My shoulders droop as if everything I’ve needed to say has weaseled its way out of me. Finley sits unmoving across from me as Emma Jane quietly and quickly sets our sandwiches down. Though the silence is suffocating me, I manage a whispered “thank you” to Emma Jane before she departs.
Finley’s eyes roam from my bouncing leg, to my fidgeting hands, and finally, to my face. I believe he may be looking into the depths of my soul at this very moment, which causes the bounding leg to go double-time.
“Leilei, are you scared to date me because you are scared you will fall in love with me?” He tilts his head to the side and a wave of blond covers one of his mesmerizing blue eyes.
Yes.No? “And I don’t want to move.”
“So you are also scared you willwantto move if you date me and fall in love with me?”
Dang this man. Dang him! He has no business taking my rambles and coherently presenting them back to me with such ease and clarity.
“Yes, Finley!” I recognize my rising voice and reel it back in. It’s not anger… Is it disbelief? Confusion around how he is reading me so well? “I’ve never been in love, and I’ve never had the desire tofallin love. I don’t want to be a tangle of emotions and passion only to fizzle to a painful, burnt end. I want safety, trust, security, and the feeling of home.”
Finley clears his throat, and I look anywhere but at him. The cracks in the wooden floor, the teens in the bookshelves across the building, the way the light filters through the Dragon Tree by the windows…
“Lorelei.”
How could I allow myself to say those things? Yes, he gave me permission to speak honestly, but did he really mean it? He must desire a whirlwind romance. Look at his past for crying out loud! I can’t compete with those women…
And mercy! When have I ever even entertained the thought of competing with a woman? I am in no competition. A man will want me as I am, or he will not want me at all. It’s perfectly okay that I don’t want to fall in love. I’m like the Dragon Tree plant. Tall,sword-like, and easy to care for. A plant, er, woman like me doesn’t need much. Too much would be overwhelming. Finley is…
“Leilei. Look at me.”
Finley’s pastel yellow shirt interrupts my admiration of the Dragon Tree.
“You’re too much for me, Finley. I need simple. You aren’t simple.” My eyes plead for him to understand, but instead, the man crouches and holds my fumbling hands firmly between his own, the touch simultaneously soothing and shocking me. He sets his jaw and blue fire rages in his eyes.
“I’m not going to try and persuade you here and now, but I do have to ask you this: If you truly believe there is something between us, would you please do me the honor of taking a risk and exploring it and testing me against your perceived notions? I gave you the hand-made gift and asked you to date me with serious intentions as is the custom of our country. I am dedicated to this. To pursuing you.”
Huh? That little show was a custom to ask someone out. Lucy must have loved helping him prepare that. It’ll end up in one of her romance books. That knowledge settles my nerves, but only a little bit.
Back to the topic at hand, though. “You have less than three months. I wouldn’t be ready to move anywhere in three months. You should focus on a girl who would… like mysister!”
“With all due respect, Lorelei, your sister is a lovely woman, but she is not the woman I desire. I desire you. I want you. I want your brain. I want your soul. I want your random facts. I want your shyglances. I want your individualism. I want your fears. I want your doubts. I want your weird.”
My heartbeat thunders in my ears as I process his words. I search his body language for seedlings of error. He is crouched, grasping my hands, staring up at me as if I… as if I was already his world.
Too much, too much, too much,my mind echoes. The processor has reached its limit. If I were a cartoon, steam would be wafting upwards over my head.
“Can I have time to think it over?”
Finley smiles softly, though it doesn’t reach his ears this time. “Of course. I know this is not an easy request being who I am. I know on paper we are opposite in every way. But I want you to get to know me as you. Not as Lucy. I want to get to know you asyou.” He brightens. “Why don’t we hang out tomorrow. We can go to the bookstore and go for a nature walk. Maybe we can visit an antebellum home.”
“Oh, we could go to tour Adeline’s Place. It’s supposedly haunted, but I don’t quite believe in that stuff.” Then what he’s doing hits me, and I narrow my eyes. “Hey. Unfair. Books, nature, and history…”
He waggles his brows, his lips turning upward. “I never said I would fight fair, Leilei.”
“If I say yes to this, do you promise it’s just as friends?” Darn man. Tugging on my weaknesses. This must be Lucy’s doing. How can I say no to books, nature, and antebellum homes?
“No, Lorelei. For the sake of not lying to you, I can’t tell you I will treat tomorrow as an outing of friends. But I can promise you that I will respect your boundaries. I want to get to know youbetter. I want you to get to know me better. Romance can come later.”
As I process, I take a sip of my tea, which has cooled to a temperature I no longer enjoy. He was honest with me. That’s respectable. And maybe if I go, he will realize that I’m not the right woman for him. Romantically.
Lucy’s words flitter back into my mind.
Sometimes love is unexplainable.
But while this might not be love, maybe the same applies to friendships, too. Maybe some souls are simply meant to be acquainted and befriended.
