Read Online Illusions Complete Series by Annie Jocoby - Free Book Online

do.” I suddenly realized that I was feeling more comfortable around Ryan. I really didn’t care that he saw my disaster of an apartment. Or smelled the disaster of a litter box. It occurred to me that the reason for my newfound comfort was because Ryan seeing a therapist made him seem more human.
    I noticed that everything was not all right with him, though. He was staring down at the plastic cup holding the vanilla soy milk-butterscotch Schnapp’s concoction - all my glasses have long since been in the sink dirty, and I was reduced to drinking out of plastic cups when I wasn’t drinking straight out of the bottle or out of the milk carton - and I saw that he was shaking a little.
    “There’s something wrong, isn’t there?”
    He looked at me. “No, nothing. I just feel bad for hurting you.”
    I narrowed my eyes. I knew better, but I didn’t push.
    He smiled, although it wasn’t really sincere. “This drink’s pretty good. Did you invent this?”
    “Not really. It’s called throwing together whatever I happen to have on hand.”
    “You’re a regular MacGyver.”
    I had to laugh at that one. “MacGyver” is a word that I often use for people who are resourceful and are able to create things out of everyday household items. I realized that the fact that we were close in age was a plus, as we both get the same pop-cultural references.
    “Yes, a drink MacGyver. You’d be amazed at the things that you can put together if you really make an effort.”
    He smiled again, wanly, then sipped the last of his MacGyver cocktail. I sat down next to him, obsessing about the garbage bag of wine bottles, and, more importantly, obsessing about the dead roses in the smashed wine bottle. The roses were dead, and that wasn’t a problem – it’d been almost a week. But I never bothered to buy a vase for them. The inescapable conclusion was that I just didn’t care.
    I took his cup. “Would you like another?” I asked, moving towards the kitchen. Surreptitiously, I grabbed the roses out of the smashed wine bottle, then threw the bottle away. I crammed the roses themselves in a drawer, and started to pour another drink.
    “Actually, it’s pretty late.”
    “Sure, you’re right. Um, I would give you my bed….” Oh, please, act like you really don’t want the bed. I know that it would be the kind thing to do, but, trust me, that room is a holy mess.
    Well, I could always just throw the clothes on the bed into the closet and shut the door. Yes, that’s what I’ll do.
    “No, I can’t put you out like that.”
    “Really, it isn’t a problem,” I lied.
    He looked up at me. “I hope that it isn’t too forward to ask if we could sleep together in your bed? I mean, I promise I won’t try anything. I know that we started out as a one-night stand, but I really want us to be about something other than sex.”
    “Not a problem,” I lied, hoping that I wasn’t gritting my teeth as I said it. “Uh, do you mind waiting here? I have to use the bathroom.” The only bathroom in the apartment was attached to my bedroom, so it was a great excuse to do a whirlwind cleaning job.
    “Sure.”
    At that, I ran into the bedroom and shut the door behind me. Shit, shit, shit. I took the entire pile of clothes off the bed, and threw them into the closet on the floor. That takes care of that. I realized that I hadn’t vacuumed in there for awhile. Oh, Iris, what’s your problem? You aren’t usually this messy. Then I remembered my profound depression that week. No excuse. You have to do better than this. Still, without the pile of clothes on the bed, the room was passable. You will just have to figure out later what is clean and what is dirty.
    Oh, who am I kidding. It’s all dirty by now.
    The clothes crisis resolved, I returned to my earlier obsession – my weight. Looking in my full-view mirror, I noticed that I had lost some weight this past week, but not nearly enough. Now I was only 25 lbs overweight, not 30 lbs, but on