I stopped putting on blush and flipped around to face him. “Why?” I wasn’t even sure what kind of answer I was looking for. All I knew was that before this week I thought he hated me.
He leaned forward, putting his hands out like a plea. “I’ve spent a lot of time and energy, more than I want to admit, making sure nobody ever suspected I’ve had feelings for you. And I’m tired. I’m tired of pretending this isn’t what I want. The biggest reason I felt like I had to hide it was because I figured you wouldn’t… reciprocate.”
He was afraid of rejection. Wow. My throat closed off and I didn’t trust myself to speak, so I covered his hands with mine and traced the lines across his wrists with my thumbs.
“Say something,” he whispered.
“Okay. I have a confession. A small one.” I wasn’t ready to reveal everything I was feeling, but I could give him this.
“I’m all ears.”
I met his eyes, though I knew my face was growing hot. “I did sneak over to you at the door, but not to peek in the bags. I thought about kissing you and then chickened out. Or came to my senses. But we’re not talking about the bathrobe thing again, okay?”
I’m sure whatever he’d been about to say in response would have been good, but Jenny chose that exact moment to come barging through the door to the apartment and stomping down the hall to my room. From the look on her face, either she was about to ugly cry or shout in anger.
“I hate Noah Edgeworth. I never want to see him again!” She burst into tears.
Ah, so it was both. “What happened?”
Clay moved out of her way and motioned that I should call him. A fist-sized ache started in my chest, but I ignored it and patted the spot on the bed he had just vacated. Jenny didn’t act this way over nothing. A breakdown from her like this was rare.
Jenny collapsed into the spot next to me, laying back with her hair fanned out. “You don’t have to go, Clay,” she hollered. “Just pretend to watch TV or something for a few minutes.”
There was a muffled, “okay,” in response, and Jenny and I laughed, her through the tears streaming down her face, and me in relief. I didn’t deserve such a good friend and roommate.
“What did Noah do?” I asked, reaching over to my desk and retrieving my tissue box. I handed it to her and waited while she blew her nose.
Jenny sniffed. “His date, the one who cancelled, called while I was standing there with him and asked if it was too late to come, and the hot air balloon pilot guy said he didn’t care as long as she got there in the next ten minutes. So we waited for her. I should have left right then, but like an idiot, I went on a date with another girl competing for his attention, and she was playing to win, let me tell ya. She spent the entire time clinging to him, pretending she was scared. Okay, maybe not pretending. We were all scared. What was I thinking going up hundreds of feet in the air in a wicker basket? I was terrified and miserable, and he kept trying to make the situation better, and like a dude, he totally made it worse.”
“I’m so sorry, Jen.”
“Me too. And I woke up at the crack of dawn to get all ready and now I’m—” she let out a yawn that seemed to go on forever. “I’m so tired.”
“Are you hungry? I could make you something.”
She shook her head. “I’m going to climb back in bed and pretend I don’t have to see him on Monday for carpool. Go be with your man.”
“Are you sure?”
Jenny climbed off my bed and stretched. “Yes, I’m sure. But if you wanted to bring me back donuts I wouldn’t complain.”
“Done.”
Jenny reached back and stole my fuzzy heart pillow she’d been laying her head on and escaped to her room, closing the door after her.
A minute later, Clay’s head peeked around my door frame. “Noah sounds like a real jerk. What did he think was going to happen if he took them both?”
“I doubt he thought that far ahead.”
“Truth. So, what do you want to do today?”
“You tell me. After all, you brought all the bags full of stuff.”
Clay came closer and took my hand, tugging me up off my bed. “I have a couple different ideas. How special is this super-secret running spot you’ve been keeping from me?”
“Really special. But I don’t want to jog today. I’ll take you there, and we can play bocce ball or lawn bowling or whatever the game is called that’s in your bag. And then we can come back here with donuts for Jenny. How does that sound?’’
His smile warmed every part of me. “That sounds perfect.”
