Chapter 8 Grace #2
There’s a pause, letting this ambiguous atmosphere simmer between us.
It isn’t quite boiling, becoming untouchable.
We can still run our hands through it, test it out to see if it’s worth a quick feel.
Sift through it until it soothes into something comforting and easy.
Or let it continue to heat, combust into an explosion we can never come back from.
“Look,” I finally say, searching for my words while trying to reason with him.
I can do this. I can talk to him without letting all the opacity fog up my brain.
We’re adults. I can have an adult conversation with him and lay out all the reasons he shouldn’t be here under the guise of visiting a friend, using sushi as an excuse for what can only look like a late-night booty call.
“I think what happened between us was a…moment of weakness.”
“Weakness?”
I nod, firmly stamping my point. “We were lonely, and quite possibly horny—like really horny—and fate just happened to bring us together at the moment we were feeling those two very unreliable emotions. And now it’s passed, I think it’s smart if we give each other some distance so we can move on from this, and it won’t be weird between us. ”
He does a little head tilt that burrows into my weakness, tugging it out of hiding. “Why would it be weird between us?”
We’ve stopped eating, our chopsticks lying over shiny foam edges of to-go boxes in different formations of X’s. He rounds the two corners separating us, moving cautiously with his gaze firmly on me. He closes the only line of defense I had from him, and I feel completely exposed.
I huff, trying to ignore the way the air around me has been syphoned out of the room. “Because you’re Teeny’s baby brother. Because you’re a practical child. Because I’m me, and you’re you. And…”
He crowds the space around me, and I start to feel small. All the conviction I tried to hold on to so strongly is withering away. But I stand my ground. Only it doesn’t feel firm beneath my feet. It feels soft and malleable, so easily swayed.
“Andrew, please,” I plead. My words come out thin and weak, and I know they lack the conviction I wish they had.
“Please, what?” He braces his hands against the counter at my sides, and I watch his throat bob, pushing down the words he knows he shouldn’t say. His forehead presses against mine, and my hands find the collar of his shirt. They fist the fabric, unsure if it’s to push him away or pull him closer.
My heart starts to play a jagged game of tug of war. How easy would it be to give in to this. To guide his hands around my waist and circle me in a casing of safety and comfort. If only it didn’t feel so wrong.
“Please,” I repeat, my voice sounding the complete opposite of opposition but more of an actual plea. “Don’t make this harder than it needs to be.”
He doesn’t argue, knowing I’d just argue right back, leading us into a pointless bickering standoff.
We just stand there, an inch of space sitting between our torsos with this static charge that seems to be buzzing inside that hollow space, taunting and provoking.
His eyes roam over my body, pausing over the rumpled state of my shirt.
My chest rises and falls, my breathing growing desperate and erratic.
“I like my shirt on you a lot better than on me,” he finally says in an intimate whisper, dissolving some of the ache that settled in my chest. I’d changed into it earlier, picking it over my usual DOG MOM sleep shirt.
I snicker a loose chuckle, my watered-down version of a laugh. I lift the collar to my cheek and take in a small whiff. “It’s soft,” I comment. I don’t add the small detail that it smells like him too.
His eyes avert to my other hand. I’d inadvertently pressed my fingers to his stomach. An attempt to create some space between us. It feels safer there than bunching his collar again where I can easily twist and tug.
“I’m sorry, Andrew.”
He offers a smile, though the slight scowl on his face remains intact. “Don’t worry about it.” He says it earnestly, accepting his defeat.
I step out of the tiny cage of his arms, wishing I could linger there a little longer. I walk to my purse and shuffle through my wallet. His eyes stay on me the whole time, and when I reach his side again, I can’t ignore the completely expectant way he looks at me.
“Here,” I say, jutting out a stack of twenties in his direction.
“No,” he immediately says, stepping away from me and my offer.
“Please,” I say, poking my hand at him. “Like you said, we’re friends. And friends go dutch. The only way you’d have paid for me is if it was like, a date or something, so…”
“Was that why you were sending me the money?” he asks, the hurt misting his eyes. “To make sure that I knew it wasn’t a date?”
I nod. “I sent it because that’s what friends do.”
“So, we are friends.” His words sound sad in the way they lack hope, filled with resignation instead.
“Yeah,” I finally say, realizing that if anything can come from this, it should at the very least be a friend. Someone who I feel safe and comfortable around. “Of course we are.”
“Grace,” he pleads. “You can let me pay for some drinks without…it’s fine,” he adds after a hesitating pause. He gestures a hand toward the money. “I get it, but you don’t have to do that.”
I hesitate for a second and nod, placing the money on the counter where it sits under a figurative spotlight, showing how the word ‘friends’ still doesn’t seem like the accurate word to describe what’s brewing between me and Andrew.
He exhales a defeated sigh. His frustration weaves into my heart, and my determination starts to waver.
Guilt starts to spread its way to my bones, and it blurs all the lines I decided to draw between us.
I lift a hand to his cheek, wanting to smooth away any resentment that may lie between us.
It’s risky, but I can’t let him go like this.
“I really am sorry,” I whisper.
He turns his face, planting a wet, gentle kiss into my palm.
And I give, just a little. Just enough to put to bed what was never meant to be.
I lift up onto my toes, brushing my cheek against his.
When I pull away, I see how the mask Andrew was wearing has fallen to the ground.
Gone is the cocky, flirty man I had one drunken night with.
In its place is someone I somehow don’t recognize yet understand completely.
He takes my hand in his, letting my fingers rest over his palm. He looks at it like he’s committing it to memory. Every line, every crease.
“I’m sorry too,” he finally says.