m 𝜗℘˚˖𓍢ִ໋

Azzi likes Dallas. She really does. Growing up in Virginia didn’t really give her a great idea of what a big city would be like. Neither did getting her MBA in Connecticut. But she’s living here now and she thinks she’s really hit her stride. She’s made friends out of her neighbors and is steadily making her way up the company she works for and has a house she shares with her best friend. It might be small, and she might not really own it, but it’s a house. She likes it.

“Carol,” Azzi whines from the kitchen table. She’s sitting in front of her MacBook, one of her knees drawn up to her chest, frowning as she traces quick circles on the mousepad and is only met with a loading screen. Her feet are bare and she curls her toes around the edge of her seat. “Why is the internet not working? Is it down or did you kick the router again?”

She can hear Caroline scoff from the living room, the two girls only separated by a little bit of space. She looks up. She can see the television and the back of the couch from where she sits. Caroline is sitting on it, head of sleek brown hair facing her. “I don’t get why you ask that every time, I literally kicked it once. It was an accident.” The clicking of her video game controller finds Azzi, who rolls her eyes from under the thick lenses of her glasses.

She looks down at her laptop again. The morning sun is shining down on her through the large window that yawns behind her and it casts her own shadow lightly onto the screen. She can see the slope of her shoulders, the bag of her sleep shirt she had cut the hem off of in college, the mess of a bun her hair is collected in on top of her scalp. “That shit was not an accident, you were aiming for it.”

“No, I was aiming around Jana. The router was just in the way of my aim.” Azzi wrinkles her nose at this, looking up again at her best friend. The girl is still too caught up playing video games to make real eye contact with Azzi, who just scowls at her from the table.

“The router is more important than a goal. This is why you’re not allowed to play soccer in the house anymore.”

Caroline makes another noise of disbelief. Azzi’s laptop starts loading again. She looks down at it expectantly, willing the document she’s trying to download to download faster. Her WiFi symbol has an exclamation mark over it, warning her that it’s not doing too well. “Hey, this is a ‘we’ thing, Azzi. Neither of us are allowed to play it anymore.” She sighs and scratches her shin. Looks up at the television just in time to watch as Caroline’s game freezes, controller still clicking as she tries to mash the buttons to get it to work. Smiles a little at the absurdity of it. Caroline swears under her breath. “Yeah, I think it’s just really slow right now. It always gets slow when you open your Mac. You have too many documents open on it.”

Azzi rolls her eyes at this. “‘m tracking things for my big girl job. You’re playing Fortnite right now. I feel like one of us should have priority over the other.” The downloading button disappears. Azzi runs her finger around her mousepad again and then tries to open her downloads. The screen pauses again. Her cursor turns into a multicolor circle. It spins at her. She fights the urge to groan.

“Yeah, and I’m literally two kills from winning, so I think my Victory Royale is currently more important.” Azzi squints at her laptop at the certainty in Caroline’s voice. It stays still in front of her. She can hear Caroline’s game pausing itself again.

“Bro,” she mutters under her breath. Caroline either doesn’t hear her or ignores her, because she doesn’t respond to the word. Azzi’s brows furrow. She scratches her knee. She can feel her nails dragging a little too harshly against the skin there, is sure there will be reddened lines pressing into her when she’s done. Caroline groans from the couch. Azzi looks up and sees that she’s dead, screen dimming. She laughs. “And you fucking sold. Who has priority now?”

Caroline groans again. “Whatever, fuck you.” She raises her arms above her head to stretch out her back, falling sideways onto the couch. The cushions accept her weight with a soft sound. The television stays on, much to Azzi’s annoyance, but she says nothing. Just continues to wait in silence for her MacBook to load. Quiet noises she can only describe as Fortnite ambience fill the space between her and her best friend.

The doorbell rings. The sound startles Azzi into looking up from her laptop. The door is tucked into the foyer, which is right between where Caroline is sitting in the living room and Azzi is sitting in the kitchen. It’s a Saturday morning. Neither of them are out of their pajamas. “Not it,” Caroline immediately calls from the couch. She shoots an arm up, pointer finger up towards the ceiling. “I opened it for the electrician last week and talked to him the whole time. That counts for, like, at least four times of you checking the door.”

Azzi groans from the kitchen table. “No, Carol, ‘m not wearing a bra, you gotta get it,” she says, crossing her arms over her chest as if to hide herself from the person at the door they haven’t even answered yet. Caroline grunts in protest. She doesn’t move at all. Azzi doesn’t either. She sits there, waiting, squinting at the other girl’s arm. When a few moments pass and neither of them have moved, Azzi gets up out of her chair and grumbles wordlessly at her. Caroline laughs.

Azzi’s bare feet pad against the wooden floors as she walks to the front door. She keeps her hands crossed over her chest, trying to coax her annoyance away from her face. She really hopes no one is actually at the door and that she can just bend down and grab a package or something. She doesn’t know who would even be at her door. Two girls in their mid twenties don’t attract many random visitors.

She gets to the door and sees a sleeved arm in the thin window next to it. Internally, she groans again. Someone actually is there. She’ll just have to hope it’s some random delivery driver she’ll never have to see again. Azzi crosses one arm over her chest to hopefully hide the peaks of her nipples poking at the thin fabric of her shirt and reaches out for the doorknob. She pulls the door open.

The woman standing on her front porch when she opens the door is the most beautiful one Azzi thinks she’s ever seen. Her stomach drops to her ass. She’s smiling a little at Azzi, teeth not bared but lips still curved endearingly. Her hair is blonde and pulled together at the nape of her neck. Baby hairs hang away from the bun and frame her face effortlessly. She’s tall, even taller than Azzi, and has a lean frame that Azzi thinks she can sense muscle poking through. And her eyes. They’re bright and blue and they shine in the sun despite the covering hanging over the porch. She’s beautiful. Azzi swallows to force herself to not let her jaw drop.

It’s quiet for a moment between them. “Hi,” the woman tries, and Azzi feels her entire face go warm. She’s standing in front of her and she looks homeless in her ratty t-shirt and pajama shorts she doesn’t think show from under her top. Her hair is a mess and she’s in glasses and no makeup. And she’s here, arms crossed over her chest, staring at the prettiest girl she’s ever met. “I have a package for Azzi Fudd? It needs a signature.”

“Oh, yeah, that’s…me,” she says. Her mouth feels dry. She looks down to the woman’s hands and notices she is, in fact, holding a package. And a clipboard with a pen tied to it. She offers the latter out towards Azzi, who immediately forgets the reason her arms are crossed and reaches to grab the pen. Her face heats even farther. She scrambles trying to pick the pen up off of the clipboard, clicking it so the point of it is out.

The woman stands there in silence. Azzi prays her nipples aren’t too out. She signs her name on the line and then sets the pen back down on the clipboard, looking back up at her. The girl is already looking at her. Blue meets brown, ocean waves crashing against wet rocks. Azzi’s mouth wavers a little with the beginning of a smile. Her heart is pounding. “Alright, thanks.” She holds the package out. Azzi doesn’t even remember ordering anything. It’s decorated with Amazon logos. She takes it from her. Their fingers brush. Heat trickles down Azzi’s spine.

The woman smiles at her one more time, under eyes pressing into the softness of her bright irises, and then takes a step backwards off of the porch. “Have a good day, ma’am,” she says, nodding her head at Azzi. It’s somehow incredibly attractive. The bottoms of her quads peek out from under her little delivery uniform shorts and they flex as she steps down.

Azzi’s mouth is still so dry. She steps back farther into her house, trying to offer the woman something like a smile. “Yeah, you too,” she says, and then the woman is turning around, leaving Azzi with only the sight of her messy bun at the nape of her neck and the shape of her back as she walks back down her driveway and to her delivery truck. Azzi watches her for a few moments longer before she realizes how fucking insane she looks and steps fully inside the house again. She shuts the door.

Her heart is racing. She doesn’t think she’s ever been that flustered by a stranger before in her life, let alone at her own goddamn house. Azzi clutches the package to her chest and turns around herself, eyes wide. Caroline is still laying obliviously on the couch. “Carol,” she says carefully. Caroline hums from the living room. The Fortnite ambience is back. “The Ring doorbell is set up to record all the time, right?”

Caroline pauses for a moment. Azzi doesn’t move from in front of the door. “Yeah. Why? You just get, like, attacked?” Azzi glances down at the box she’s holding. She doesn’t even know what’s in it. She doesn’t remember placing an Amazon order, let alone one that would require a signature. She turns it over in her hands while she mulls over a response to Caroline’s question.

“Basically,” is what she eventually lands on. Caroline perks a little at this, turning away from her game just long enough to furrow her brows and look at Azzi. She looks only a little concerned. Azzi shrugs at her. “I just met the hottest woman I have ever seen. The delivery person. Genuinely the baddest woman I’ve ever met.” She looks back down at her package. At her fingers, which aforementioned baddest woman had grazed while handing off the package.

Caroline sighs quietly. “Azzi, if you’re tryna jerk off to Ring doorbell footage, this is a new low, even for you.”

Azzi looks up at Caroline again, brows furrowing, mouth parting in shock. “No, I- What the fuck does that even mean? Even for me? I was just gonna show you her. What the hell is your damage?” Caroline just laughs back. Azzi flips her off and pads back to the kitchen where she will abandon the document she had been downloading in favor of opening up her package with a steak knife, replaying her interaction with the delivery driver in her head the entire time.

—

Google Search History [[email protected]] 06/13/26

Searched for amazon

9:50 AM • Details

Searched for amazon.com

9:51 AM • Details

Searched for what amazon packages require signatures every time

9:51 AM • Details

Searched for do the same amazon workers deliver to ur house every time

9:51 AM • Details

—

Amazon: Your package is out for delivery. Estimated date of arrival is Sunday, June 14th.

Amazon: Your package is arriving today between 1 - 4 PM. Signature required.

—

It’s a new day. A new day, a new Amazon package, and potentially a new driver. Azzi is hoping the final part of that won’t actually come to fruition. Before this, it had been the same one every time she had caught a glimpse of him walking back to his truck after leaving the package at their door: an older man, hair balding and usually covered by a hat, his walk a little funny sometimes. He probably quit or something and this new woman is his replacement. This hopefully means that, as his replacement, she will be the one to drive around their neighborhood every day. If she’s even working today.

Azzi’s wearing makeup. It’s Sunday, so she’s just gotten back from a yoga class with Caroline and a few of their mutual friends. She has nothing else to do the rest of the day and she still had put on makeup after her shower. Caroline is sitting cross legged on the floor in the living room, typing away on some assignment she keeps complaining about. Azzi is sitting sideways in the armchair and reading. It’s just past two. Her entire body is buzzing with a nervous excitement she thinks she should probably be ashamed of.

“I swear to God, Azzi, if you keep kicking your legs that fast outta the corner of my fucking eye, I’m making you an amputee,” Caroline grumbles from where she sits. Azzi can only look up from her book and offer her best friend a sympathetic glance. She doesn’t really feel that bad. She’s just nervous. She’s excited. She hasn’t actually understood a word from her book since about five pages ago. She’s going to be annoyed with herself when she has to flip back until the last time she was genuinely reading later. “Is this seriously over the Amazon delivery lady?”

“Yes, bro,” Azzi all but whines. She tips her head back, curls hanging down over the arm of the chair. Caroline huffs. Azzi shuts her eyes, nearly wincing up at the ceiling. “What if it’s not even her? What if the usual guy was just sick and so he’s back today and I’ll literally never see her again?” She drops her book in her lap and raises both hands up to cover her face. She’s careful not to make too much direct contact with her skin so as to not disturb her makeup.

Caroline scoffs from where she sits on the floor. Her keyboard clacks as she starts typing something. Azzi stays laying dramatically draped across the armchair. Her feet twitch with the urge to start kicking them. “I hope that’s what happens, ‘cause I don’t think I can take more of this.”

Azzi removes her hands from her face and turns to look at Caroline, scowling. Caroline doesn’t even look up to meet her eye. Azzi only furrows her brows further. “Can you be supportive for once in your life?” And right as she’s saying it, the sound she’s been waiting for all afternoon comes. The chime of the doorbell. She straightens up where she’s sitting like a dog being called.

Caroline sighs. “Go get your girl,” she mutters. Azzi is scrambling to get out of the chair before Caroline can even finish her sentence. She’s grinning a little to herself as she does so, bare feet padding against the carpet of the living room and then the wood of the floor to the entrance of the house. She can see an arm through the little side window again. If she was feeling any more delusional, she’d say it looks familiar.

She stops in front of the door. Takes a deep breath, smoothes the palms of her hands over the tank top she has on. It hugs her nicely. Her boobs are sitting a way she likes much more than the way they had the first time she had met the hot delivery woman. She tucks her curls behind the shells of her ears and reaches out to open the door. Her heart is quick in her chest. It’s such a stupid school girl crush.

It’s her again. Her hair is down today, blonde and straight and long around her shoulders. She’s wearing the same soft smile, the same frame peeking out from under her delivery uniform, the same blue eyes that catch on sunlight Azzi didn’t think could reach them from here. Her smile splits open a little when Azzi opens the door. Her teeth are slightly revealed through the pink flesh of her lips. “Hi again,” she says.

She remembered Azzi. Azzi’s own grin widens a little more. She moves to tuck her hair behind her ear even though it’s already there. “Hi,” she says. And for a moment, they just smile at each other a little, and Azzi can feel every part of her body warming and tensing at the same time. It’s all conflicting. She feels like she’s malfunctioning. The woman holds out the clipboard again. “Sign again?” Azzi asks it even though it’s a dumb question. She’s reaching for the pen anyway.

The girl nods once at her. “Yeah,” she says, flipping some of her hair over her shoulder. Azzi signs on the same line she had signed on a different paper yesterday and then sets the pen down again, looking up at her. She’s smiling at her. Her blue eyes feel like they’re swallowing her whole. She holds out the package silently and Azzi just takes it. Their hands don’t brush this time. Azzi tries to swallow her disappointment, instead looking warmly ahead at her. “Thanks. Have a good day,” the woman says, and then she’s stepping back off of the porch, cheeks warm with the summer sun, a kind smile warping her features.

Azzi really doesn’t want her to go. She leans into her door a little and waves at her. The action is small and it feels so stupid to do, but she’s so flustered she doesn’t even care. “Yeah, you too,” she says. The girl smiles at her one last time before turning around again. Her delivery truck is grumbling next to the sidewalk, sleek and black. Its door yawns open to take the woman from her. Azzi sighs and shuts the door.

“That was the least romantic interaction I’ve ever seen,” Caroline says from behind her. Azzi whips around, clutching the package to her chest. Her best friend is standing right there. She looks slightly amused, brows raised a little, mouth fighting a smirk. She’s holding a banana. There’s very clearly some of it still in her mouth. “You could’ve at least flirted or something, Az,” she says. She shrugs after it like that would make it better.

Azzi immediately scowls at her. “Shut the hell up,” she says, brushing past her. She hits her on the shoulder as she does so. Caroline stumbles a little but says nothing, instead laughing quietly. Azzi walks to the kitchen to start opening the package the woman had just given her. Her heart is still racing a little. “She’s prolly turned off by how disgusting I looked yesterday.” She sighs.

Caroline walks into the kitchen after her. She leans up against the counter and takes another bite of her banana, chewing as Azzi opens the cutlery drawer. Azzi is so flustered. Obviously she is. That’s just the effect that beautiful woman has on her, even when she’s long gone in her stupid Amazon truck. “You’ve bagged girls who’ve seen you worse. Remember when that girl still hooked up with you after you threw up at the pre? And the pre was at her apartment?”

Azzi winces at the memory. She pulls a steak knife out of the drawer and looks up at Caroline, grimacing a little at her. Caroline pulls a similar expression back and swallows her bite of banana. “That was a hard time in my life. I don’t…that doesn’t count.” Azzi shakes her head as she speaks as if to ratify the decision.

Caroline frowns at her. Her brows furrow. “That was four months ago, Azzi.” She doesn’t even laugh as she says it, which just draws even more regret up within Azzi, who now is juggling both present and past embarrassment. She raises her hands to her face and presses the heels of her palms into her eye sockets. Doesn’t even care if her mascara gets messed up, because the hot delivery woman was the only one she needed to see it, anyway.

“Get away from me, oh my God,” she moans with her hands pressed over her eyes. She can hear Caroline laugh at her before walking away, steps muffling when she gets to the carpet of the living room again.

—

Amazon: Your package is out for delivery. Estimated date of arrival is Monday, June 15th.

Amazon: Your package is arriving today between 11 AM - 4 PM. Signature required.

—

Azzi works from home most of the time. They rarely need her in-office. She’s home today, brows furrowed in focus as she types away at a report, leg drawn up as she sits at the kitchen table. Caroline is air frying something. Azzi can smell the burn of it wafting through the kitchen. Caroline apparently cannot, because she has yet to turn off the appliance.

It’s seven minutes until half-past four. No one has rang their doorbell today. Azzi is trying really hard to not care. She chews on the inside of her cheek, the skin there soft and a little metallic-tasting as she does so. Her molars twist it around until small chunks are bitten off. She’s looking up from her document to check the time every few seconds. She’s surprised Caroline hasn’t caught on yet and started making fun of her.

Silence is even between the roommates. The clicking of Azzi’s keyboard and the humming of the old air fryer fills it comfortably. Azzi squints at her laptop. Then she squints at the time displayed on their oven. Then she squints back at the report she’s trying to finish. It’s really hard to work when all she can think about is a beautiful woman she’s had exactly two interactions with. Especially when the third was scheduled to have happened at the latest twenty-three - Azzi looks up at the oven clock again as the green numbers change - now twenty-four minutes ago.

The doorbell rings. Azzi straightens immediately. Caroline looks over at her, face blank. And then it curls into something else. Something knowing and amused, brows raising slightly, mouth smoothing into a smirk. “I’m guessing you wanna get that?” Azzi doesn’t even care to answer the teasing question. She just stands up from where she sits at the kitchen counter, a small and somewhat nervous smile pulling across her face, heart starting to quicken in her chest.

She starts walking towards the entrance to their house. She can hear Caroline laughing a little at her. She elects to not react to this, either, instead running the palms of her hands over her ribs to both smooth the fabric of her top and soothe herself. It’s a cropped athletic t-shirt, her naval piercing shining over the waist of her shorts. It’s soft and she runs the hem of it between her fingers a few times before reaching out to open the door.

It’s her again. Just as Azzi wanted. Her heart picks up again in her ribcage. She smiles at her and the woman smiles back, a real one that her teeth shine through. Her lips stretch over the whiteness of the bones. It’s a pretty smile, eyes pressing softly from almonds to fat crescents. The clean blueness of her irises still reaches Azzi through the slightly thinned shape. “Hi again,” she says.

Azzi feels a little fuzzy. She tucks her hair behind one of her ears, nails dragging along her skin as she does so. “Hi again,” she agrees. She’s still smiling like an idiot, the apples of her cheeks warm. The woman’s hair is slicked back into a ponytail that hangs behind her. She raises a hand and smoothes the palm of it over the side of her head as if to slick the ponytail again. It’s a cute little tic.

“Sorry I’m a little late,” she says. She uses her free hand to grab the package where she had tucked it between her side and her elbow and then extends her now free arm to hold the clipboard out to Azzi. Azzi picks up the pen without hesitation. The line for her to sign her name is familiar now. She tears her eyes away from the hot delivery woman and looks for it.

“It’s totally fine. You’ve been so good the other times, you get a pass.” You’ve been so good? What the fuck is Azzi even saying at this point? The pen scribbles as she draws her signature onto the paper. Her face feels warm. Her heart skips a little as she becomes a little embarrassed, biting the inside of her cheek, still smiling a little.

The woman holding the clipboard just laughs quietly. Azzi finishes signing and sets the pen back on the clipboard. “Glad you won’t hold it against me.” She looks up at her and the girl is grinning at her. It’s a little wider than the ones before it have been, a little more open, like it’s more real. It makes Azzi go soft, body like putty as she smiles back at her. The woman holds out the package. “I like your necklace,” she says. It’s a little quiet.

Azzi reaches one hand out to accept the package and another to her throat, fingers pressing themselves against the bone below it. The pendant of her necklace presses into her skin. The necklace she’s wearing had been a gift from her mother, a dainty silver chain with a small pink stone sitting on it. Not really anything special. She grins at the woman anyway, skin flushing. “Oh, thank you.” She takes the package. Their fingers brush again. Azzi thinks she’s been lit on fire from the inside out and will be reduced to a pile of melted wax and jumping sparks pretty soon. “Have a good day,” she says as the woman steps backwards off of her porch.

She offers her one last smile. “You too, ma’am.” She turns around, blonde ponytail swinging behind her with each step, her lean yet muscular legs taking her down Azzi’s driveway. She watches her for a few moments longer than necessary before stepping back and shutting the door. The click of its close feels not at all as final as it should to Azzi. It just feels like the promise of another delivery tomorrow, an echoing of the same interaction and the same two girls and the same two pairs of eyes shining.

“At least she complimented you this time,” Caroline calls from the kitchen. Azzi walks back into it from the foyer, holding her package, grinning. Her best friend is still standing in front of the air fryer like she had before. “I still think you’re, like, really delusional, but at least something happened.” Azzi doesn’t even bicker with her. She just beams at her, setting the package on the counter, ignoring the way Caroline snorts a little at her.

—

Amazon: Your package is out for delivery. Estimated date of arrival is Tuesday, June 16th.

Amazon: Your package is arriving today between 5 - 8 PM. Signature required.

—

Tuesday night, Azzi is sitting around after eating dinner with Caroline when the doorbell rings. It’s a little before seven. The sun has just barely begun setting, sky deepening from a baby blue to a slightly colder color. The star is orange on the horizon. Azzi feels almost as bloated as it, laying spread out on the couch next to her roommate as the television plays something for them she hasn’t really been paying attention to. She starts paying attention, though, when the familiar chime of the doorbell sounds through the house.

Caroline sighs next to her. She says lazily slumped on the couch next to where Azzi is sitting. Azzi straightens up and turns to look at her. Caroline is still facing forward to watch the show. The colors of the screen try to lick at her skin but the sunlight lifting the entire house blocks them from doing anything other than dancing out of the corner of Azzi’s eye. “Y’know, ‘m kinda worried about your bank account. I dunno how you’re affording Amazoning packages literally every day.”

Azzi scoffs as she stands up, her t-shirt draping softly over her frame. Her hair is pulled up in a bun. A nice one, a slick back she had put effort into. Not similar to the one she’d been wearing when she had first opened the door to the hot delivery woman with. “I have big girl money from my big girl job. It’s fine.” She tosses this reply over her shoulder as she walks towards the door, body going warm with giddiness again. Caroline snorts a little at it. She doesn’t care.

Azzi walks to the foyer and tries to fight her smile when she sees a familiar arm with a familiar delivery uniform in the window. Her heart is quick in her chest. A smile is pulling across her face before she’s even opened the door. She steps forward and grabs the doorknob and opens it, letting the door swing open as she stands in the gap it’s created.

It’s her. Her hair is in a messy bun again, an irregular shape Azzi can see peeking out from behind the base of her neck. She’s smiling as Azzi opens the door. Again, her teeth are bared, making it larger than the first few Azzi had seen. Her eyes are sparkling. She blinks and her lashes drag up and down, sweet smudges against the brightness of her irises. Azzi’s face feels warm. Her chest does, too. “Hi again,” the woman greets.

Azzi feels herself smile stupidly, lips splitting to reveal her teeth, cheeks crushing with her dimples. “Hi again,” she repeats. And for a moment, they just stand there, looking at each other. Azzi can’t tell if they spend longer than they should there. She can’t accurately interpret the pause, is unable to focus long enough on anything that isn’t the woman in front of her to try and pick apart the interaction. She just smiles at her. And she’s smiled at back.

She holds the clipboard out after a moment. Azzi knows the drill by now. She looks down at it to grab the pen, looks towards the woman’s hand to trace the outline of it, lets her eyes roam the way veins rise off of the backs of her hands like little mountain ranges Azzi can pick up even from where she stands. “‘m here a lot, I feel like. You need a lot of stuff from Amazon?” The pen clicks.

Azzi’s face twists as she fights a smile. She pauses, pen in hand, form unsigned. Looks back up at the woman instead of the clipboard. Is met with a soft smile and shining eyes. Her heart picks up again in her chest, ribcage rendered useless as she feels herself melt all over her porch with a softness she doesn’t think is normal to feel towards someone who is basically a stranger. “Something like that,” she lands on, still grinning a little. She moves the pen down to the line. Her mouth opens without thinking. “Hey, you know my full name and address, but I don’t know yours. What’s your name?”

For a split second, she’s worried she’s being too forward, the scrawling of the ballpoint hitching with her breath as she waits. But the woman laughs easily. “I’m Paige,” she says. Azzi breathes again. The pen continues moving. Paige continues speaking. “I’d give you my address, but I dunno what you’d really do with it other than stalk me.”

Azzi finishes the last loop of her signature and glances up from the form. Paige is already looking at her face, eyes sparkling a little. She’s grinning. Her cheeks look a little pink. Azzi can’t tell if it’s the sunset playing tricks on her or not. “Not into that?” It’s teasing. Azzi sets the pen back down on the clipboard.

Paige just looks at her for a second. Her smile is still stretched across her face. Her gums barely hide under the spread of her lips and Azzi thinks it’s adorable. And then Paige looks down, pupils dragging over the length of her body like something physical. Azzi feels a spark run down her spine like an electrical shock. Paige looks back up. “I could be,” she muses.

Azzi squints at her a little bit. Her heartbeat is quick in her chest. Paige was definitely just checking her out. Paige is flirting with her. The hot delivery woman is flirting with her. Azzi’s entire face feels like it’s going to peel away from her skull with how hard she’s fighting the biggest smile she thinks she’s ever worn. “Well, if you’re not gonna give me your address, I could think of a different string of numbers you could give me to even it out,” she says, batting her lashes once. It’s a little joking.

It works either way. Paige laughs a little again, looking down at her feet. Her cheeks definitely look a little flushed. Azzi feels giddy. Paige looks back up at her again and she’s smiling the biggest Azzi’s seen so far. It’s adorable, eyes squinted into thin crescents, gummy smile softening all of her so sharply carved features. “You’re smooth, miss Azzi Fudd.” Azzi laughs a little at this. She feels like she’s shining.

Paige holds her hand out almost expectantly. Azzi stares at it blankly for a moment before scrambling to pull her phone out of the pocket of her shorts, fingers quick as she digs into the fabric and then unlocks her phone. She opens her contacts and holds it out to Paige almost shyly. Paige takes it silently, grinning, and begins to type with one hand. Azzi watches her in silence. Her heart is beating so quickly she can almost feel it in her throat.

The blonde girl hands back her phone after a few moments of awkward, one-handed typing. She hands the package off with it. Their hands touch again and it feels very much purposeful on both of their ends. It just makes Azzi grin at her like an idiot, body buzzing with an excitement she doesn’t know how to cut through. “See you soon, I’m assuming?” Paige laughs a little with it.

Azzi laughs, too. The sounds tangle in the soft air between them, the summer warming it and the sunset letting it bleed sweetly between them like wine on a tablecloth. “Yup,” she says simply, and Paige laughs again. Azzi clutches the package to her chest. Her face hurts from smiling and blushing so much. Paige steps down off of the front porch. Once again, Azzi’s eyes are drawn to the way her quads flex a little under her shorts. “Have a good day, Paige,” she says.

Paige smiles at her. Her eyes get squinty again. Azzi feels her entire being soften, a response she didn’t even know she could have. “You too, Azzi,” she says, and then she’s turning around again, her little truck waiting for her against the curb. Azzi is so obsessed with her it feels like she has heartburn to watch her walk away.

Azzi shuts the door before she’s even stepped onto the driveway. Shock, dumb and a little cold, splashes down her. It follows the same path along her spine as the sparks that had caught along the knobs of her vertebrae earlier. “Carol,” Azzi all but yells, feet cemented into the floor. Her roommate says nothing. “Caroline, I got her number,” she says at the same volume.

Silence for a moment. Azzi smiles dumbly into the house, phone and package held tightly. And then bright laughter. It’s from Caroline. Surprisingly, it’s not mocking. It rings along the house, echoing off of the walls and the windows that let in the sun’s fading light. “Wait, seriously?” She sounds just as shocked as Azzi feels, a slight happiness for her bleeding into the sound of it. Azzi laughs.

—

Unknown Number: VERY bold to put the winky face

Unknown Number: didn’t think u had the dexterity to do that one handed

paige bueckers 😉: hey i am very dexterous

paige bueckers 😉: i dont play about my thumb flexibility.

azzi: is that something they train amazon workers for

paige bueckers 😉: yup and i bet u dont even have good thumb flexibility bc u dont work for amazon so

paige bueckers 😉: actually what do u do for work?

azzi: um rude i am also very dexterous

azzi: i’m an operations manager for one of the bigger tech companies in dallas so it’s js a lot of boring business reports abt products and shipping

azzi: but i actually am ambidextrous

paige bueckers 😉: wait wtf thats so cool ive never met one in real life

azzi: one??? what am i a zoo animal

paige bueckers 😉: LMFAO NOT LIKE THAT

paige bueckers 😉: j like idk isnt that rare

azzi: prob idk

azzi: mine isn’t natural my dad pretty much forced it

paige bueckers 😉: u can force being ambidextrous???

paige bueckers 😉: was it like a punishment or smth im scared

azzi: LMAO

azzi: no i grew up in a big basketball family and when i was rlly little he used to like seran wrap my right hand to my body so i would dribble w only my left hand

azzi: but i never liked basketball so i js would start doing other things like that and then i became ambidextrous

paige bueckers 😉: that is the weirdest thing ive ever heard

paige bueckers 😉: u r one interesting person

azzi: i’m gonna take that as a compliment

paige bueckers 😉: u should

paige bueckers 😉: 😉

paige bueckers 😉: u couldnt see it but i typed that with one thumb btw

azzi: wow ur kinda a dork

—

Amazon: Your package is out for delivery. Estimated date of arrival is Wednesday, June 17th.

Amazon: Your package is arriving today between 12 - 5 PM. Signature required.

—-

The doorbell rings right before four in the afternoon. Azzi knows this because she barely has time to hang her work bag up in the laundry room and fill up her water bottle again before it’s ringing, the sound chiming through the house. Azzi thinks she knows who it is. She smiles a little to herself and pads towards the front door, heart rate picking up the way it always does when she knows she’s about to see Paige. She’s still in her work clothes, navy skirt wrapped around her thighs and white blouse smoothed over her chest. Her flats are in the way of the door where she had kicked them off. She kicks them away carelessly and opens the door.

It’s Paige. Of course it is. Her hair is down again and it’s in effortless waves that tumble down her shoulders. The sandy color of the waves and the bright blue of her eyes are beachy and sweet. She smiles at Azzi. “Hi again,” she says. It’s endearing. Azzi grins back wider.

They had stayed up texting late the night before. Azzi had sent the first message barely an hour after Paige had put her number into her contacts. It had taken an extreme amount of restraint to not text her immediately after. But Paige had responded not even twenty minutes after that and then their conversation had brought them nearly to midnight, with Azzi being the one to say goodbye first and citing her need to work in person the next morning as her reasoning. They’ve been texting periodically all of today as well.

“Hi again, Paige,” she says back. Paige brightens a little at the sound of her name. Azzi notices that she’s holding the package and clipboard, but they’re both tucked between her arm and her side. She’s not ready to give them to Azzi yet. She’s not cutting their interaction short. Azzi feels the familiar buzz of being flustered in front of her start to hum through her body. She doesn’t want to cut it short, either. She’d let Paige keep that stupid form and stupid package from her forever if it meant getting to talk to her for that long.

Paige reaches up and tucks some of her hair behind her ear. Her skin looks like it’s glowing in the sunlight, the high points of her carved features shining at Azzi. “How’s your day been?” She rocks back a little on her feet as she asks it. Her cheeks look slightly pink. Azzi can’t tell if it’s her mind playing tricks on herself or if Paige is really blushing at her.

In Azzi’s opinion, the question is a little unnecessary. Paige knows how her day has been. They’ve been texting throughout it. But she thinks it’s really cute that she’s asking, and so Azzi smiles at her wider and then shrugs a little. “Good. Really didn’t want to go into the office today, but good. How’s yours?”

Paige shrugs as well. The clipboard starts slipping a little with the action and Paige has to reach out her free hand to grab at it. “Pretty good now,” she says. It’s almost quiet, said as she’s looking away from Azzi. It still makes her blush a little harder, the apples of her cheeks thinning the shape of her eyes. Paige holds the clipboard out now that she’s already grabbed it and doesn’t have an excuse to put it off for longer. Azzi reaches for the pen. “Sign it with your left hand.”

Azzi pauses. Something within her sparks a little harder. She looks up from the clipboard and to Paige, right hand hovering near the pen. Paige is looking at her with eyes that look like they’re shining jewels. She’s grinning stupidly, both girls frozen. “You need proof?”

Paige laughs a little. “Yes! I can’t be talking to a liar, Azzi.” Azzi exhales a soft laugh and shakes her head. At Paige’s command, though, she lowers her right hand and picks the pen up with her left. She feels warm at the way Paige so easily brings up their other conversations, the way she’s real and concrete and beautiful in the seconds Azzi gets when she hands off her packages and then funny and charming for hours over text and Azzi gets to know that those are two parts of the same person.

The pen scribbles along the paper. She doesn’t really use her left hand anymore, and so even though she’s technically ambidextrous, she can feel herself wobbling a little and smudging it as she goes. She lifts the pen from the paper and sees the lines of her signature faded as ink runs off to the side. “I ruined it,” she complains, setting the pen back down.

She holds up her hand and looks at the bottom of it. Black ink is smeared across the skin there, gray on caramel bleeding to peach. She looks up at Paige and frowns a little, angling her hand towards her. Paige only glances at her hand for a moment before she’s just looking at her face. “It’s fine,” she says softly. A little smile is playing at her face. Her cheeks look a little flushed.

The clipboard is tucked back into Paige’s side. Before she can produce the package for Azzi, the brunette starts speaking, tongue running wild while her heart is quick in her ribs and her entire body feels like it’s humming. “Do you work every day? You’ve been the one to deliver every single package I’ve ordered.”

Paige looks back up at her. She squints at her a little, nose scrunching on top of her smile. It relaxes away again after a moment. “No. You lookin’ for other delivery drivers?”

“No,” Azzi says. Her response is almost knee-jerk. She thinks it was slow enough to play off as not outright weird, but not enough for it to have been truly casual. Her stomach flips a little.

Paige laughs. The sound is a chime blowing through a gust of wind, a soft and tinkling sound Azzi really likes. Her smile goes gummier. “They put me on schedule five days in a row. I think ‘m off tomorrow and the day after that. But my schedule changes by the week, so it’ll prolly be different after that.” She shrugs again. Reaches back towards her side to grab Azzi’s package.

Azzi leans up against the doorway a little. She can feel the neckline of her blouse moving a little, shifting with her shoulder to reveal a little more cleavage. She doesn’t care to adjust it. Maybe Paige will look and like what’s there. Maybe Paige will also then look a little higher, from her chest to her throat, and see that Azzi hasn’t taken off the necklace she had complimented in days. “Guess I won’t be ordering anything that’ll come before three days from now, then.” She shrugs a little.

Paige laughs. “Damn. Won’t cheat on her Amazon driver. Dream girl.” This comment makes Azzi almost dizzy with that familiar buzz of being flustered. Her smile deepens and her face flushes a little. Her heart trips over itself.

“Not a liar or a cheater. Package deal. You’d like that.” She points at the package Paige is still holding. Paige laughs at this, face folding into another gummy smile. Azzi just listens to her for a moment and then swallows, words suddenly pressing themselves out of her. They feel like they’re crawling out of her mouth. She doesn’t have enough time to think about stopping them. “Wait, but now that you’ve brought that up…I don’t work Friday, either. Would you…like, I dunno. Would you maybe wanna…go get drinks or something? Or dinner?”

Her breath stills in her lungs. If she’s being honest, she was not expecting herself to be so forward. Or so quick. Her entire face heats. She clamps the inside of her cheek between her molars. Her body feels frozen as she waits for Paige to respond. But the blonde girl immediately smiles again. It’s different from all the other ones. Lopsided, sweet and large and almost disbelieving. The silence that hangs itself between them feels like the longest silence Azzi has ever endured in her life. “Yeah,” she says almost softly. Azzi exhales. “Yeah, I’d really like to get dinner with you. On Friday.”

Azzi feels like she’s fully slumping into the doorframe with how hard she’s leaning into it. She’s grinning like an idiot, every inch of her skin warmed, every square inch of volume in her mind infatuated with the woman in front of her. “I would, too,” she says. Paige’s smile just turns even more lopsided. It’s the most endearing expression Azzi thinks she’s ever had the pleasure of seeing on someone else’s face.

Paige tucks her hair behind her ear. Azzi does, too. The same nervous tic mirrored. Azzi thinks it’s cute. “So it’s a date.” Paige nods once as she says it.

Azzi likes the sound of the word. “It’s a date,” she agrees, and Paige just seems to soften even more in front of her. They’re both made of butter, soft and sweet and melting under the attention of the other. Paige takes a singular step back to get away from the porch. There’s a color that has risen to her cheeks that hammers the final nail into the coffin: Azzi definitely has Paige blushing. Azzi feels giddy with the knowledge. “I’ll see you then, Paige.”

Paige nods once again. Her waves drag up and down her shoulders with the action. She steps back and the late afternoon light starts to swallow her again, her entire being bright against the slowly dimming sky. “See you Friday, Azzi,” she says, voice warm and lifted with a happiness Azzi can almost taste between them. She watches Paige walk until she’s on the driveway and then softly shuts the front door. And then she jumps up and down and screams.

—

azzi: never gave me my package btw

paige bueckers 😉: SHIT LMFAO

paige bueckers 😉: WHY DIDNT U SAY ANYTHING

azzi: I JS DID

azzi: HOW DID U NOT NOTICE

paige bueckers 😉: can u even blame me for being distracted by u

paige bueckers 😉: turning around now

azzi: no like its fine ive lowk js been ordering a bunch of bullshit this whole time

azzi: like whatever was cheapest and said it would show up the next day

paige bueckers 😉: okay well first of all this is my job so its like. i kinda have to give it to u even if u dont need it

paige bueckers 😉: second of all what is ur problem

azzi: god forbid a girl think her amazon delivery driver is hot

paige bueckers 😉: okay well good news u dont have to keep ordering random stuff to see me

paige bueckers 😉: is that deadass the only reason u were ordering sm stuff

azzi: maybe…

azzi: maybe i js rlly needed multiple packages of plastic straws and a box of sunglasses 🙂

paige bueckers 😉: wait aw

paige bueckers 😉: ur so cute

azzi: ur not allowed to flirt and drive omfg bring me my plastic straws