A memory surfaces: my mom showing up before winter break.
“You’re making a habit out of letting people pop into my life without telling me,” I accuse him. “I’m not sure I like it. Are you conspiring with anyone else to leap out at me? My grandmother? An elementary school nemesis?”
Orok huffs, but it sounds like he’s wincing. “No. I’m not conspiring with anyone else. I wasn’tconspiringwith—no, I’m sorry. I should’ve told you I talked to him.”
“Or you should’venottalked to him.”
“So he isn’t who you texted me you were taking home? And that wasn’t him creeping out of our apartment last night as I was getting in?”
My neck heats. That heat climbs, hits my cheeks, my ears. “The outcome of your meddling cannot be used to counteract the treachery of the meddling itself.”
“Thank you, Orok,” he badly mimics my voice. “I got laid because of you, Orok. You’re the best wingman ever, Orok.”
I usually push back. I usually keep the banter going.
But my mouth dries.
Orok allows that silence for a beat. “You’re trying to make it something complex when it’s not.He is not his family. You can like him. You’re allowed to like him.”
“I don’t like him,” I say. “What we’ve done is just physical. That’s where it stops.”
That’s where ithasto stop.
If I think beyond that, it all falls apart.
Like how we’re lab partners, and no matter what happens, we’re committed to working together for the next several months, and wecan barely do that when only animosity is involved; but adding in other feelings?Ohhhhboy, actual murder, violence, implosions.
Or how heispart of his family regardless of what Orok says, but… it’s honestly easy to forget that. Too easy. And that’s a betrayal of myself, isn’t it? Forgetting who he is, what his family’s done. I can’t let that go. Ican’tforget.
This is too messy. I’ll call it off. I’ll walk up to Elethior at the lab, give him a firm handshake, and say,Good game, buddy, but we can’t take to the field anymore.
My brain comes up with a very sophisticated counterproposal, which is Elethior’s growlyCan I suck you off?
Great. Now I’ve got a boner on the bus.
Orok brings me back to the topic at hand when he asks, “You both agreed that it’s just physical?”
I shrug though he can’t see me. “Yes.”
Well,Ilaid that boundary, and he didn’t push back. Is that what he wants?
“And you’ll be okay with that?”
“Why wouldn’t I be?” I frown at the passing city streets. “You told me to trust myself. Elethior and I laid boundaries. We know where we stand. It’s—”
“Seb. I just asked if you’ll be okay with it only being physical.”
My brain stutters. “I—why wouldn’t I be? We’re going in circles.”
Something squeaks on Orok’s end and I can imagine him lying back on his bed. “I’m not sure you’re ready to hear what I think yet.”
My heart launches up into my throat, panic frying my nerve endings. “I told you, I have this handled. I’m thinking clearly, I’m in control. I promise.”
“That’s not what I meant. I meant I don’t think you’llhearwhat I have to say, and that’s fine. I know you’re doing better. This lab partnership thing with him has been messed up, but you’ve handled all of it. I think you’re only freaking out because you’re not freaking out. But what I will say”—his exhale scratches across the phone—“is that you should be gentle with yourself. Don’t compartmentalizethis so much that you get lost in the boxes you’ve locked yourself in. Trust that you can handle more. That you can handlereal.”
“You and your armchair psychology. Or bed psychology, as it were.”
“Have you meditated today?”
