18. Amie
eighteen
Amie
M y ego still stings from Cam’s comment about being friends. We are friends—at least, I thought we were. I hoped we were, but when we talked earlier, he suggested that maybe we aren’t.
Have I read this all wrong?
I want to be friends. Hell, just the sight of him has my pulse quickening and my thighs clenching. I’d like to be more than friends. But we can’t. He has a whole life of his own in Phoenix, one I’m not privy to. For Maisy’s sake, and since we’re tied together forever now, I want to be friends.
I glance at the clock beside my bed. It’s almost midnight. Flipping the pillow and punching it for good measure, I fling myself back down with a huff, annoyed. I’m annoyed that I’m still awake, I’m annoyed that Cam doesn’t think we’re friends, and I’m annoyed that I’m annoyed. And I’m annoyed that still being awake makes me annoyed.
I snatch my phone from my bedside table.
Amie
What do you think this means?
ROO
what does what mean?
Amie
Fucking hell Roo hold on, I’m getting there
I type furiously for a moment, relaying my earlier conversation with Cam.
Amie
So I said “we’re friends, I feel like that’s the kind of thing I should know” and then he said “friends?” and I said “well I thought we were but maybe I misunderstood” and then he DIDN’T CORRECT ME
ROO
Fucker
Lolo
dump him sis
Amie
I can’t dump him Lo, he’s Maisy’s dad
Katy
He’s a man, he probably didn’t even think about it
ROO
No, he def did. Fucker.
Ugh.
Just as I throw the phone down to the mattress in defeat, it begins to buzz with a conference call in our group message. I answer, holding the phone at my chest knowing full well that in the dark of my bedroom, my friends can’t see me anyway.
“What the fuck are you wearing, Lo?” Ruth greets us. I lift the phone to my face and squint at the quarter of the screen occupied by Paloma. She’s wrapped in a mint green silk robe; the one Katy bought her last Christmas to match the slippers and eye mask I bought. But I know instantly that Roo is referring to her hair: Paloma’s long red hair is swallowed up by neon green and yellow ribbons with a stiff wave. She looks like Medusa on 80s rave night.
“They’re heatless curls and they’re going to look AMAZING,” she tells us, dabbing splodges of lotion onto her face. It looks like she’s propped her phone against her bathroom mirror as she goes about her nighttime routine.
“He doesn’t want to be friends,” I whine bitterly. “I want to fuck his brains out and he doesn’t even want to be friends.”
“Says who?” Ruth is clattering around her kitchen, pouring steaming water into a mug. The clang of a teaspoon against the ceramic rings through my phone’s speakers and I wince, turning the volume down.
“Duh,” I supply. “He’s nearly forty—”
“Sexy older man vibes,” Lo smirks, wiggling her tongue in and out of her mouth salaciously.
“He’s nearly forty,” I repeat, rolling my eyes. I wince. It makes him sound so much older than he is—like there’s more than just eight years between us. “We’re in different places. Physically. Figuratively. Literally. He lives thousands of miles away. ”
“Maybe he’d move,” Ruth suggests. She’s at her desk now, the blue glow of her computer screen reflecting in her glasses.
“I doubt it,” I sigh. “He’s settled. He’s got a good job. One he loves. One he’s worked fucking hard for, too. It’s what he’s always wanted.”
“And you’re not?” Ruth quirks a brow.
“I’m not what? Settled? In a good job? Doing something I love, that I’ve worked hard for? Yes to all of the above, and no, I’m not about to uproot my three-year-old and move her to the other side of the world. Not when you guys and Mum are all here.”
“I meant you’re not what he’s always wanted, but go off, sis.” Ruth dunks a cookie into her mug and hangs it over her mouth as it breaks into soggy pieces.
I scowl into the lens.
“I’m glad you’re finally admitting that you want him to rail you. But for what it’s worth, I think you should talk to him about it,” Katy speaks up. She’s also in bed, illuminated by her pink bedside lamp. I can see the glow from her e-reader reflecting on her skin. “Miscommunication is the worst relationship trope. It’s always just some bullshit that could’ve been fixed by people just talking to each other.”
“You and your damn tropes,” Ruth sighs. “They’re not star-crossed lovers in a sappy romance novel, K.”
“Are you sure?” Katy waggles her eyebrows into the camera and Lo snorts.
“Yeah, maybe call him. Maybe have hot phone sex,” Lo suggests, now finished with her lotion and applying some kind of potion to her eyelids.
“Ugh, why did I ask you guys?” I sigh .
“Because you love us, and you know we’re right,” Ruth answers. “Now, shit or get off the pot, A. Call him and have it out.”
Ruth clicks off the call first, then Lo waves goodbye with a mouthful of toothpaste. Finally, it’s just me and Katy.
“Call him, love,” she says softly. “Don’t let this become your relationship. Don’t let this sour everything. If not for you, do it for Maisy. I love you.”
Katy ends the call, leaving me alone.
I scroll quickly and hover my finger over another name.
What if I really did misunderstand everything? What if Maisy is all he wants from me? We’ve spent the last few weeks talking every night, and it’s been amazing. I’ve felt seen and respected, we’ve laughed. We have a lot in common, and talking to him is so easy, even when it doesn’t involve Maisy. Every night, he reminds me why I let myself be drawn to him in Singapore.
What if he doesn’t want to be friends with me? What if all we are is co-parents for the rest of Maisy’s life? Can I live with that?
Can I live with myself if I don’t at least try?
I don’t know how much longer I can keep pretending I’m not hopelessly head over heels for him. I don’t know how much longer I can run from my feelings before I’m all out of road.
Before I can talk myself out of it any further, my thumb hits the green circle.
“Amie? What’s wrong, is Maisy okay? Are you okay? Are you sick?”
He squints at the screen of his phone, shafts of daylight streaming through gaps in the blinds.
“No, she’s—we’re fine. I just needed to talk to you,” I say. He sits up in the bed, rumpled sheets pooling at his waist. He’s shirtless, naked from the waist up, and I lick my lips as my thighs clench of their own traitorous accord.
“Okay,” he says, still squinting against the daylight spilling into the dark room, and I hear the faintest whisper of a curse as he rolls his body and stretches.
“God, I can’t believe I slept so long,” he presses on, shaking his hair out and pushing the locks from his face.
“You must have needed it,” I say in a small voice. He hums in agreement.
“What did you want to talk about?”
“Did you mean it? When you said we weren’t friends?”
“I never said we’re not friends, Amie,” he says. Confusion colours his face.
“You said—”
“ You said friends first,” he says gently, cutting me off. “And I never disagreed. We’re friends, Amie. At least, I hope we are. I hope we can be.”
He rubs a hand down his face, an action I’ve seen him do numerous times. It seems to happen when he’s tired or stressed or frustrated, and right now, he looks like he’s probably all of the above.
“I want to be friends,” I say quietly. I want to be more, but I don’t think he does. Friends seemed to shake him up enough; I think the concept of more than friends might send him running for the hills. No matter how badly I want him. No matter how the sight of his bare chest has my mouth drier than the Sahara, or how the mischievous twinkle in his eyes takes me right back to Singapore and all the things he did to me that night. No matter how the rich, low timbre of his voice sends shockwaves right to my core .
Or that after seeing him love our little girl, and then hearing his voice for an hour every night leaves me clenching my thighs and ruining my underwear. God , it’s getting so hard to be just friends with Camden Whitehouse.
“Good,” he says. “Friends.”
“Friends,” I repeat, testing the word on my lips.
He sits forward, resting his upper arms on his knees and using one hand to run through his hair as the other holds his phone. Rogue light brown locks fall loose in front of his face.
“I like being friends with you, Amie,” he says. So, we’re friends. But the way he’s looking so intently at me through the screen…
There goes my underwear.