Chapter Twenty-One #2
“Well, if there’s ever anything you’d like to talk about…” Her words fade as she watches me, then she lifts a shoulder casually. “You know where to find me.”
A nagging feeling pokes at my stomach, but I ignore it. “I should reach out to our point person for this weekend’s event to triple-check that we’re still good to go,” I tell her, jabbing my finger behind me. “If you need me, I’ll be at my desk.”
She watches me for a second in a way that feels a little too knowing. Like she can sense there’s something I’m holding back. Like she knows all the secrets—both mine and Thomas’s.
But if she did, it would be detrimental.
Still, I can’t shake the feeling that something is coming. I don’t know why or how to stop the anxiety from nipping at my consciousness, so I walk to my cubicle with the weight of the world on my shoulders, feeling ten times heavier.
When I sit down, I see four messages waiting for me on my phone.
Kourt: Dinner at my place? Brad said he’d get Chinese, and I’ll get your favorite
Kourt: I’m not going to take no for an answer
Kourt: I’ll pick you up at 5
Moskins: How are you feeling?
My stomach flops at the last message, and I don’t even groan at the idea of seeing Brad. Fingers hovering over the keys on my screen, I hesitate before typing out a response.
Not to my sister.
But to him.
Me: You didn’t need to get me anything
Me: But it was nice of you
I’m not sure why my skin buzzes as I wait to see the responding bubbles dance across the bottom of the screen. Or why my heart drops when I don’t see them after a few minutes.
“Stupid,” I tell myself, setting my phone down. “You’re being stupid.”
I startle when Farrah asks, “Are you talking to yourself?”
Hand flying to my chest, I stare over at my coworker, staring strangely at me. “When did you get here? I didn’t even hear you.”
Her perfectly tweezed brow arches as she gestures toward her heels. Stilettos that look like they could double as weapons. “How did you not hear these? I’m offended. Somewhere out there, so is Tom Ford.”
I frown. “Who?”
She gasps, mouth open as she gapes at me in disbelief. “You don’t know who Tom Ford is?”
Slowly, I shake my head.
Then her eyes trail to my ballet flats, and she winces. “Makes sense,” she mutters. Instead of elaborating, she says, “You owe me big time. While you took personal leave, I had to answer the millions of calls you got. Here.”
She passes me a stack of sticky notes with her handwriting on them. There are a lot of them, which makes me feel bad for not coming in sooner and soaking up the time Janel gave me.
“If you’re going to play in the big leagues,” she tells me with an odd look on her face, “you need to keep up. That means knowing designers, because people like Thomas Moskins aren’t wearing secondhand items.”
If I were younger, I’d be embarrassed by the comment.
It isn’t the first time I’ve had people poke fun at the clothes I wear.
After my parents’ death, I wore a lot of Kourtney’s hand-me-downs or whatever we could find cheap at Walmart or local thrift shops.
Some clothes were even donated to us. They never looked old or worn down, but they certainly weren’t up to date on trending fashions either.
“It’s a good thing I don’t care what Thomas Moskins, or anybody else, thinks,” I inform her with a tight smile.
To which she smiles back, with something flashing in her eyes. “Don’t you?”
That’s all she says before walking away with a pep to her step that I don’t trust.
I shake my head and try to avoid the funny feeling in my stomach. The anxiety bubbling there that reminds me something is off. Something I can’t put my hand on.
When my phone buzzes, my heart picks up, and I find myself lunging to check the message.
That’s when I know I’m in trouble.
Because it’s not Thomas.
It’s my sister.
And I’m…disappointed.
Kourt: Stop trying to think of excuses to get out of it. It won’t happen
Kourt: Five pm sharp
Kourt: Luca says he misses you
If I felt bad before, it doesn’t equate to the feeling now. I’m sad because a man who isn’t even mine to claim isn’t texting me back. I feel twelve again, waiting for my first crush to finally talk to me.
I type back a reply and force myself to lock my phone in my desk after.
Me: Tell Luca I miss him too, and I’ll see him tonight
*
Dinner isn’t a total bust. Brad is on his best behavior, and so am I.
Mostly because I spend the majority of my time in Luca’s room watching videos of children playing with claw machines instead of with the adults.
I find it more distracting when Luca asks me a million questions about what kind of pulley system and motor I think is inside the machine, and what kind of money engineers make to build them.
I use my phone to Google answers for him instead of obsessing over the unanswered messages I sent to Thomas earlier.
My sister tries to convince me to stay the night because she knows what I’ll do when I get home. And she’s right. Because after telling her I’ll be fine to go home, she drops me off and I curl up on my living room couch that I haven’t looked at the same since the day with Thomas.
And the second the silence sinks in, I hate it.
I hate that I can’t drown out the noise.
Or the sadness.
Or the guilt.
I hate that I’m not looking forward to going to the gala and seeing Thomas, not because I have nothing to wear—because I don’t—but because I have no idea how I’ll react around the man I can’t stop thinking about.
I kissed him, and he kissed me back and…
nothing. Maybe all it took was sleeping with me to get me out of his system.
Maybe he just needed to prove to himself that I would cave and kiss him exactly as he expected.
Maybe using him the way I did put the final nail in the coffin for us.
Not that there is an us, but whatever relationship we were forming. Friendly. More than that.
That’s the problem with getting to know people. You start to like them. You start to open yourself to them. And the second you realize you want more—more of their secrets, time, and company—it’s too late. You’re sucked in, regardless of the consequences.
There have only been a few times in my life that I’ve truly been scared. The first was when I realized my mother and father weren’t coming home. I would never have my father’s famous pancakes or hear my mother’s angelic laugh when she heard Dad’s jokes that weren’t even that funny.
The second was when I graduated from high school and had no idea what came next. I had no ambitions like my older sister and no clear path that made sense to me. I felt alone in a world full of billions of people and had nobody to help guide me in the right direction.
And the third is right now, when I realize that I might love Thomas Moskins—a married man with secrets, a wife who loves him, and a life of grandeur that is beyond what I’ll ever comprehend.
This isn’t some rags-to-riches story. Because at least Cinderella had parents.
No. I won’t be that girl—the one who depended on somebody to give her a better life.
I made a promise at my parents’ graves that I would stand on my own two feet and live a life they would be proud of me for.
That can’t include him, because he isn’t mine to love.
I’m starting to wonder if it can include anyone, or if I’ve been broken for a lot longer than I thought.