Chapter 8 Lily
CHAPTER EIGHT
LILY
Sebastian Thorne had just friend-zoned me.
That shouldn’t have been my first (crushing) thought. My mind should be processing his explanation and whether I could trust him enough to forgive him.
But my brain stuck on friend-zoned. And then proceeded to tabulate all the reasons why.
Ugh, I hated that my first reason was superficial.
I wasn’t thin enough, pretty enough.
He was a golden god who could date the most beautiful humans on the planet.
Then the “Maybe I’m not posh enough” filtered in almost immediately. Sebastian was a member of the royal family. He probably couldn’t date a commoner like me.
I wrinkled my nose.
I was not common.
My parents raised January and I to believe in our importance to them and to the world, if we did our part to make a difference in it.
My podcast might seem silly to some, but I felt like it was making a small impact.
Moreover, I intended to become a psychotherapist. To help people identify problems with their mental and emotional well-being so we could put in place processes to help relieve those problems, i.e. , improve people’s lives.
Perhaps it was the commoner thing though, after all. The friend-zoning. Because … there had been moments when Sebastian definitely seemed attracted to me. The almost-kiss in the library in front of my mum, for a start.
“Where did you go?” Sebastian asked, bringing me out of my tangent. “I quite literally saw you disappear somewhere inside your mind.”
“Literally?” I teased.
He grimaced, eyes bright with amusement. “Forgive me for my imprecise use of the word. You know what I mean. Where did you go?”
Goodness, I did not want Sebastian to know that my first takeaway from his confession was that I was somehow not good enough to be girlfriend material, but I definitely made the cut as a friend.
“Just … processing. Your explanation is reasonable. That doesn’t mean I can magically have a reasonable response to it.
Emotions sometimes don’t follow a logical process, as much as we’d like them to.
I can’t switch on the trust button. It would have to be earned again.
” I winced almost apologetically before I continued.
“And I don’t know if I want to give us the space to explore a friendship to build trust.”
He blew out air between his lips and sank back against the wall. “Spoken like a psychology student.”
Now I winced for a different reason.
Sebastian saw. “I meant that as a compliment, believe it or not.”
“Okay.”
“Lily …” His expression turned pleading. “Please give me a chance.”
Could I be friends with Sebastian when I was attracted to him?
Well, it wasn’t like I hadn’t done it before.
When I was fifteen, I’d had a massive crush on Euan, a guy in our friend group.
My girlfriends knew about it, and I got along really well with him.
I’d thought we were heading into girlfriend/boyfriend territory.
Until one day, my friend Nikki approached me sheepishly to tell me Euan had asked her out and she’d said yes.
I’d been hurt. However, I was a weirdly rational teenager and reasoned that there was no point in standing in the way of the happiness of two people I cared about, even if they’d shown little care for mine.
Would I have appreciated an honest conversation with my friend before she agreed to date the boy I liked?
Yes. And I wouldn’t have stood in her way then either.
Anyway, long story short, I created a new place in my mind for Euan once he became my friend’s boyfriend. Somehow, I’d emotionally managed to friend-zone him. In fact, eventually watching him be so clingy with Nikki, I began to find him annoying.
I could do that with Sebastian.
Couldn’t I?
Not the annoying part. Hopefully. But the friend-zone part.
There was no point in pretending I wasn’t drawn to him. He was obviously drawn to me, even if only platonically. Maybe I could get to that same place. I did like him. I liked being around him. Before I found out about the podcast.
My attention turned to the camera in the corner.
However, I couldn’t authentically make strides toward that in a room where our conversation was being recorded. If I’d been locked in the room with a stranger, we could have passed the three hours making idle chitchat or awkwardly ignoring each other.
Sebastian and I were definitely not in a place for idle chitchat. It would only confuse things more.
Which meant I’d spend the next three hours guarding my words and emotions because I didn’t want them being recorded for use in a research paper.
Och, this could hurt my reputation with the grad students, but the decision had to be made.
Hopefully, they’d recognize my integrity and desire to not compromise their research rather than think me a flake and a waste of their time.
I got up off the bed to cross the room.
“Where are you going?” Sebastian asked. “What’s happening?”
Pressing the button by the door, I glanced back at him. “I’ll explain in a minute.”
Thirty seconds later, the door opened. An irritated Arthur stood on the other side. “You two have a background and you can’t interact authentically, and you don’t want to compromise the integrity of our data,” he supposed.
Grimacing, I nodded. “Sorry.”
“My fault. As soon as he said you were his friend, I should have switched you with someone else. Rookie mistake. You may leave.” He gestured, waving us out of the room.
“Sorry, again.”
He shrugged off my apology as I walked out, motioning for Sebastian to follow me. Arthur handed over our smartphones and we left. He was irritated, but I got the impression he wouldn’t hold it against me.
I didn’t speak until we were out of the old student accommodation building. Sebastian followed me over to my bike. He watched me warily, curiously, as I unlocked it.
“We can try,” I finally said. “To be friends.”
His expression softened. “Really?”
“Sure.”
“Friends have each other’s phone numbers.” He held out his smartphone, wearing a hopeful, boyish look on his gorgeous face.
With a shake of my head, I attempted to suppress a smile as I rhymed off my phone number. He immediately hit the call button, and it rang in my pocket.
“Didn’t believe me?” I snorted, tugging out the phone.
“Of course. I wanted you to be able to add me as a contact.” He pointed at my phone screen. “My name is spelled S-e-x-y F-r-i-e-n-d.”
I did laugh now. “You’re incorrigible.”
“That’s a word we don’t hear enough these days. Incorrigible. Your beauty is incorrigible.”
“That’s not how you use that word. Also is flirting the way you ‘friend’?”
“Friend is a verb now, is it?” he teased back. “And yes. It’s a disease I was born with, I’m afraid. I even flirt with my granny’s dog. Though I did have to stop because she took it as encouragement to hump my leg any bloody time she pleased.”
“I can guarantee you I won’t take your flirting as encouragement to hump your leg.”
“How disappointing.” He grinned wickedly.
I rolled my eyes. “Maybe I take it back. Maybe I don’t want to be friends.”
“Too late, I have your number. And you should know I was that annoying child in preschool who hugged everyone and refused to go away and play with someone else when told to.”
Trying not to laugh at his silliness, and failing, I shook my head. “No, you weren’t.”
“No, really I was.” He cocked his head, studying my face. “You aren’t just placating me? You really mean you’re going to give this a shot?”
“Why do you want to be my friend so badly?” I blurted out.
Sebastian shrugged. “Because I like you.” He suddenly looked away, his expression grim. “People can be so disappointing, Lily.” He turned back to me, seeming sincere. “It makes you want to hold on to the ones you feel you can really trust.”
“And you think you can trust me? We don’t really know each other.”
“But my gut instincts are usually never wrong. I want to know you. I want you to know me. And if you decide you don’t want to be friends, that’s fine. I’d just like the chance to try.”
Friends.
That hadn’t stopped stinging quite yet.
Deciding I would leave the ball in his court, I got on my bike. “If you text, I promise I’ll answer. Goodbye, Sebastian.”
“See you soon, Lily,” he called after me as I rode off.
I was barely a minute from him when my mobile beeped in my pocket.
It could have been anyone, but when I got back to the flat, I anxiously pulled out my phone. There were several texts. One of them was from Sebastian.
Meet me for coffee at Books ’n’ Cup Monday at 11 a.m.?
My belly fluttered, which meant this was a very bad idea. But the coffee house he referred to was only a two-minute walk from my flat and I didn’t have a class then.
I replied before I could change my mind.
See you there.
Not a minute later, Sebastian replied:
Can’t wait.