The elevator opened. “Bye.” Brooke rolled her eyes and waved him off, entering the elevator and riding it up to her apartment.
Friends, she could be friends with Logan. George had it wrong, and she planned on proving it to him. Because they would only ever be friends.
CHAPTER 4
Logan peeled off his jacket and plopped himself down on his couch. His mind reviewed the entire night’s interactions with Brooke.Friends?It sounded weak even to him. He groaned. If he could go back, he would’ve asked her out. But no, he chickened out, blamed her recent break up with Dr. Moreno as an excuse. And snap, he single-handedly placed himself in the dreaded friend zone. Ugh.
He leaned forward and raked his hands through his hair. Surely, one could bridge the gap, right? Did any of his friends manage to parlay their way from friends into dating? Maybe they could offer him much-needed guidance to fix this. He came up blank. He’d dug himself into a hole.
His phone rang. He fetched it out of his pocket. His sister’s name, Danielle, flashed across the screen. Logan smiled to himself as he leaned back on his couch and kicked up his legs on the coffee table. At least he could count on her to take his mind off the fiasco of his dating incompetence. He tapped the screen to answer and put it to his ear.
“Danielle,” Logan cupped the back of his head with one hand, “are my cute nieces keeping you up again?”
“Yes,” she huffed. Danielle continued, “It’s a good thing they’re cute, because I swear—” Her voice was interrupted by a wail, soon another crier joined.
The twins cried in almost unison. The sound made him move the phone six inches away from his ear to keep from having permanent hearing damage.
“Have they been crying a lot today?” Logan spoke over the loud ruckus in the background with the phone still far from his ear. He hit the speakerphone and set his phone down on the coffee table.
“Off and on. I might lose it.” He heard Danielle try to soothe the twins. Logan waited, knowing his sister only needed someone to complain to. He heard Danielle speak calmly to them. A minute later the crying stopped. “There, I should be good for a minute or two.”
“What did you do?” He rested his forearms on his knees and leaned closer to his phone’s mic.
“I’m currently holding a pacifier into each of their mouths. Luckily, there was this invention of air pods to allow me to keep my hands free while on a call.”
“True.” More silence. Logan cleared his throat. “As much as I love to shoot the breeze with you, I know it isn’t what you do. Please ask whatever it is that you want to ask me.”
“Can’t a sister call to talk to her brother?” Danielle asked.
“Some sisters do, mine doesn’t.” He cradled his hands together. “Spit it out. What did you want? Free babysitting? Maybe going in on a group gift for Mom’s birthday? Or do you need me to get Mom and Dad out of your hair?”
Danielle groaned. “How do you know me so well?”
“I think living in the same house for half your life does that to people.”
A cry escaped. Danielle rustled around and then the crying stopped.
“Can you make it to dinner next Sunday?” she asked.
His stomach twisted. Danielle was up to something. She knew he would come if he could, but the dangling inquiry told him to tread lightly.
“Why?” he replied.
“Just answer the question,” she countered.
“Tell me what you are up to and then I’ll answer.”
Danielle huffed. “I ran into Shelby?—”
“No,” he interrupted her. His jaw tightened while his neck stiffened. The mention of his ex-girlfriend made sweat tickle his brow. He never wanted to see her again. “Absolutely not.” He stood and paced the small length of his living room.
“Why not?” Her voice eked out of the speakerphone. “She’s back in town. Apparently, she’s single and working as a nurse at the dialysis center on Seventh Street. She kept asking about you, and Logan she looks good, like time hasn’t aged her one bit.”
Maybe time hadn’t aged her, but it had aged him. He couldn’t and wouldn’t see her. Even after all these years, she still held this grip on him. He wondered if first loves were like that with everyone. He swore he would never agree with anyone more than Sheryl Crow singing about the first cut being the deepest. And the cut from Shelby managed to paralyze him.
The woman had broken his heart when she dumped him right before they went off to college. It took his first year of college to learn how to function without her in his life. Then it took another year to even have the courage to ask another woman out. Shelby tossed him aside and never looked back. He didn’t care how good she looked because being attracted to her had never been the problem.
Sure, he’d seen her a few times since they broke up. He ran into her in between college and medical school, and he asked her out to grab lunch. Bad idea. He fell back in love with heronce again after a simple conversation. When they made plans to meet up again, she ghosted him. It unraveled him even more.
