“If you stayed here, I mean… if you wanted, maybe we could just renew the lease on this place. I really like this setup. And if you left, I’d still want to be with you. I mean, all my friends are online. We can call all the time, visit each other. It wouldn’t have to be a permanent arrangement, either. None of this has to be permanent. We’re just making decisions about what’s good for right now, and tomorrow will come and bring around new things, new choices to make, new things we could find together.”
“I’m not… supposed to… do any of…” I wasn’t even sure where the sentence was going. She squeezed me.
“Victoria, baby. You can do anything you want. Whatever makes you happy. If I want you, and you want me, who is anyone else to tell us we can’t?”
“You know you could do a lot better,” I said, voice wavering pitifully.
“Youdon’t even think that,” she said. “You know you’re capable of anything. You just think you’re supposed to think that.”
I snorted. She’d always thought so much higher of me than I knew what to do with. No wonder I felt this way about her.
“If you just say the word, I’ll give you everything you want,” she said. “I just want a decision. Whether you want to be with me or not. Nothing else really has to matter.”
I should have. Should have been able to just give her the word. “I’m sorry,” I said, and I saw the moment she broke, her grip tightening on me, a distant look in her eyes before she shut them.
Was I waiting for her to argue? To push back? To change it… to make me do something different?
Chapter 18
Bridget
It had sounded so simple when Sam had said it. Respecting the other person to make the choice they needed to make, respecting yourself enough to not be strung along. But it was easy forhimto say it when he was getting everything he wanted.
I guess maybe I’d asked for too much. Victoria was perfect, and I just hated all the people who had made her feel like she wasn’t. Either way, she wouldn’t give me an answer, and that had to be that.
“You did what you could,” Nikki said, and I groaned, slumping back in the chair. I wasn’t normally one to go call and chat with my friends out of the house, but with how things had gone down with me and Victoria, I was finding all kinds of reasons not to be in the apartment. Guess there was a reason people didn’t date their roommates.
And with everything being miserable and cold and ugly and gray, the best I could do was a cozy coffee shop with a big hot drink.
“It was really stupid of me,” I said. “She was basically telling me from the beginninghey, I’m emotionally unavailable, don’t catch feelings.And what do you know! Here I am, catching feelings.”
“Shame you’re in public. I know a quick masturbation session always helps with feelings.”
“Ugh. Even doing that wouldn’t help. I don’t think I’ll be able to have company for that for alongtime. This sucks. I can’t even pay attention to stuff from, like, Tessa or Gina or anyone. Do you know how bad I have to be that none of that can help?”
She sighed. “You know, I don’t think you did anything wrong. You saw what you wanted, you went for it… sometimes things don’t turn out the way you want.”
I stared down at my sugary latte drink that my stomach was going to be mad about later but that I needed right now. “She told me this would happen. I told her I’d be trying to change her mind. And I swear it’s like… the way she looked at me, it was like she was praying I would pull it off. Didn’t, though,” I sighed. “Maybe it should have been you instead. I’m not a psychologist.”
“Don’t have to be to know what’s the matter. She’d already been waiting for somebody to change her mind, to convince her it’s okay. But hey. Family trauma runs deep.”
And speaking of family, that was the magic invocation that got family involved—a movement pulled my gaze out of misery land, and I looked up at where Kevin waved, a soft and concerned smile my way. He mouthedheyand then signaled to my headphones, asking me for a second, and I stared blankly at him.
“I guess,” I said. “Sorry, one sec. I know you’d never have dreamed of the day I’d interrupt you to talk to a man, but Victoria’s brother is here.”
“Damn, I’ve seen it all.”
I slid my headphones off one ear, looking up at Kevin. “Hey,” I said. “What’s up? Tracking me down?”
“Not intentionally. Sam wanted me to pick up a drink ‘big enough to drown in with enough caffeine that I’ll regret it’ for when he got off work, so I came in here and got concerned when I saw you without Vicky.”
“Oh, yeah, that…”
“Well, I’m not trying to rub it in. She told me what happened. Just wondering if there’s anything I can do. Sam and I are your friends too now, even if Vicky’s confused.” He gestured to his ear, signaling my headphones again. “Unless you’re on a work call?”
I sighed, taking the headphones off. “No, just talking to this whore I know. I’ll put her on speaker.”
He paused. “That’s, er. That seems a bit harsh.”
