Chapter 4 – Philip
After leaving Haley, I head home. My apartment is on one of the top floors of the McIntyre apartment building, which is owned by my boss, Shane McIntyre, CEO and co-founder of the company I work for.
He reserves several of the top floors of the building for his employees.
Free rent in an upscale, secured apartment building is one of our company perks.
Haley’s father—Mack Donovan—lives just down the hall from me with his new wife, Erin.
Sometimes that’s a good thing, sometimes it’s not.
When Haley would come over to visit her dad and Erin, I’d usually get to see her.
With Mack and Erin chaperoning, of course.
Now Haley and I have her dad’s permission to date, but if she comes over to my place, and her dad gets wind of it, I can’t help thinking he’s wondering what we’re up to.
I really don’t want Mack Donovan imagining what I’m doing with his daughter.
After spending much of today with Haley, I’m way too wired to sleep, so I head to the spare bedroom for a workout. It’s arm day, so I do some serious work with free weights. Then, for cardio, I get in a two-mile run on the treadmill.
I do my best to stay in shape. My job on Jake McIntyre’s surveillance team isn’t usually dangerous. My job consists primarily of monitoring the comings and goings of customers or suspects, but sometimes it gets physical, so I’m careful to stay fit.
After completing my workout, I grab a quick shower. I’m still stoked after the impromptu make-out session with Haley earlier, so I take care of a lingering hard-on in the shower. Clean-up is so much easier this way.
I’m not going to be able to sleep anytime soon, so I pull on a pair of knit shorts and crash on the living room sofa. After flipping through the channels on the TV, I find an old movie I like—Aliens. It’s a classic. And I’ve seen it so many times I could recite the dialog by heart.
While the movie’s playing, I text Haley to wish her goodnight.
She texts me back right away, wishing me the same.
God, I wish we could live together.
For some reason, I feel unsettled about Haley moving into a campus dorm room.
It’ll certainly be an adjustment for her, too.
My mind drifts back to earlier this afternoon, when I unloaded Haley’s boxes from the back of my pickup.
I saw how many guys checked her out as they passed by.
I’m not surprised. The girl definitely turns heads.
And when you get to know her, and you realize how sweet and kind she is, and then how smart she is, she’s even more irresistible.
I’ve dated a few girls in my life. Some of my relationships bordered on serious, others didn’t. In the end, none of them lasted for one reason or another. I have enough life experience to recognize a keeper when I see one, and Haley’s a keeper.
The problem is, I’m her first boyfriend.
That scares the shit out of me, because most girls move on from their first boyfriends.
In a lot of cases, first boyfriends are practice boyfriends.
The girls eventually move on to date a few more guys before they finally realize what they want in a partner and are ready to settle down.
Basically, I’m probably doomed.
I don’t want to be Haley’s first boyfriend. I want to be her last boyfriend. I want to be the guy she ultimately decides she wants for life. But is that really fair to her when she’s never had any other boyfriend? She’s had no one to compare me to, good or bad.
The statistics are not in my favor.
God, I’m so fucked.
I just know she’s going to break my heart.
Not intentionally, or out of spite. That’s just how it goes.
I’ll be her practice boyfriend, and eventually she’ll move on to someone else.
Maybe she’ll meet someone at her university.
Someone who’s as smart as she is. Maybe another pre-law student or an engineer or a future doctor. I can’t compete with that.
After the movie ends, and the credits roll, I turn off the TV and head to the bathroom to get ready for bed.
My extra-long king-size bed feels laughably huge in comparison to Haley’s new twin bed.
I hope she sleeps well tonight. I hope her pre-med dormmate is nice to her.
At least I’ll get to see her tomorrow. We made plans to have lunch, and then we’ll go to the bookstore to get her textbooks.
There are approximately fourteen thousand three hundred students at her university—I googled it.
If half of them are guys, she has the potential to meet over seven thousand guys over the next four years of undergraduate schooling.
And after that, she’ll spend three more years in law school surrounded by the best of the best. Smart guys with bright futures.
How in the hell can I compete with that?