Chapter 17
Oliver was on my porch. Even after that look he’d given me at the restaurant yesterday. Even after I was certain he wouldn’t want to see me again.
“I’ve decided that somehow you know when I look my worst and magically appear,” I said, stepping aside and opening the door wider for him to come in. Unlike me, he looked amazing.
“On two out of the three occasions you’re referring to, you invited me. So magic isn’t really the right descriptor.” He handed me the bag of food.
I raised my eyebrows at the money I still held out for him.
He shook his head with a smile and took the cash from me, only to pull me forward by the pocket of my sweats and tuck the money inside. The way my downstairs region reacted to that simple, yet intimate, gesture surprised me.
I gripped the In-N-Out bag tighter and tried to say as casually as possible, “I invited you today?”
He chuckled, stepping inside.
“I’m scared to know.”
“You were really drunk.”
“Don’t hold it against me. Yesterday was a bad day and Sloane is a bad influence.” I closed the door and locked it.
“That isn’t from me, by the way.” He pointed to the fast food in my hands. “It was on the porch.”
“My mom.”
“Nice mom,” he said.
“It’s not a hangover gift.” I peered in the bag to see several orders of fries and at least three burgers. “It’s a promotion gift.”
“I see,” he said.
“She thinks…” I was actually promoted was how I should’ve finished the sentence, but I didn’t. The lie I’d told my sister had now spread to my mom. My head hurt too much to think about the conversation I needed to have with her.
He walked past me to the living room, his scent filling my senses. He looked at the empty Bad Decisions jar on the ground.
“You smell good,” I said.
He chuckled again. “So I’ve heard.”
“Ugh. I don’t want to know.” I swiped up the jar and placed it on the coffee table. Then I gestured toward the table in the kitchen. “Are you hungry? My mom ordered me too much food.”
“Yes, actually.”
We settled in at the table, him on the end by the window and me to his right.
I passed him a burger and the smirk that had been on his face since he’d arrived slipped off as he opened it.
“I wasn’t judging you, Margot. I promise my reaction had nothing to do with you and everything to do with my history.
My face sometimes has a mind of its own and it was obviously giving off dick vibes. ”
“What?”
“Yesterday. Your boss. I was surprised and shouldn’t have asked.”
“Spill. Did I call you last night or something? How do you know that I thought you were judging me for Rob? You didn’t talk to Sloane, did you?”
“Your roommate? No. You left me a message.”
I put my face in my hands. “I didn’t.”
He laughed. “It was amazing and I will save it forever. You don’t remember?”
“Not even a little bit.”
He took a bite of his burger while simultaneously pulling his phone out.
I let it happen. I let him pull up his voicemails and push play while I slowly ate my burger, hoping that the aspirin or the grease would take away the pounding in my head and the twisting in my stomach because I knew the sound of my voice ringing out over his speakers wouldn’t.
“You probably didn’t think it was a booty call,” was how the message started.
He paused it. “You sent me a text before this message asking if I was awake, followed very shortly by a text that said ‘that was not a booty call.’”
“Thank you for the context,” I said, a spotty memory coming back to me with his explanation.
He smiled and pushed play again, and my voice continued: “But I just got a booty call text from someone. So that’s on my mind. From someone on the apps, I mean, not from someone in my life. I said no, of course. I could’ve said yes if I wanted to. I’m a single woman who actually likes sex.”
My real-time self groaned in embarrassment.
“And, by the way,” my very drunk voice continued, “my boss was single when I slept with him. I know he’s older and he’s my boss, but it’s not like I slept with him the first second I saw him.
I knew him. We have lots of things in common.
Unlike us. You really shouldn’t judge people.
My boss is dreamy. You saw him. Maybe not as dreamy as you but not everyone can have amazing hair and a killer smile.
Also, you have nice arms. And you smell like soap and wood and cinnamon.
Why do you smell like cinnamon? I didn’t think I liked the smell of cinnamon.
Well, I mean, everyone likes the smell of cinnamon, but in hot chocolate or on cookies or whatever.
I didn’t think I liked it on a person. You make it work. Like, really make it work.”
I met Oliver’s eyes then and he raised one side of his mouth in a half smile.
I narrowed mine as I continued to listen to myself drone on: “Also, is Seattle code for something? Do I need to add it to my first-date questions? I should sleep. Not with you. Not that I wouldn’t.
I mean, I would. I totally would. We should.
You want to, right? Let’s just do it and get it out of our system.
We should’ve three years ago and then we wouldn’t be here now pining, thinking about how hot it was.
You were hot in that car. You really had no right to be when your dinner conversation was so terribly one-sided.
You hardly knew me. And you were rude to our waitress.
Why aren’t you responding to my texts? It’s late, I guess.
Oh shit, it’s two A.M. Shhh, I’m sorry. Go to sleep.
But come over tomorrow so I know you’re not a judgy jerk with a stick up his ass.
Sorry, I don’t think you have a stick up your ass.
I’m drunk. Really drunk. But come over. My address is… ”
He pressed stop halfway through me relaying my address.
“Wow,” I said. “I’m never drinking again.”
“I am here to prove I’m not a judgy jerk with a stick up his ass.” He didn’t comment on all the sex talk.
Neither did I. “Drunk Margot is ridiculous. I’m sorry. The stuff about my boss, it was my shame talking. I have all sorts of…” I blew out some air because my throat tightened with emotion. “I’m not proud of sleeping with him.”
“I wasn’t trying to make you feel bad at all. And besides, it’s really not my business. I shouldn’t have asked. I’m sorry. Also, was I rude to our waitress that first night?”
I covered my face with my hands. “No, I mean, sort of, but it’s fine.”
“What did I do?”
“You just ignored her when she tried to take our order. Didn’t stop talking.”
“Wow. I’m sorry. Like I said, I’d just broken up with my fiancée and I really had no business being there.”
“And your reaction at lunch yesterday, you said that had to do with your history too?”
A fry was halfway to his mouth when a questioning look took over his face. “I said that?”
I leveled him with a stare. “Yes, you said that, earlier. And since nothing can be more embarrassing than that”—I pointed at the sleeping screen of his phone sitting on the table—“you have to tell me what you meant.”
He seemed to struggle with himself for several minutes but eventually said, “The whole thing yesterday reminded me of how I found out my fiancée was cheating on me. We were sitting in a café and her ex came in and her face went pale because apparently he’d given her some sort of ultimatum about telling me or he would.
He marched up to our table, much like your boss yesterday, and demanded to speak to her.
And she asked me to give her just one minute. ”
“Like I did yesterday.”
“Yes, like you did. And it…”
“Triggered you?”
“A little. It shouldn’t have… but it did.” He wadded up the wrapper of his finished burger.
“I get it. I’m sorry. Are she and her ex still together?”
He nodded slowly. “It’s not the first time I’ve been cheated on either.”
“Oh yeah? When was the first time?” I reached into the bag, pulled out another burger, and put it on the table in front of him.
“In college. Also, I can’t eat another one.”
“I believe in you.” I nudged the burger closer to him. “Were you two serious?”
“Yes. We were good friends for about six months then dated for about six months.”
“Shit. Sorry.”
“It was a long time ago, but I obviously still have trust issues.”
“What?” I asked in faux shock. “There’s a valid reason why you’re single?”
He gave a breathy laugh. “Yes. I overthink everything. What about you? Do you have a valid reason for being single?”
“Apparently, I underthink everything, lead with my feelings, and end up in terrible relationships. You met the main one yesterday. My emotionally unavailable and completely wrong-for-me boss, who has been keeping me on the hook for the last several years in more ways than one. And now my life is…” I waved my arm around to indicate the mess my life had become.
“Right,” he said.
I picked up a fry that was already half-soggy. “Have you ever cheated on anyone?”
“No. You?” he asked.
“No. But I’ve turned into a liar, I guess.”
“You haven’t told your sister you didn’t really get promoted?”
“No. And now she told my mom. So now I need to tell both of them. A conversation I’m not looking forward to.”
“Maybe you texted her. You seemed to be sending all sorts of messages last night.”
“I hope not. Like I said, drunk Margot is not exactly tactful.” I tapped my phone to life. “By the way, you will delete that voicemail.”
“Never,” he said.
I clicked on my text app and scanned for my sister’s name. Before I could find it, I was stopped cold by Rebecca’s name. She never texted me. We only talked in the office or over the office line when her assistant was out.
Congrats on taking some steps forward , she said. Let me know if there’s anything I can do to help.
I had actually answered her with the words: I quit. Rob is an asshat .
“Ugh,” I said and scrolled past that mess to see if I’d made any other ones.
The most recent text from Audrey read: Not sure that’s the right call. Let’s talk it out.