He was my boss, and I had forgotten that again. That was on me. No one else.
No. I wasn’t going to think about Rip being the cause, because I wasn’t going to feel this way longer than... five minutes. I’d do this for five minutes, and that was it.
That was it.
This ache in my throat… five minutes.
This BS sense of betrayal… five freaking minutes and that was it.
I’d been yelled at enough in my life. Rip was going to get to be just another person who succeeded in making me feel this way.
I didn’t want to start over. I had screwed up. Fine. But I hadn’t screwed upthatbadly.
“Please don’t fire me,” I repeated myself, hating myself for even being in this position in the first place.
A minute dragged by. Maybe even two minutes. Just as I started to accept that he wasn’t saying anything for a reason, I took a step backward, feeling… nearly as bad as I had Friday night. Then, finally, Rip spoke up. “I’m not firing you,” he claimed in a voice that was pretty damn close to a growl.
It didn’t seem like he wasn’t firing me.
“I’m not,” he repeated himself.
The saliva in my mouth started to taste sweet as I stayed right where I was in every way. “Are you sure?” I forced myself to ask.
Rip’s voice was low as he murmured, “Yes.”
Okay then.
He wasn’t firing me for someone else’s mistake.
Feeling the frustration—and the hurt—in the backs of my eyes, I sucked in a breath and nodded. I could feel my nostrils flaring as I took another step back. Then another.
I’d gotten what I wanted. I had no reason to be upset. Not because this was unfair. Not because he had just hurt my feelings by reminding me that he was my boss and that was all there was between us.
Not because he had held me while I cried over my sister shooing me out of her life.
“Luna,” came my name in that murmured, rough voice that I usually enjoyed, except in that moment.
I ignored it.
“Will you help me carry it out of here?” I asked him instead, my own voice low.
There was a beat of silence, and I had no idea if he was looking at me, doing the sign of the cross, or rolling his eyes. I wasn’t fired, and that was all that was going to matter then.
Lenny had rescheduled my date for that night, and even though I wasn’t super excited over it, it was something to look forward to. That could be the best part of my day, even if nothing came of it. Because at least I was trying to make my life better. Every day, I tried to make my life better, and that had to mean something. It would.
“Luna?”
My heart started beating faster, but I ignored that too and managed to ask, “Can we please do it so I can start?”
There was a pause and then a soft, “Sure.”
I swallowed and kept my gaze on that little button. “Okay. Let’s do it.”
There was a deeper sigh. A longer one. Another “Luna…” that reminded me of a shooting star with a long tail behind it. A dying meteor. That’s what it was in a way. I would forgive him. I would move on, but thatLunawouldn’t change what it really was.
A reminder that he was my boss first and foremost.
A dying little dream that was burning itself out.
