The Love Hack

Arty

I'd been told by exes before that I acted like I knew everything and that I was always right. According to Ben, it wasn't so much about the words I said but about my delivery. I always thought this was silly. My words, I could control, but my delivery–the cadence of my voice, the arch of my eyebrow–was involuntary.

That was perhaps what I loved so much about code. Sure, everyone had a preference for good code; a clean algorithm that would get it done in a few logic checks and control statements. But, a hack-job of 100 roundabout lines would still get you to the same result, just with a few additional milliseconds of processing time. And the program wouldn't care how the result came to be, it just simply was.

As I walked home from my date with Leo, I found myself hoping that my exes were right. That I didn't know everything, and that sometimes I was wrong. Because if I did, in fact, know everything and I was always right, then what I knew was that I had just been on a bad date.

As I trudged up the few porch steps to the front door, I felt the weight of the evening weighing on me, making each step feel like a small battle. I let out a long sigh when I reached the landing before putting my keys into the door lock.

I tried to wrangle the door open as quietly as possible. It was a quarter to midnight. Ben had just gotten home from work shortly before I left to meet Leo, looking light he'd been dragged from the dead, and Jonah had school tomorrow.

I quietly closed the door behind me and kicked my shoes off. It was pitch black, and it took my eyes a moment to adjust before I could start making my way down the hallway to my bedroom.

I lingered a minute at the kitchen, considering whether I wanted to grab a beer and spend a few hours playing Spiritfarer. Something about playing a video game about death felt entirely fitting for this moment.

I decided against it and opted to just grab a glass of water and call it a night. The sooner this day could be over, the better.

As I turned to leave the kitchen with my cup, the sight of a figure lingering in the dark hallway nearly made me jump out of my own skin.

"Jesus," I exclaimed. The sound of my cup hitting the counter echoed as I fumbled to keep it steady.

Ben leaned casually against the wall, a playful smirk tugging at his lips. He had a mug in his hands with a tea bag string hanging over the side, steam still bellowing from the top.

"Sorry, should I have knocked first?" He chuckled slightly, the sound of his laugh warming the dark house.

"What are you doing up?" I asked, still catching my breath.

Ben shrugged, staring into his mug. "Couldn't sleep," he replied, pushing off the doorframe and stepping into the dim light of the kitchen, only illuminated by the small light over the oven. He ran a hand through his messy hair. He was wearing an oversized crewneck for a sports team I didn't recognize– and I doubted he knew them either– and had checkered pajama pants hanging low on his waist.

"Usually after a 24-hour shift you'd be out cold," I said. There was one time I'd come home to find Ben asleep, sitting upright on the couch and still fully dressed. He was so exhausted that he had only gotten one shoe untied before he passed out.

"Couldn't turn my brain off tonight, I guess," Ben replied. "So, it must have been a good date if you're just getting home." Ben pushed off the wall and put his cup down on the counter before pushing himself up onto the counter– a sign that this conversation wasn't ending anytime soon.

I practically snorted into my water glass, causing water to spill down the front of my chest, soaking through my shirt. "Good wouldn't be the first word I'd use to describe it."