he can do anything to help, but the minute I open my door, he drops off my list of top ten things I’m thinking about.

  But only because I suddenly have a dozen domestic issues to sort out immediately, starting with a squirrel who wants to take a bath with my mooing son.

  That’s just how it goes.

  Thirteen

  From the texts of Levi and Ingrid

  Levi: Are you up?

  Ingrid: Unfortunately. Piper talks in her sleep and Zoe answers. I’m lying in bed at 4 AM listening to a one-sided debate over whether hockey pucks or eyeglasses will be a better tool to feed the conquistadors.

  Levi: Is that how you wake up every morning?

  Ingrid: No. Sometimes I wake up to wet willies and sometimes I wake up to Hudson just standing next to my bed staring at me like he’s a zombie. And *very occasionally* I wake up naturally when my body has had enough rest and it’s time to get going for the day.

  Levi: How often does that happen?

  Ingrid: I can’t remember, but I’ll let you know if it happens again. What time is it where you are?

  Levi: Trouble time.

  Ingrid: As in you’re causing trouble, or you’re avoiding trouble?

  Levi: I need someone with good taste to stop me from doing something my brother would regret. *selfie of himself holding a two-foot-tall squeaking rubber chicken*

  Ingrid: What IS that?

  Levi: My nephew’s Christmas present. If you squeeze it hard enough, it’ll squawk for almost a full minute.

  Ingrid: Put. Down. The. Rubber. Chicken.

  Levi: Full disclosure. I already bought it.

  Ingrid: I’m breathing deeply through my nose and assuming you bought it so no one else could buy it to gift it to anyone else’s kids, and that you’re going to use it yourself in YouTube videos where you and the chicken have a sing-off and then set it on fire as a warning to all other rubber chickens who would dare squawk for a full minute. And yes, that does mean I’m ignoring that little note you sent above about getting it for your nephew. I’m creating my own reality here where I can still talk to you.

  Levi: That’s a really good idea about the YouTube videos. A little off-brand on the setting it on fire part though.

  Ingrid: And it’s at 4 AM, before coffee. Imagine what I could come up with if you had the full power of mom-brain working for you.

  Levi: I don’t think I’ve ever fully appreciated the power of mom-brain.

  Ingrid: It often disguises itself behind crazy hair, wild looks in our eyes, and both hands full of caffeine at any given hour of the day.

  Levi: You’re in camouflage. *mind blown emoji*

  Ingrid: I’ve been in real camouflage before. This doesn’t feel quite the same. This is less warrior and more total mess. Army Years Ingrid is horrified at Mom Years Ingrid.

  Levi: I think you look hot in that mess.

  Ingrid: *laughing emoji*

  Levi: Totally serious. Competence is sexy.

  Ingrid: Are you still holding a large rubber squeaky chicken?

  Levi: Yep.

  Ingrid: Huh. For once, I have absolute confidence that I truly am the more attractive of the two of us at this moment.

  Levi: So I should keep holding the chicken?

  Ingrid: Only until it makes me throw up in my mouth. Then you’ve gone so anti-attractive that I won’t want to keep talking to you.

  Levi: What if I pick up a screaming goat then? Goats are cuter than chickens.

  Ingrid: I love the screaming goat! We did a reading marathon with book club last month, and everyone who read their twenty-six-point-two minutes a day won a medal, and everyone who told me their kids interrupted them every single farking time they tried to read or listen to an audiobook won a screaming goat. GREAT for stress relief.

  Levi: I did not see that coming. *gif of himself with his jaw dropping and the words PLOT TWIST flashing at the bottom*

  Ingrid: I keep one hidden in a drawer behind the register and pull it out and let my goat scream for me when I’m having a super rough day.

  Levi: *gif of Waverly Sweet doing a mic drop*

  Ingrid: Are you always this giffy, or are you loopy because your body doesn’t know what time it is?

  Levi: Yes to both. I don’t know how long I’ve been in Melbourne, but I know I have no idea if it’s close to lunchtime or bedtime. Am I keeping you up when you could’ve gone back to sleep?

  Ingrid: Nope. Brain had already engaged. I forgot to call the insurance company with a question about open enrollment yesterday, and then I realized it’s time to sign Zoe and Hudson up for soccer in the spring, but I didn’t write it on my calendar to do it because Piper got a bloody nose as I was checking email. Sort of like I meant to delete that email with all the gibberish at the bottom that I accidentally sent to you when I chewed you out about the yodeling pickle, but the girls were arguing over something while I was writing it, then Hudson snuck into my bedroom and played on my keyboard while I was keeping his sisters from throwing food at each other.

  Levi: After meeting Skippy for the first time, I actually assumed he was the one who sent the email.

  Ingrid: *bulging eyes emoji* That…hadn’t actually occurred to me until just now.

  Levi: My nephew got hold of Tripp’s phone a while back and he and his pet frog texted me a series of links to a few adult sites. You’d think touring the world would be where you’d see it all, but nope. Sometimes it really is right at home.

  Ingrid: I can’t decide if Hudson and your nephew would be BFFs or if they should never meet.

  Levi: Probably both.

  Ingrid: Was the pet frog a pet for long after that? I already know it was the frog’s f
ault. *eye roll emoji*

  Levi: Grandma to the rescue on that one. I called her to save them both. Tripp rolls with a lot more than I would’ve given him credit for when we were younger, but a five-year-old on adult sites would put his blood pressure through the roof. Last I heard, the frog was on an extended field trip with froggy daycare, courtesy of Grandma, and Tripp changes the passcode on his phone daily.

  Ingrid: I’d lock myself out of my own phone on day three if I changed the passcode that often.

  Levi: You have parents around to help with your kids?

  Ingrid: Nope. My mom got me in the divorce, but once puberty hit, we were at each other’s throats daily, so she let my grandparents raise me. I was already at their place most days after school until bedtime anyway.

  Levi: I’m having a hard time picturing you at anyone’s throat.

  Ingrid: It’s a very good thing that who we are at eleven or twelve doesn’t define us for the rest of our lives. And my Army years were good for me too. Also, I have a feeling I’ll pay mightily for my own pre-teen years when Zoe and Piper hit theirs.

  Levi: Nah. You’ll do great.

  Ingrid: Spoken like a true optimist who’s never spent weeks on end with pre-teen girls and their mothers…

  Levi: At least therapy’s more socially acceptable now.

  Ingrid: *laughing emoji* So true. What about you? Did you get to hang out with your grandparents when you were growing up?

  Levi: I don’t remember a lot about my grandparents. Mostly that my grandpa smelled like cigars and my grandma always stole knick-knacks every time she’d come visit. Found out later that Mom used to visit garage sales to stock up on knick-knacks for Grandma to steal, once she figured out what was going on.

  Ingrid: I have a customer who sneaks stir sticks from the coffee bar into her purse when her daughter’s not looking. Sugar packets too some days. Holly, my barista, helps distract her.

  Levi: The daughter or the mom?

  Ingrid: The daughter. Holly’s wife’s dad was just put in a home for patients with early onset Alzheimer’s, and I think helping an old lady commit petty larceny is her way of dealing.

  Levi: Ah, that sucks.

  Ingrid: That’s life.

  Levi: Do you think a giant rubber chicken would make any of them feel better?

  Ingrid: *laughing emoji* Maybe? There has to be someone in the world who’d enjoy a terrifying bird that squawks for a minute.

  Levi: It only squawks that long if you’re strong enough to squeeze it all the way.

  Ingrid: I don’t want to know how many times you’ve displayed your strength today, do I?

  Levi: Not nearly as many times as I’ve wanted to. I’m actually hiding in a bathroom because I got spotted when I squawked it the second time. My security team put me in time-out. I think I’m due back on set in an hour? Seriously losing track.

  Ingrid: Is that hard? Being recognized everywhere you go?

  Levi: It’s the trade-off. I know how to get off-grid when I need to.

  Ingrid: But what if you’re in the middle of a tour and you can’t?

  Levi: *video of himself squeezing a giant rubber chicken and then letting it squawk for a minute*

  Ingrid: OMG. *crying laughing emoji*

  Levi: Stress relief. Full confession: I love squawking rubber chickens. Apparently this is my screaming goat.

  Ingrid: That should be super annoying but I can’t stop laughing. I’m going to wake my kids up.

  Levi: Feel free to add that video to your screaming goat arsenal.

  Ingrid: Now I’m picturing an army of tiny screaming goats led by you and a giant rubber chicken, and I can no longer stay in bed laughing this hard, because if I do, I’m going to wet myself. #thankschildbirth

  Ingrid: Also, please delete that last message and pretend you never saw it.

  Ingrid: For real. I didn’t say that.

  Ingrid: Okay, it’s been ten minutes and you didn’t reply, so I’m going to assume that my goat army and I are on our own. Excuse me while I go die of mortification. Enjoy playing with your rubber chicken.

  Levi, three hours later: Oh, shit. Sorry, Ingrid. My chicken and I got busted by Giselle and then my manager called and I had to get back to the set for some night shooting. Just saw these. Feel free to picture me playing with my rubber chicken anytime if it makes you feel better. Gotta dash again. Talk to you soon. *gif of himself blowing a kiss*

  Fourteen

  Levi

  After an eternity away and a very long plane ride home, my body refuses to acknowledge that this hour of the day should be for sleeping.

  And I refuse to acknowledge that I was supposed to stay in LA to hang out with Cash for a few days on my way back from Australia instead of sitting in the small recording studio in my condo, fiddling with some lyrics and waiting for the clock to tick over to a reasonable hour to text a lady and ask if I can take her to breakfast.

  There’s no reasonable explanation for how obsessed I am with Ingrid, but then, logic and I don’t really go together.

  It’s not in my nature.

  I’m playing back a song I’ve been working on when my phone buzzes with an incoming message. And when I see who’s texting, my entire body lights up with a smile.

  Ingrid: I have no idea what your body clock is like right now, but mine’s on “how the hell did a squirrel get into my pillowcase?” time. *morning selfie with a baby squirrel*

  Levi: Aww, he got so big.

  Ingrid: Fess up. You’ve practiced that line, haven’t you?

  Levi: Ha! A time or two, yeah. Especially after my new friend the rubber chicken joined my posse. But he does look bigger. What’s the average size of an adult squirrel? Hold old is he? Too many big peanuts?

  Ingrid: Are you seriously up already? Or is this your normal away message auto-reply sequence?

  Levi: Night owl + time zone changes = me at your service to deliver breakfast.

  Ingrid: I have exactly twenty-six minutes free and alone starting at 8:32 this morning.

  Levi: I should still be awake then.

  Ingrid: I’d very much like to tell you I’ll be wearing something sexy, but odds are strong I’ll have peanut butter smeared in my armpit.

  Levi: That could be sexy.

  Ingrid: Do you have fetishes, or has it honestly been this long since you had female attention?

  Levi: I can’t answer that in writing.

  She stops typing, and my phone rings.

  My body jolts in anticipation of hearing her voice. Brain? Fully engaged. Legs? Tense and ready to leap to get to her place. Fingers? Twitching at the thought of touching her. Chest? Taking a mad beating from my blood-pumper.

  I mis-swipe the first time and have to try again to answer. “Hey, Superwoman.”

  Her laugh is soft and tinged with early morning. “Hey, peanut-butter-fetish-on-a-rubber-chicken man.”

  She could’ve called me music man, or pop god—that’s what most women I’ve known would’ve gone for.

  But not Ingrid.

  I seriously like this woman. “You really are always up this early, aren’t you?”

  “I’d like to say no, that it’s just when woodland creatures sneak into my bedroom, but if it wasn’t Skippy, it would’ve been Hudson with a potty emergency or Piper with a nightmare or Zoe freaking because she realized she got a problem wrong on her math test or the alarms on the bookstore going off because the garbage truck’s lights looked at it wrong.”

  And there it is again. The reminder that she has a big, full, busy life with her family and her business as her top priority.

  This is a good thing.

  It means we can be casual. Not deep.

  She doesn’t have time to get deep with me.

  “So this week’s completely different from last week.”

  She laughs quietly, throaty with sleep. “Life is never boring here. Also, if you squawk your rubber chicken, I will hang up on you.”

  “He stayed in Melbourne. A guy on the crew for the s
hoot had an English Mastiff that decided Mr. Chicky was his new best friend, so I let him keep it.”

  “That was kind of you.”

  “Self-preservation, really. Tripp would’ve kicked me out of the family if I’d given it to either of his kids. Or to Lila, come to think of it. I think she’d use it as an alarm clock to get everyone out of bed in the morning just for fun.”

  “I’m picturing her at Duggan Field squeezing a rubber chicken instead of blowing a whistle and making the mascots all drop and give her twenty.”

  I laugh. “You have been following the Fireballs.”

  “Piper loves the Thrusters. Love-loves the Thrusters. But she got bored when there weren’t hockey games to follow over the summer, so she adopted the Fireballs as her second favorite team. And the mascot contest was fun for all of us. That was so smart.”

  “I will not be telling my future sister-in-law that you said that. She doesn’t gloat, but she has a killer told you so look. She’s been wearing it since the final mascot reveal.”

  “With good reason. Did she know the whole time?”

  “Probably.” I stretch back and close my eyes, simply enjoying the sound of Ingrid’s voice. I’ve never wanted to get serious with a woman. Never—not even as a kid—wanted to think about getting married. But I could go for a cup of coffee or tea and an early morning chat like this more often. “What’s your favorite breakfast?”

  “Anything I don’t have to cook or wear.”

  “Allergies?”

  “No, but—never mind.”

  “What?”

  “Nothing.”

  “C’mon, Ingrid. But what?”