Unapologetically, Juliet

Chapter Seven

I woke up early the next morning on my couch with flour in my hair. King was curled up on my stomach, heavier than any cat should be. Briefly, I considered just snuggling with my beast and falling back into dreamland, but then I remembered that real life actually existed. And I needed to go to work, or Sarah was going to string me up by my toes.

"Goddammit!" I rolled off the couch, shoving King to the side, earning a few scratches on my arm in return. I landed unceremoniously on my ass and weighed the pros and cons of getting fired so I never had to move again.

"What time is it?" The sound of his voice made me jump and hit my head on the coffee table.

"Ow, fuck. It's six thirty. What are you still doing here?" I grumbled, remembering that I'd told him to just stay right before we'd passed out around two in the morning. "Shit, never mind."

Saber sat up on the longer couch across from me and stretched out his lanky arms. He looked like he'd just walked out of some fashion catalogue, even with his messy hair and disheveled clothing. He yawned, before shooting me a curious look, probably wondering why I hadn't bothered to get up off the ground.

"Crap. I need a shower. And I'm gonna be late to work." I didn't actually have to be there until nine, but my thirty-minute bike ride always took longer in the morning.

"Do you need a ride somewhere? I don't have to be at work until eleven." I could have kissed him. If I didn't smell like a sweaty pantry or actually kinda want him to stick around for longer than a few weeks, I might have.

"If you can drive me to the business district, I'll give you all the cash in my coat." I didn't give him a chance to respond as another thought crossed my mind. "Oh, there are waffles in the freezer and feel free to eat anything else you find."

Saber grunted something unintelligible as he looked around the living room, probably for his shoes. "Don't take too long!" he called at my back as I rummaged through my room for clothes to wear that were both clean and work acceptable. I finally landed on a pair of dark blue jeans, a black tank top, and a green and black checkered flannel.

My shower lasted just about twenty minutes, long enough to wash myself and shave my legs and underarms, even though nobody would be seeing them except for me. And maybe King. When I finally emerged from the bathroom, I was pretty much ready to leave the house. I'd twisted my hair into a long braid over my right shoulder, and found one of my favorite gray knitted beanies to pull over my ears.

"Wow, it actually smells good in here." I spoke without thinking and I heard Saber laugh from the kitchen to the left of the front door. I grabbed the watering can by the counter and I stepped into the kitchen to fill it up in the sink. Something was cooking on the stove, and it looked like the oven had been turned on for the first time in months.

"It usually doesn't?" Saber questioned with a cheeky smile. I shrugged my shoulders and smiled back.

"Definitely not when food's cooking." I left him to finish whatever elaborate breakfast he'd decided to cook himself and started watering the plants that mostly took over my apartment. I'd collected over twenty different types, but there were several times where they'd started to get too big so I had to split them in two as best as I could and repot the other one.

"You're never going to get anywhere in the kitchen if you have as little confidence in yourself as other people do." Saber's sage advice coincided almost perfectly with the timer over the stove going off. "Have you ever had German pancakes before? My dad taught my sister and I the recipe when we were in middle school or something."

"Maybe... My mom always made up different names for stuff that she cooked. I had no idea that corn dogs were a real thing that she didn't invent until I went to a carnival with my friends in fifth grade." I heard Saber laugh as I finished watering all the plants, each one of them had their own name, but I generally kept that information to myself.