381. Chapter 381
Their first order was years ago. He was just a freshman then. In college and at the pizza joint.
There was a loud bang, a louder crash, and an even louder curse that didn’t sound quite like English, or any language he’d ever heard; there was some scrambling, some “no, it’s fine Alex, I’ll get it, just – this stupid box!”, and the door swung open.
A pretty blonde with an enormous, warm smile and rectangular glasses was at the door, cash in hand and slightly disheveled.
“Hi!” she offered brightly, and he held out the two pies with every topping imaginable automatically. This girl was not exactly what he’d pictured when the order was placed, but this job was teaching him a lot about the deceptiveness of appearances.
“Just moving in?” he asks, because he doesn’t have to crane his neck to see the boxes littering the apartment behind her.
“Yeah! My sister’s helping me, but I’m a bit… clumsy sometimes, so…” She adjusts her glasses and chuckles, more to herself than anything, before exchanging two crisp bills for the pizzas.
“If you don’t get in here with those damn pizzas, clumsiness will be the least of your problems, Kara!”
Jessy wonders what her sister looks like, to be able to somehow balance that much humor with that much menace in the same sentence.
He and the girl – Kara, he now knows – exchange a quiet, secret smile, complete with raised eyebrows.
“Keep the change,” she tells him, and it’s not until he’s halfway down the hallway that he realizes she’s tipped him nearly fifty percent.
Their next order, a week or so later, someone else answers the door. Short, straight dark hair, wary eyes. He can tell she’s the type that checks through the peephole before opening the door. But her stance is nothing if not confident.
This must be the sister. Alex, he thinks he remembers Kara shouting.
She doesn’t make small talk, but she, too, tells him to keep the change.
Kara is yelling for Alex about the show starting as the door closes in front of him, and he grins. Must be TV night.
He starts being able to predict why they’re ordering, depending on the time of night, how many toppings, how many pizzas. With beer or without. He starts bragging to his friends about the accuracy of his guesses: Movie Night Pizza. Bad Day Pizza. Game Night Pizza. I Just Got Dumped Pizza. Alex Tried to Cook Pizza.
It doesn’t matter who answers the door or how red their eyes are or how many voices her hears shouting about Mario Kart in the background. They always tip him absurdly well, and they always – he’s not sure when it starts, or who asked him his name, but it was probably Kara – greet him by his name.
“Jessy with a y! My favorite pizza guy!” Kara will charm him on Game Night Pizza nights.
“Thanks, Jessy,” Alex will grunt on Alex And The Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day Pizza nights.
He’s pretty sure Alex doesn’t live there, but she’s always with Kara.
Except on Alex Is In Geneva Pizza or Alex Is Working Late and Kara Is Lonely and Hungry and Grumpy Pizza nights. He wonders if Alex ever even sleeps at her own place.
Until late one night, when he’s working the counter instead of deliveries, a small woman with gorgeous hair and a leather jacket puts in an order for a pie and a six pack of beer while she’s talking on her phone.
“Hey, M’gann – no, no, I’m fine – yeah, she did a great job patching me up – listen, that’s actually why I’m calling. I can’t get a hold of Kara – do you know if Alex is with her, or at work, or home, or – of, she is? Okay, great, I just wanted to – oh, shut up. Good night. No. I’m hanging up now. Bye. Sorry about that. How much do I owe you?” she redirects to Jessy. She bounces on the balls of her feet and blows air out of her cheeks like she’s nervous about something while he rings her up. No, not nervous. Terrified.
But she, too, tells him to keep the change.
After that, he starts getting delivery orders to Alex’s apartment, too.
The first time she answers an unfamiliar door for him, his heart jumps. “Hey, you actually have a place of your own!”
Alex scowls at him, but she tips him even more than she usually does, so he sees right through it.
The next time he delivers to the older Danvers girl’s address, the woman from the shop answers the door, in an oversized shirt and basketball shorts.
He grins knowingly at her, his heart leaping hard and happy. “Her stuff looks good on you,” he murmurs conspiratorially. “I wear my boyfriend’s stuff all the time, too.”
The cautious, guarded look that crossed her face at his first sentence is replaced by a massive, dimpled smile at his second, and he gets his biggest tip yet.
He adds Late Night Sexy Times with My Girlfriend Made Us Both Hungry Pizza night to the list, but he doesn’t add that category to the pool with his friends at the shop. He feels more protective of the Danvers girls now than ever before.
The next time he sees Alex’s girlfriend – the late night pizza and beer she picked up all those months ago really must have worked – it’s at Kara’s place, and he’d guessed rightly: Game Night Pizza was back in action.
He alternates, now, between Alex’s place and Kara’s, and Alex looks happier than he’s ever seen her, her hair getting curlier and redder and her smile getting easier by the week.
When Kara greets him at the door tonight, he’d put in back at the shop pool for Movie Night Pizza, and he chuckles in part amusement and part disappointment when Kara opens the door and he sees Alex waving an aggressive towel at the smoke detector like it insulted her sister instead of her cooking.
So it’s an Alex Almost Burned The Place Down Pizza night.
He shrugs with a smile. He might have lost tonight’s bet about why the girls were ordering tonight, but they seemed happy – the Danvers sisters and Alex’s girlfriend, whose name, he’s gathered by now, is Maggie – and that is more than enough for Jessy.