CHAPTER 22
“Hey, what are you working on?” Samantha asked, sitting down next to her at one of the long tables in the main part of the shared office space building.
“Filling out my apartment paperwork. I got the email that my application beat out all the other applications, so I can read and review the terms and conditions, lease, and all the addendums. After I send them my armandmy leg, I can select a move-in date and have my own place,” Harlow replied.
“You’re moving out of Larissa’s house?”
“Yeah, of course. Why?”
“Nothing. I guess I thought you’d stay.”
“With Larissa? Why would I do that?”
“You know why, Harlow. And I’ve seen the two of you around here. I thought maybe you were moving toward having the inevitable talk that all of your ex-girlfriends have been waiting for.”
Harlow laughed and said, “You make it sound like you are all in a group chat, and you give each other updates on who I’m with now or who I’mnotwith, in this case.”
“Not exactly. But I bet the moment you put anywhere on social a picture of you and Larissa, saying you’re a couple now, all of us will collectively say, ‘Finally,’ out loud to ourselves andmaybe create a former-girlfriend support group or something to help us process our emotions together.”
“It’s not like that. You know that when I was with you, I was with you.”
“I know you weremostly, but you couldn’t exactly give me your whole heart. I’m sure it was the same for the other women you’ve been with. Kind of hard to do that when you are in love with someone else, and that someone else is your best friend. You’ve apologized a bunch, so I’m not saying this to get another one out of you. I just really thought you’d stay with Larissa.”
“She asked me to move in.”
“And?”
“I said no because ofinsert obvious reason here.”
“Oh, she asked you as a friend,” Samantha concluded.
“Yeah. She suggested we becomeroommates. I’d make the guest roommyroom, and we would wake up every day around the same time, have coffee or breakfast, talk about the day ahead, go to work, and when we’re done there, I’d come home, and she’d be in the kitchen or living room, and we’d have dinner and watch a movie like we did last night.”
“Too couple-like for you?”
“Yes,” she stated. “I know I need to tell her. I will. But I just can’t. Sometimes, I think I’ve finally got the courage I need ready to go, and I’m going to tell her, but she’ll say or do something, and I can’t.”
“Like what?”
“Like she offered to go to a baseball game with me just because she knows I love it.”
“That bitch,” Samantha joked.
Harlow laughed and said, “She hates sports, but she’s offered to go and not ask a million questions. She just wants to hang out with me doing somethingIlike.”
“Well, that’s good of her, I guess. But why couldn’t you tell her how you felt, then?”
“Because I’d be giving that up. If she says she doesn’t feel the same way, there’s no way she’d want to go to a baseball game with me. Or, if she did, it would be awkward.”
“You’re making a lot of assumptions there, Harlow. Just tell the girl already, find out her answer, and if she’s not into you, you deal with the consequences. It’s got to be better than whatever it is youaredoing – sitting here, trying to get an apartment that costs an arm and a leg, apparently, when you’d much rather stay there and watch movies with Larissa every day for the rest of your damn life.”
“We woke up together this morning,” she shared and closed the laptop. “We fell asleep on the couch, and I woke up with her holding me.”
“So, you’reextrascared right now, huh? You’ve got that fight or flight look about you. Makes sense now.”
“Yes, obviously. I mean, what if I’m the one who pulled her arm around me when I was asleep, and she woke up like that, thinking I–”
“Have feelings for her? Yeah, you wouldn’t want that, would you? A little real honesty between the two of you,” Samantha teased.
