Faulty---> mgc

onze

"I'm going, okay Michael?"

I look up from my journal and see Jade standing in the hallway to the door with her jacket and shoes on.

"Oh, are you seeing that guy in the coffee shop or whatever?" I ask, pretending to not give a damn when I really do give a damn.

"Yeah, I'll probably be back in two hours or so. You okay with that?" She asks, switching her purse from her left hand to her right shoulder.

I sigh very quietly, and say a small 'yeah.' Jade exhales through her nose and walks towards me and sits next to me on the couch. I just stare at the messy handwriting scribbled into the journal in my lap.

She reaches a hand to my hair, and gently guides my head to her neck where I kind of half hug her and half lay on her as she pets my hair. I close my eyes and hum.

"I know how you feel about me going out with this guy."

"I know. I just can't help it."

"It's only for the couple hours, Michael. I'll be back and we can do something, alright?"

I just nod because that's what she expects me to do. She stops the movement of her hand in my hair and I lift my head. Jade cups the sides of my face and I look at her pretty blue eyes. She just simply kisses my forehead and stands up from the couch, stroking my head once more before leaving the small apartment.

For at least an hour, I stay in the same position with a tingling feeling on the front part of my head.

* * *

"Dude, I can't believe it! I have a daughter!" Calix exclaims as I sit in the chair across from him in the 'employee only' room.

I shake my head and smile a bit, just imagining what it would look like for flustered, clumsy Calix holding his newborn daughter. As I finish filling out the shipment form, I ask him, "What did you name her?"

"Sarah and I have both decided to go with Fiona Blue Carroll. I liked the name Delilah, but she said it didn't feel right."

I glance at the 27 year old and say, "Did you like Delilah because of the Plain White T's song?"

He shrugs his shoulders, which almost goes unnoticed, and says, "Well, kind of. I just really like the name.

I nod my head and repeat 'Delilah' a couple times.

"It's a cool name. I like it," I say, sliding the shipment form into a letter and shoving it into the basket of things we need to mail.

"Feel free to use it if you have a kid."

"I'm not even in a relationship yet, don't get too ahead of yourself."

"No, wait. I thought you were! With that one girl!" he points a finger at me, staring at me with wide eyes.

"You got that wrong. Jade is a friend that I met in November of last year. She didn't have a home so I took her in, and we've become, like, best friends," I explain, waking over to my chair and flopping down in it, still staring at Calix.

He scoffs and rolls his eyes, mumbling, "Looked a lot more than friends if you asked me."

"You saw her for, like, 10 seconds!"

"I saw the heart-eyes! You looked at her the same way I look at my wife! Especially when you were staring at her when she was walking around the store."

I turn to him with a look on my face that says, what the fuck are you talking about?

"Explain."

"Okay, so, when I said I was leaving to see the ultrasound, I realized when I got in my car that I was 45 minutes early. So I was going to come back in and talk to you guys or something, when I saw you come out with your work shirt on. You sat down in the chair and you were watching her walk around, not even realizing that I was standing outside of the store, like, 15 feet away from you," he rambles.

He continues, "So I basically stood outside for 45 minutes, watching you two interact. You guys were exactly the same as me and Sarah before we started dating. All of the hugs, kisses and all that lovey-dovey shit."

I furrow my brows and suck my lips into my mouth, just thinking about what we were doing on that day.

"So you stalked us for 45 minutes."

"Exactly."

I slap my hand to my forehead lightly and chuckle. I shake my head and say, "You've got quite the imagination Calix."