A Slice of Life

Swimming in grease, sir

As always on Thursday nights, Samuel and his best friend Jordy went to the gym, before ending up at Samuel's place to order in pizzas and game for a while. Samuel had already placed an order for their pizzas in the LazyFood app, while Jordy was setting up the Xbox. Samuel's parents went out for dinner a lot, taking clients from his father's own business with them. Samuel didn't really mind their absence a lot. He was used to be home alone, even though he had a twin sister, Jenna, who wasn't home a lot either. While she prefered to hang out with her friends in different places, Sam used the liberty of not having parents around to have fun nights with his friends—Jordy in particular.

And as soon as the delivery guy dropped off the pizzas, they would pop open some beers, and start slaughtering zombies for the rest of the night. Samuel couldn't think of a better way to spend his free night.

Since they just got back from the gym, his hair was still damp—it was raining outside after all—so his hair didn't get a chance to dry yet. He was wearing his favorite sweatpants, a hoodie, and as always, he brushed his teeth as soon as he came home. All the sugary sports drinks during their work-out sessions were bad for his teeth. Not to mention how much his teeth would suffer from drinking beer.

Samuel watched Jordy grab the beers as soon as he got back downstairs. He walked to the back door to allow his dog Rex into the house, who happily jumped around for a couple of seconds, until Samuel told him to stay quiet. As usual, his parents had forced Rex to stay in the backyard while nobody was home to keep an eye on him. Though Samuel was pretty sure he trained him to be a good boy even when he was alone, his parents were sure he was going to terrorise the house when he was left inside alone.

"How long until the pizza arrives?" Jordy asked as soon as Samuel walked into the living room. He was already seated in his favorite place on the couch, the controllers of the Xbox waiting on the coffee table in front of him. Samuel noticed he already took the liberty of grabbing snacks in the kitchen, which made him frown.

"Well, LazyFood says 'Aleksei' is on his way with our pizzas. Which brings me to the next question; why all the snacks?"

Jordy shrugged and smirked, grabbing a handful of popcorn to stuff in his mouth. "What can I say? I'm still growing, I need food." He answered with a mouth-full.

"All those work-out sessions in the gym are useless if you keep stuffing yourself with unhealthy snacks and foods, you know. And all of this shit is bad for your teeth." Samuel gestured towards the snacks and rolled his eyes, flopping down on the couch with a sigh. "I'm not going to grab a bite from any of those snacks."

Jordy grabbed another handful of popcorn and shoved it in Samuel's face. "You sure? Come on you know you want them."

"Oh, god no!" Samuel shoved Jordy's hand away from him with a disgusted look on his face. "Don't you hate to have tiny bits of popcorn between your teeth?"

"What, these?" Jordy leaned in and opened his mouth to show a bunch of half-chewed popcorn.

"You are disgusting, get away from me." Samuel pushed him away once more, and in that moment the bell rang. Aleksei, whoever you are, you couldn't have timed your arrival better. Samuel jumped up, and hurried into the hallway to answer the door, making sure Rex wouldn't follow him and try to escape—or worse, attack the delivery guy as soon as he smelled the pizza. As soon as he opened the front door, however, Samuel found a soaking wet guy holding two boxes of pizza.

He looked moody, for real. Cute, even though he looked like a soaked and grumpy cat, but moody. Besides, he was bringing Samuel food, and that in itself scored the boy some points.

"Hello Aleksei. I've been waiting for you." Samuel smirked while he looked him up and down, taking in his wet clothes. "Have you gone swimming while I was waiting?"

Dude. I've been driving around in the pouring rain for hours. I'm cold, my underwear is wet, my glasses broke, and I just stumbled over the stupid front door tiles of your unnecessarily ginormous could-house-five-families place. Do I look like I'm in the mood for your jokes?

Aleksei hated it when customers used the fact that LazyFood decided the delivery would be more personal if they added names. But, of course, Aleksei wasn't about to tell a paying customer, or anyone really, where he could stick the pizza. He needed his job, and he needed the tips.

He also needed to know why the handsome ones were always jerks.

Not that those were appropriate work thoughts. It'd be better if he got them out of his head before he'd go beet-red like he always did when cute guys talked to him.

Aleksei swallowed his words and put on his best fake, forced smile.

"Your pizza, sir."

"Hope you didn't take my pizza swimming." Sam joked, trying to get another smile from the boy. Because damn, that smile was cute, even though it was obviously forced.

Aleksei glanced down at the pizza box, watching the dark stains where grease managed to seep through the carton box.

"Only swimming in grease, sir," he replied through clattering teeth.

Samuel huffed in response. The boy not only dared not to laugh at his joke, no, he also made a better joke than he did. Samuel felt like he was a fool, and wanted to handle things fast, so he could get away from the moody boy who refused to laugh over his jokes. Yeah, sure Samuel understood it wasn't fun to ride a bike through the pouring rain, but he had decided to become a delivery guy himself. Surely, it couldn't kill to smile a little, now would it? Especially if his smile was already cute while it was forced. Samuel wondered how his smile would look when it was genuine.

He really needed to stop thinking about how cute the boy looked despite his dripping-wet state. And the words he choose to think didn't make it easier to stop thinking about it. Get it together Sam, it's just a delivery guy you'll never see again.

"Thank you, Aleksei." Jordy slipped into the door opening next to Samuel, took the boxes, and handed Aleksei some cash. Samuel watched Jordy giving the boy more than needed. Jordy nudged him, waking him up from his stupor. "Sam, if you want to finish a couple of levels before your parents get home, I'd say stop chatting with the delivery guy, let him do his job, and get your ass inside."

Hey, the customer said it, and Aleksei wasn't allowed to argue with the customer. Aleksei shoved the wad of cash into his pocket, and stepped away from the door. Onwards to the next delivery, which was hopefully to a house where there were no jerks making jokes.

"Thanks," he told the guy who gave him the generous tip.

When he got on his bike however, it was the other guy's face on his mind. Sam. His name was Sam.

Aleksei frowned at himself. Get it together. You're never going to see him again, and he makes stupid jokes about you while you're standing there, soaked to the bone. Really? That's what you like?

Aleksei sighed, pedaling a little faster to fight the cold in his body. These poor judgement calls are exactly why you're single. 

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