Chapter 21
I’m so fucking tired. When I got my job with the department of transportation, I assumed the busiest months would be during winter.
As it turns out, at least in my position, summer is my busiest season. Which fucking sucks because asphalt is hot as balls after baking in triple-digit heat.
My busy season couldn’t come at a worse time. My relationship with Delilah is upside-down, underwater, in a car with the window cracked.
I’m slowly drowning in agony having her so close, but we’ve never been further apart. Everything’s gotten so fucked up.
I thought living with Delilah would be a dream. Instead it's been a nightmare, unraveling me day by day and I’m about to snap.
I can’t touch her the way I want. I can’t look at her the way I want. I can’t tell her the words bursting from my heart. I LOVE YOU! I’ve loved you as long as I can remember, and I’ve been IN love with you for nearly that long.
Regardless of how messy things are between us, nothing will stop me from working toward her dream. Someday, the long shifts and overtime will pay off. It has to.
The soft click of the front door is barely enough to rouse me from my sleep-deprived wallowing. Tentative footsteps approach our bedroom and stop outside the doorway.
This is what I mean. She’s right here but she might as well be a million miles away.
Hell, I’ve fucked things up so badly she’s afraid to come into her own bedroom for fear of facing me. I hate myself.
“I can see your shadow, doll. You can come in, I promise I won’t bite.”
The light from the living room casts an ethereal glow around her, and I forget to breathe. I unconsciously drag my knuckles along my sternum to ease the chronic deep ache.
“I don’t know how to do this,” she says.
“Come here.” I pat her side of the bed, and she eases onto the comforter beside me. “What don’t you know how to do?”
She hesitates, fear marring her features. “This. Us. From the day I met you, our relationship has been effortless. This scares me.”
“What are you afraid of, doll?”
“Everything. What happens next. What happens to our friendship.”
I’m not stupid, I know what she’s getting at, but I refuse to accept it. I wrap my arm around her shoulders and pull her down to rest on me.
“Let me tell you what’s going to happen.
I’m going to be away a lot this summer, so you’ll have space.
But don’t think for a second I’m going anywhere, or that you’re going anywhere.
What happens next is you preparing for your internship and leaning on the Andersens and Olivia to indoctrinate you into horse-land.
” I finger comb the strands of white-gold silk draped across my chest.
“And nothing happens to our friendship. We made it through the Great TV Show Cheating scandal during high school.” She jolts up to argue with me, but I hold her tightly against my body.
“I maintain we had no such agreement about not watching episodes seven and eight over the weekend. But as I’ve apologized for the last decade, I’m sorry I found out about Jennifer’s baby before you did.”
Delilah’s slight body trembles beneath my arm, containing her laughter. Her delicate fingers clutch at my shirt.
“We’ve made it through hundreds of tiny disagreements and insignificant fights. I don’t see how this is any different,” I explain.
Her warm breath penetrates the thin cotton of my shirt. “This isn’t a tiny disagreement…or an insignificant fight,” she whispers.
She’s right. Of course she is. But I’m sure as hell not ready to put words to what’s broken between us.
“No, you’re right. But I’ll never let anything, or anyone, come between us—not even ourselves.
I don’t regret moving you in here for a second, but I won’t lie, it’s been a big adjustment for both of us.
We’re treading in uncharted waters, but there’s no one I’d rather have by my side.
” I hug her tighter against me and she melts into my hold.
“What’s happening to us, Connor?” Her question breaks my heart.
“Nothing we can’t handle, doll. Nothing we can’t get through together.” I kiss her temple and drag in her vanilla jasmine scent for longer than I should.
We sit in relatively comfortable silence, soaking in each other’s company. Being with Delilah has always recharged my soul, and despite our current predicament, I feel infinitely better than I did ten minutes ago.
“I’m sad you have to work so much this summer,” she says quietly.
“I know doll, but summers are always a bitch.”
“I know. But…this is the first summer in years I haven’t had classes. I get a real summer, and I wish you could be a part of it.”
Fucking ouch. Heart, meet waffle iron.
“I’ll try to get back on night shift so we can have days together,” I offer desperately.
“No, no. You’d be exhausted. I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said anything. I don’t know why I’m being such a baby about this. Things have been so weird between us…I thought some summer fun would help. It sounds stupid when I say it out loud.”
I do mental math to calculate the minimum number of shifts and overtime hours I need to hit my savings goal by the end of summer.
“Let me see what I can do, okay? There’s a lot of seasonal guys looking for extra work and I bet I can get out of one or two of the longer trips.” I expect her to tell me not to bother, because Delilah always puts everyone else’s happiness above her own. But she surprises me.
She lifts from my chest, propping herself on one arm and traces the collar of my shirt with one finger. Electricity courses from her body to mine.
“I’d really like that. If it’s not too much trouble. I want to be with you as much as possible before my internship takes over my life.”
Does she have any idea the effect her words have on me? I want nothing more than to be with her.
But she doesn’t mean it the way I wish she did. I can’t formulate an appropriate response, so I go with the simplest truth.
“I want to be with you too.”