The Hating Game

Lucy and Danny go on their date. There’s no spark when he kisses her goodnight. It’s clear to them both they should be friends. Lucy drives to Joshua’s apartment building. She doesn’t know which apartment is his; she walks around, unsure what she’s doing. Meanwhile, Joshua texts her, asking for an update and her whereabouts. She doesn’t want to reply. She runs into him on the sidewalk, and he gets her to admit: “’No one can kiss me like you do’” (163). They kiss. He invites her to his apartment, but Lucy refuses. She knows “Or Something” will happen. It terrifies her, and she tries to run.

Joshua stops her and brings her up to his apartment. He tells her it’s only so she can see his place, so they can be even regarding what they know about each other. Lucy tells the reader: “The Joshua I know is no longer enough. Knowledge is power, and I can’t get enough at this point” (167). His apartment is cozy, homey, and extremely clean and neat. He has medical texts from attending one year in medical school. His bedroom is painted a surprising pale, pretty blue. She pockets a matchbox car.

He has her sit next to him to watch the show ER. He tells her he watches it to spite his physician father because the episodes are so medically inaccurate. He holds her hand. She wants him badly, but he won’t even kiss her again. He explains that if they’ll only have sex once, he wants to wait because the anticipation makes it better, that he wants to have sex over the course of days. More importantly, he doesn’t want to be used for sex and be left for a “nice” guy. When he was a child, he says, he used to save his Easter egg for months, while his brother Patrick ate his immediately. It drove Patrick crazy that the Easter egg sat there, uneaten, until Joshua decided he was ready.

Joshua walks her to her car, and she realizes she still has the matchbox car in her hand. He tells her to keep it as a present. He’s taking the day off tomorrow for an appointment, and she feels deeply disappointed: “Please, I beg myself. Please hate Josh again. This is too hard” (178). She dislikes how her feelings for him make her vulnerable.

At work, with no Joshua—now “Josh”—”Lucy can’t focus. She goes to a florist and buys him white roses with a note that makes it clear she’s interested in him for more than just his body. She practices her interview presentation for Helene, and Helene expresses guilt that she hadn’t encouraged Lucy to move on from her assistant position. When Helene asks Lucy why she never tried to move up herself, Lucy says: “’I think maybe I was waiting for the timing to be right. Or I didn’t have confidence. Now I’m being forced to go with it. It's a good thing, I think” (184). There’s a parallel between becoming close with Josh and her changing career aspirations. Mr. Bexley eavesdrops and sees some of Lucy’s presentation.

At home, Lucy is restless. She gives in to her agitation and calls Josh, then hangs up. He calls her right back from the gym. She says she doesn’t have any food or tea, plus she’s bored. He invites her to his apartment, and they race to be the first one there.

Lucy and Josh meet in the elevator of his building. They go to his apartment and get to know one another more while the sexual tension between them rises. Josh says he assumes she’d run away if they had sex too soon. She says: “I want to know what’s going on in your brain. I want to juice your head like a lemon” (203). He tells her that when he had tried to become a doctor like all the other Templemans, he had vomited in front of a cadaver in medical school.

Lucy and Josh mess around, driving each other crazy with lust. Lucy tells the reader: “A miracle has occurred, and I don’t know when, but I know it now. Joshua Templeman does not hate me. Not a bit. There’s no way he could when he kisses me like this” (206). Eventually, Josh pulls away . She knows she has to leave.

Lucy tells him: “’I feel like your Easter egg’” (211), meaning he’s waiting to physically enjoy her. She throws out different reasons he must be waiting: He’s planning on having sex with her to the point of not functioning the morning of the interview so that he can beat her for the job; he wants her to be all over him at Patrick’s wedding.

The next day at work, Julie, the coworker who never hands in work on time, calls Lucy. Both Josh and Lucy know she’ll ask Lucy to excuse her, leading Lucy to stay late to do her work. Josh says: “’I want to see you be as strong with other people as you are with me’” (215). Lucy manages to be assertive. She tells Julie “no.” When Mr. Bexley comes by and, as usual, ogles Lucy’s breasts, Josh tells him: “’Don’t’.” Lucy, emboldened by her assertiveness with Julie, asks Mr. Bexley what he’s looking at. Mr. Bexley tells Josh that having seen some of Lucy’s presentation for the interview, he wants to give Josh some tips. Josh says: “‘I’m not going to need any help beating her'” (219).