Fan Fiction ❯ Eve's Garden ❯ Chapter 3

Chapter Two

The best suited word for describing him was burly. He was six feet two inches in his bare feet, with shoulders that nearly spanned the width of the door, striking blue eyes, a well kept goatee, and a smile that instantly put Eve at ease. Eve couldn't help but smile goofily back at him. She could see what Diane had been attracted to, although he wasn't really her type. In spite of his size, or maybe because of it, when he smiled, his eyes lit up and made him as intimidating as the stuffed animal Eve had had on her bed since she was six.

Eve introduced herself and the teddy bear backed out of the doorway to invite her in saying, "Nice to meet you, I'm Michael. Diane's getting out of the shower, should be out in a minute."

Nice to meet you indeed, his eyes said, as they sized up the curves beneath her shirt and the tight fit of her jeans. Eve was no slouch, but she was not used to such open inspection and was about to remark on it until Michael smiled again.

Michael turned around and went back to the dining nook to a card game where a few of his equally attractive friends had begun without him. Feeling a bit out of her element with so many new faces, Eve sat down on the sofa. Michael called over to her, with an unlit cigar between his teeth, "Eve, come'n over, there's always room for one more." Then there was that smile again.

Eve flushed to the roots and smiled back without realizing it, "Oh, that's ok, you guys look fairly well set without me."

The guys returned to their game of penny poker, laughing and taking jabs at each other over nachos.

Eve looked around her, taking in the room. To say that Diane and Michael were slobs would have been the understatement of the century. A cockroach would have wanted to attack the living room with a broom and a trash bag.

Clothes lay in piles throughout the living room, stacks of magazines (the kind that get mailed in brown wrappers), towers of CDs, movies that come from stores requiring I.D. for entry, and empty food containers of all shapes and sizes nearly left the carpet invisible by their absolute numbers. Eve was pretty sure the flooring was brown, but was uncertain if that was the original color. The galley kitchen was no better. Stacks of dishes overflowed from the sink to cover every available inch of countertop and the garbage may have been waiting for the Rapture to be taken out. Crumbs and particles of previous meals were strewn all over the linoleum, as the two apparently didn't own a broom. All in all, Eve couldn't help but wonder if every tenant who had ever rented the place had left in such a hurry that none had bothered to take their belongings with them, or to clean up when they did, and if the manager had just moved in the next tenant, as is.

Of course, that was the neat nick in her talking. Eve knew she was a certified perfectionist and had often joked that she couldn't help it, it was in the stars. After all, she was a Virgo. Besides, she told herself, Diane always lived more than cleaned. Maybe that's why she seemed to live her life with so much more fun by comparison.

Just when Eve could have sworn that she saw something move in the kitchen, Diane came out of the bathroom with a towel around her head, "Evie, I'm sorry, I didn't know you were here yet. Give me just a few to get slap something on and I'll be ready to go."

"That's okay, I was just admiring the view," Eve laughed back, throwing a glance at the table of hunks in the other room.

"Well, take your pick, each one's as good in the sack as the next, if you ask me," Diane said a little too loudly and winked.

Eve nearly choked. Not because it was offensive or true; she knew that despite Diane's many boyfriends, she was not promiscuous. She just didn't want the guys to realize she'd been checking them out, especially the dark haired one with the glasses, sitting in the corner. He reminded her of someone she'd had a crush on in High School, quieter and more somber than the others. The two tried not to laugh too loudly and failed miserably.

The guys in the next room dropped quiet.

"What'd we miss?" Michael asked, still chewing the unlit cigar.

"Nothing," Eve said quickly.

"Oh, we were just trying to decide which of you lucky boys Evie was going to take home for a meaningless fling," Diane smirked. Eve playfully smacked her friend upside the head and looked at the floor, more than a bit embarrassed.

The dark haired one jumped in the fray, "I didn't realize we were playing high stakes poke her, um, I mean poker," he said laughing.

By this time, Eve was squirming. She was unaccustomed to being the center of attention for very long, particularly the center of so many cute guys' attentions. Luckily, Diane saw her friend's unease and shooed the boys back to the game and herded Eve into her room. Eve was so grateful for the reprieve that she almost didn't notice that the bedroom was as messy as the front rooms. Almost didn't notice.

"Did you have to do that?" Eve sighed.

"Evie, don't worry. None of those guys would hurt a fly. They're harmless and fun and joking. Besides, they're used to me. Think I could say anything that would phase 'em?"

"It's not that. They don't know me. I don't want any of them getting the wrong idea."

Diane rolled her eyes to the ceiling, "Oh, I get it. I thought you were joking when you said you were checking out the guys. You were serious. So, which one caught your eye-Pete or Jack? Or maybe it was Michael?"

"Hah! I don't want your sloppy seconds."

"Very funny. Michael's a great guy. He's just looking for things right now that aren't in my plan. He's ready for a wife and kids and a house with a white picket fence. I want a career and no rug rats. Plus he's really sentimental and I don't go in for mush. So, which one was it?"

"Well…"

"Come on, it's me," Diane said while towel drying her hair.

"I kinda was checking out the quiet one, the one with the glasses."

Diane stopped drying her hair and started tossing various garments out of her closet like a woman on a mission. "Oh, that one's Pete," Diane said while scrutinizing a black piece of material that may have been a skirt, a shirt or a scarf, "He's a little quiet, but when he gets warmed up, watch out- he's worse than me." With that, Diane straightened up, obviously having found what she was looking for, "Aha!" she said triumphantly.

"Another of your impeccable clothing choices, Dee?" asked Eve. Diane might have enough smarts to be the first female President, and a tongue that could make a sailor blush, but what she didn't have was an ounce of fashion sense. Bright, short and thin made a good outfit in her book, even if the items didn't match. Eve did have to give her credit though; what she had procured from the closet this evening wasn't completely hideous and it did cover more of her body than most of what Eve had seen her wear before.

"Back to the boy toys, Evie. You're not getting out of things that easily."

Eve knew she wasn't going to be able to change the topic, so she conceded, "Ok, you got me. Yes, I think he's a cutie. But you know what I've been through lately. I'm just not ready to jump back in to the dating pool yet."

By now Diane was mostly dressed, "Well, he is nice enough, but he hasn't been dating for a while. Had a bad run himself so he's not into anything serious either. I just don't want you to get hurt, you know, thinking you're being all happy-go-lucky, and then falling for a guy who isn't serious too."

Eve sighed, "I know. You think I haven't thought of that? That's why I'm holding out on the dating thing. Enough of this though. Let's just forget all about it and do something fun. Of course, it can't be anything too fancy, you can see I'm not exactly dressed for a black tie dinner."

"Care if the guys tag along, ladies?" said a voice near the door. Eve just about jumped out of her skin and yanked the door open. She hadn't noticed it had been standing just ajar the entire time she and Diane had been talking.

"You sneak! How long were you standing there? That's not very gentlemanlike, you know," Eve hissed at Michael.

"Easy, easy. Guess things were being said that those of us with one less chromosome shouldn't be privy to. Don't fret, I just walked up. No harm, no foul right?"

"I'm sorry," Eve stammered. She was angry at herself for blowing her top at such an obviously nice guy, "I didn't mean to yell at you."

"Don't worry about it, besides I wouldn't say anything anyway. After all, I want first crack at wooing you, so I'm not about to give Pete a heads up."

Eve blushed again. She would have been furious except she already felt like a heel for yelling at Michael in the first place. And he was smiling that smile again.