CHAPTER TEN #2
“Here.” Amelia held out a bottle of water as he reached the table.
His smile crinkled the corners of his eyes as he took it. “Thanks.”
Once the crowd of kids around the table had thinned out, Amelia turned her attention back to Ben. He was leaning against the wall, watching the teens as they stood in small clusters.
“Everything go okay so far?” she asked.
Ben nodded. “Though a couple of the boys were getting into it. Seems like they may have brought some off-court stuff to the clinic.”
“Teenagers, huh?”
“I don’t really miss those days,” Ben said with a chuckle. “The drama was off the charts sometimes.”
“Was it?” Amelia frowned. “I don’t really remember.”
“You kind of had other things you were focused on,” Ben said. “And I was glad you weren’t caught up in all of it.”
Amelia was glad she hadn’t been either, but in some ways, it bothered her a bit that Ben had experienced things going on in high school with people they both knew but hadn’t said anything to her about it.
“What sort of drama?”
“It usually centered around who liked whom and who was dating someone that another person liked.”
“Were you caught up in the drama?” Amelia asked, almost afraid of the answer.
“Off and on,” Ben said. “I got dragged into stuff, but it wasn’t anything significant.”
“Did girls like you?”
It wasn’t something they’d ever talked about, and he’d never given her any reason to think there might be other girls in his life. But thinking back, it was ridiculous to think that there hadn’t been girls with crushes on him. In addition to being cute, he’d also been nice.
“Sure,” he said with a shrug. “But the only one I cared about… the only one I loved was you.”
Amelia felt heat creep into her cheeks. He said it so easily. She looked down at her hands, then out the window. Anywhere but at him.
“So,” he prompted. “Dinner tonight?”
Glad for the reprieve from memory lane, Amelia looked back at him. “With your parents?”
“Yes. I’m staying at the big house on the estate, so I’ve been eating my meals there. Julian and Kiki will be there with their kids too, and possibly Angie and Jude,” Ben said. “So, will you come?”
Amelia wasn’t sure if the extra guests made it better or worse, but she knew she had to answer. “Uh… sure. Yes.”
His smile widened. “Great. I’ll let Mom know.”
He pulled his phone out of his pocket and tapped out a quick message. “Do you want me to pick you up?”
“I can drive out.”
“Are you sure?” he asked, slipping his phone back into the pocket of his basketball shorts. “I don’t mind coming into town to pick you up. Really, I would like to do that for you.”
Amelia couldn’t figure out why it seemed important that she let him do it. “Okay. If you want.”
He smiled. “Good. I’ll be at your place around six-thirty. We usually eat around seven.”
Excitement fluttered in her stomach at the thought of him picking her up and then spending the evening together. It made Amelia a little worried that she might have made a mistake.
The rest of the afternoon passed quickly, and when the clinic was over, Ben came to speak to her again.
“I’ll need your address,” he said, lifting his phone. “Unless you’re still living with your parents.”
“No, I’m not,” she said, then gave him the address.
“Perfect.” He tapped it into his phone, then angled a look at her. “Do you mind giving me your phone number?”
“I’ll text you, so you have it.” She opened a text message from his contact information, then typed him a message.
Here you go.
Ben looked at his phone when it chimed, then back at her with a smile. “Got it. Thanks. I’ll leave you to finish your day, and I’ll see you at six-thirty.”
“Do I need to dress for dinner?”
“Not really, no. I mean, Dad prefers we don’t dress too casually, like shorts and T-shirts, but everything else is fine. What you’re wearing is good.”
Amelia glanced down at herself, having already decided that she would change.
“Dad has relaxed his expectations in recent years, so don’t worry too much about what to wear.”
That was so easy for a guy to say, especially Ben. He’d always had a simple sort of style, and clothes had always looked good on him.
After he said goodbye, he and Luca left, while Amelia returned to the office for the final hour of her workday. She found it hard to focus, so she was glad when five o’clock rolled around.
As she drove to her apartment, Amelia tried to figure out what to wear. Ben might think she had nothing to worry about, but she knew that his mom would be dressed very nicely. She doubted that Elizabeth Burke ever dressed like a slob.
At the apartment, she went right to her bedroom. She stood in front of her closet, staring at her options. And her non-options.
The far right of her closet held the clothes that were no longer an option. She didn’t know why she kept them. She’d given up hoping that she’d one day fit into them again.
Ignoring them, she focused on the clothes she’d picked up more recently. She was still trying to find her style, but it was a challenge.
In the end, she settled for a sundress with a lightly fitted bodice and a flared skirt. It was a light turquoise color, and she paired it with a white, lightweight cropped jacket with short sleeves.
The sundress had wide straps, but she wasn’t comfortable baring her upper arms. The muscle definition she’d once had there was gone, giving way to a softness that she still wasn’t used to or accepting of.
She left most of her hair down, choosing to pull only a small section back with a claw clip. When it came to makeup, she knew how to apply it well, since she’d done it all the time when competing.
She didn’t wear much these days, however, but she still had all the products.
Once she was ready, she sat down on the couch to wait for Ben. The internal debate still raged over whether or not she’d made a mistake in accepting his invitation. For a lot of reasons, but primarily because she could feel exhaustion rising like the tide, pulling at her.
Amelia hoped that she could keep her thoughts together long enough to last through the meal and then through a conversation with Julian. The last thing she wanted to come across as was someone who wasn’t articulate.
Sometimes brain fog made her slow to respond and to share what she was thinking coherently. She didn’t think on her feet as well as she’d once had, and the worst part was that she was well aware of it.
That was just another before and after situation that she had to endure. She hadn’t just taken a physical hit. She’d taken a mental one as well.
Which was why she needed to guard her heart when she was around Ben. She knew she was no longer the type of woman he’d be romantically interested in.
So even though she still had feelings for him, she had to make sure they didn’t once again gain strength. But more than that, she had to make sure that he wasn’t aware of how she felt.
Somehow, they’d ended up as friends, and she didn’t want to make things awkward between them when they interacted in the upcoming weeks. He’d be leaving again when the summer was over, so she just had to keep her emotions under wraps until then.
The pang of hurt at the thought of him leaving again took her by surprise, and she had to take a deep breath to ease the tightness in her chest.
For the moment, she had to just focus on getting through the evening. Preferably without making a fool of herself. Or yawning.