Chapter 2
Jeremy
“Did you grab all the bags from the living room?”
I sighed, checking once more that Leah had brought nothing else out. We were only going to be gone for two weeks, and I still didn’t completely feel comfortable with all of this to begin with. By the time she’s brought out the third bag, I’d told her to take it back.
“I got the two important ones. You don’t need the other one.”
Leah came around the corner and pouted. In the past, that look would have gotten her a long way.
I don’t know what I’d been thinking. Something said that proposing to her would change things, make me want her a little more, but nothing changed.
She was just the cute girl that I’d connected with when I’d transferred to NYU my sophomore year of college.
Something about her had felt familiar... comfortable even.
The longer we were together, the more it all felt like a natural progression.
We dated,got a place together, and the next thing I knew, I was down on one knee and asking a woman to marry me.
I had no idea if she was even the person I wanted to spend the rest of my life with.
And now? Now I was getting ready to board a plane to Chicago to meet her family. This was all a huge mistake.
“But the other one has all of my lingerie.”
And that was the other thing. She’d been dangling that in front of me for a while.
What guy didn’t want to fuck his girlfriend?
Hell, his future wife? The more I thought about it, the more my heart pounded and I’d get all sweaty.
It always sent me on this wild and dangerous spiral that landed me sitting at a bar, drinking away worries and scrolling a hook-up app.
I never acted on it. Hell... Leah would probably kill me if she knew.
No, I knew she would. Especially because it wasn’t the typical hook-up app.
I’d never told Leah about when I’d been at UC-Berkeley.
We’d met at NYU when I’d transferred my social work program.
We shared some of the same classes, and while we’d hit it off.
.. I didn’t know. I’d always considered myself bisexual.
Or even Pansexual. Who needed gender or sexuality to limit you on who you fell in love with, but something was missing.
Men had always done a little more for me. I lost my virginity to a guy when I was in high school. It had been painful as hell. I’d shared that with Leah. She didn’t seem to care. Her brother was gay was all that she’d said, and sexuality didn’t seem to matter.
I gave her a tight-lipped smile and tried my best to brush off the fact that she was still trying her hardest to sleep with me. Yeah... that was the issue. I’d been dating Leah Bennett for almost two years, had asked her to marry me, and I still hadn’t done the deed.
Maybe she thought the ring would change things.
Taking me home to meet her parents. I don’t know.
It was all so freaking weird. There was still no placing why she was my comfort.
Safe. If that was the right way to put it.
.. but I had no desire to be with her sexually.
Just... that obligation from being together for so long.
I did not grab the luggage that contained her spicy undies. Nope. Not happening.
We climbed into the car and headed to the airport and it should have spoken volumes to me that I was able to tune her out so well as she droned on and on the entire way about the house.
.. or at least I think that’s what she talked about, I was more focused on the road.
That was the problem with winter in the Northeast. There was so much damn snow, and it was a miracle our flight hadn’t been delayed.
Leah had told me horror stories of years in the past where she’d tried to go home and couldn’t.
At least she’d offered to pay for parking my car at the airport.
JFK wasn’t small, or cheap. When we’d looked up extended stay lots for how long we needed, the total had just about made me want to faint.
Then there was trying to talk her into taking a rideshare.
That wasn’t happening. Nope. Not with all the bags she wanted to take.
Hey, as long as she was paying to check all of them.
My bank account would have cried at the fifty dollars per checked bag.
My hands slipped along the steering wheel as I found a parking space and turned off the car. I did a last check to make sure nothing was left out that would attract anyone to break in while we were away.
There were so many signs that Leah and I were a bad idea. It didn’t change the fact that she had that ring on her finger and I had been dumb enough to buy it for her.
Why the hell was I going through with this?
That fluttery, nuclear, world-shattering panicked feeling didn’t vanish. It stayed with me through security, onto the plane and until we landed.
“Jeremy?”
I finally snapped out of my daze to realize we were standing at a baggage claim in Chicago.
I was so fucked. None of this would have been a problem had I had the guts to tell Leah my hang-ups.
She was a great girl. I just wasn’t interested in her like that.
But as we pulled our bags off of the carousel and made our way to the rental car counter, I couldn’t open my mouth.
Would I be able to keep up the charade through the holiday? Would her family be able to tell?
We pulled up outside of a two-story single-family home. It was cute with its little porch and shutters that framed the windows, but I couldn’t shake the feeling of dread. I was walking into a minefield. Would these people hate me?
For once I was thankful I wasn’t the one driving.
Leah was familiar with the area, and I was more than happy to let her take the wheel.
The lady at the rental counter hadn’t been thrilled with us.
Then again, it hadn’t been my idea not to book a rental in advance.
Who did that? Especially over a major holiday.
That was when an insane amount of people were traveling, and we were lucky that we’d gotten anything at all.
The little subcompact was cramped and barely fit all of Leah’s bags, plus my one, before we crammed ourselves inside.
I was a tall guy at six foot two. I didn’t handle cramped spaces well.
The hour drive from O’Hare to the house had been borderline torture.
Hopefully, we wouldn’t need to do much traveling around over the next two weeks.
“It looks like my mom and dad are here. I’m not sure who that huge SUV belongs to. It might be my brother. You’re going to absolutely love him.”
And I was back to tuning out my girlfriend as I opened the passenger door and got out of the car. Maybe if I got a little breathing room, I wouldn’t feel so damn suffocated by what was happening. God, I was such a shitty human for going through with all of this.
But that was when my heart stopped. If I thought things were better out of the car? Nope...
I wanted to climb back in and head straight back to the airport. Hell, fly all the way back to the Big Apple. It would be better than the reality I was about to be confronted with.
“Austin!” Leah squealed as the man came plowing out the front door, racing to her side and picking her up in a hug. I looked off to the side and tried not to watch as he swung her around in a big circle as the melodic sound of their laughter filled the air.
I’d recognize that man anywhere. It had been three years since I’d seen that shaggy mop of brown hair and the splash of freckles across his cheeks, but then it hit me. Leah had the same freckles.
My eyes widened as I turned back to stare at the two of them. It was a mistake because the second that Austin looked up and saw me, the same recognition flashed through his eyes. He tensed and released his sister before backing away.
“Austin, this is Jeremy. I told you about him on the phone.”
Leah didn’t seem to pick up her brother didn’t seem all that welcoming. I couldn’t blame him.
Three years ago I’d left his place, telling him we’d see each other again in a week. I hadn’t told him about my transfer. He was my first real boyfriend, and instead of being brave and ending things like I should have, I ghosted the poor guy.
No wonder Leah had felt so safe and familiar. She was the sister of the one person I should have never screwed over.