Clara scoffed. “Trust me, there isnobudding love.” Although a part of her, a really big part, wished there was. Would probably always wish he loved her the way she loved him.
Indie gave her a look. “That’s because you haven’t told him how you feel. Tell him. Take a chance.”
Clara wet her lips before scrunching her eyes and blurting the words out. “I did tell him.”
“What? When?”
Clara looked at her cousin. “Three years ago. I never told you because…I don’t know. I was embarrassed.”
“Okay, I need more details.”
“It was the night of the annual street party. Holden and Jesse were home. Even Colt was there.”
Indie’s brows creased. “I remember that night. You got a drink spilled on you, so you went to get a clean shirt from your car, but you never came back.”
“Holden followed me. He gave me his sweatshirt and I…I told him I loved him.” She wrinkled her nose and hurried the next words out. “I told him it was the kind of love that made me want to kiss him and count down the days until I saw him again.”
Indie was silent for a moment before uttering one word. “Wow.”
“Yeah, wow.”
“What did he say?”
She looked back at her drink, his response burned into her brain. “That I’d be easy to love. And that’s why he has to stay away from me.”
“What doesthatmean? Why can’t he love you?”
Clara lifted a shoulder. “I don’t know. But the next time we saw each other, it was Thanksgiving at Mom’s, and he just acted like it had never happened, so I did the same…and neither of us ever mentioned it again.”
“Oh, Clara—”
“It’s okay.” Well, it wasn’t, but what was she supposed to do? Dwell on the fact that she loved someone who didn’t love her back? “He cares about me like a sister. I need to get over this little infatuation and move on.” Little? Huh. She’d loved the guy as long as she’d known him. She sipped her drink before looking at her cousin. “Maybe I just need to find a random guy and have sex with him.”
Indie choked on her cocktail. “What?”
“I’m going to be thirty in the next month.Thirty.”
“I know. I wanted to throw you a party and you said no.”
“And it’s still a no. But I shouldn’t go into my thirties a virgin. That’s weird, right?”
“No. There’s no right or wrong time.”
“I think it’s weird.” She looked around the bar. “I should just pick a guy and do it. Rip off the Band-Aid.”
“You absolutely shouldnot.”
She looked back at Indie. “Malcolm’s nice.”
“Who’s Malcolm?”
“Hey!”
They both looked up to see Helen Monroe, from the running group. “Helen…hi.”
The other woman’s eyes were wide and her smile big. Before Clara knew what was happening, Helen drew her into a hug, and all Clara smelled was sweet alcohol.
She was drunk. Probably too many of CJ’s famous cocktails.
