Chapter 20
twenty
By the time the movie was over, I was more than ready to head home.
For a moment I had been energized and happy being out and not on a date.
That was until Josh’s nonplussed behavior along with erratic switch from interested to not interested signals Matt was giving showed up.
Though, of course, Josh had nothing to do with that.
Of course not.
I barely spared Josh a glance on the way home. I wanted to be mad about whatever he must’ve said to Matt to make him stop talking to me so suddenly—since that had to be it! But, I was more confused than anything else. Why would he do that? I just didn’t get it.
I slung my coat, scarf, and purse over the hallway hook, and the thing chose that exact moment to rip clean off the wall.
I stared down at the mess on the floor—coat, scarf, purse in a heap.
Perfect.
I didn’t bother picking anything up. Just stepped over the whole disaster and kept walking.
I was done.
“Bri, wait,” Josh called behind me, sounding tired.
I closed my eyes for a second before I turned around, forcing a smile. “What’s up?”
Josh tilted his head a little, watching me. I waited for whatever it was he was about to say. “Don’t look at me like that.”
“Like what?” I asked, all wide-eyed innocence. “I’m not looking at you like anything.”
He raised his eyebrows in that way he did when he was trying to call me out without saying a word. Usually, I rose to that challenge. Not tonight.
“I’m tired,” I said honestly. “I’m heading to bed.”
“Brielle.” He scoffed.
He actually scoffed at me.
I stopped just shy of my bedroom door. My back stiffened.
“You can’t be mad at me.”
“I’m not mad at you,” I said.
“It really feels like you are.”
I shrugged. “I wonder why.”
Josh hesitated. “So, you are.”
I didn’t say anything. I didn’t have to.
“Matt …” he started, then stopped.
I folded my arms. “Yes, Josh. Matt. What was that all about?”
“What was what about?”
I took a step toward my room.
“Can we talk?”
“You want to talk?” I turned back to face him. “Then tell me why Matt suddenly looked like he wanted to run a background check on me after we just had a perfectly normal conversation. A good one. Better than I’d had with anyone on these exhausting blind dates Gina had set me up with.”
“You don’t want to date Matt.”
Was he serious? “That’s not your decision to make.”
“He’s not ready to date someone like you.”
“Oh, great.” I gestured toward him. “Go on. Enlighten me. What’s someone like me?”
Josh pressed his lips together, like he regretted even saying that much.
“Someone who’s … good,” he finally said. “Someone who’s strong and actually shows up. You give a damn about people. He doesn’t. He can’t even text a girl back, let alone—he’s not going to be what you need, Brielle. He’d ruin it. And he’d ruin you.”
My chest tightened. “All right. If that’s true, then fine. But that still doesn’t make it your place to step in. I don’t need you to protect me. God, I’m not thirteen anymore.”
“I know that.”
“Then what did you say to him?”
Josh sighed. “Fine. He didn’t just back off on his own.”
“No kidding. So, what, Josh? What was it? You told him something embarrassing? Something stupid from when we were kids? Something I said in my sleep during a movie marathon you still tease me for?”
Josh opened his mouth, but I barreled on.
“Or did you just make it clear I was off-limits? Because that’s what it felt like.”
He didn’t deny it.
And that was somehow worse than anything else he could’ve said.
“I just …” His voice finally broke through. “I didn’t mean to make you feel alone.”
“Not physically,” I said softly. My throat felt tight. “But, yeah, that’s exactly how I felt.”
I looked down at my feet, then back up at him. “You know what? It’s fine.”
“Brielle.”
“I’m done pushing on this. It’s not worth it. It’s late. I’m tired. I’m just gonna go to bed.”
He took a step forward. “Don’t you want to watch another episode of our show?”
“No,” I said. “Not tonight.”
“Please? I … I want to know what happens next. And tomorrow’s going to be long. Faculty meeting. No one ever brings fresh doughnuts or the good flavors. It’s all Boston cream or jelly-filled.”
He was trying to be funny, but I really didn’t want to laugh or smile at him. Not right now.
I folded my arms. “You can go ahead. I’ll catch up on it later.”
His face fell. That was the first crack.
“You sure?”
“Yeah. Maybe if I have time tomorrow I’ll just watch it by myself.”
I could already feel the maybe turning into a no. For the last few weeks, any excuse to spend more time with Josh had felt like a gift. But now? Now I didn’t want to sit beside him and pretend we were fine when we weren’t.
He looked down, shoved his hands into his pockets.
“Wait. One episode?” he asked quietly. “You don’t even have to sit by me. I’d rather not watch it alone. Please, Brielle?”
God, he knew me too well. He knew I hated being behind. He knew I wouldn’t be able to resist.
I sighed. “Fine. One episode.”
He nodded, and it looked like relief swept through his shoulders. “Thank you.”
I grabbed a throw blanket and sat on the opposite end of the couch.
And when the episode started, I didn’t lean into him. I didn’t nudge his foot with mine. I didn’t laugh when he muttered a commentary under his breath.
I just watched the screen. Focused hard. Waited for the credits.
Because I needed the reminder.
There was nothing between us.
There was never anything between us.
No matter how much I wished otherwise.
“You’re still mad at me.”
“Josh,” I sighed. “Just drop it. Let’s watch the show, or I will walk away. Don’t … don’t ruin this.”
That seemed to shut him up—for all of two minutes.
“Fine. You want to know what happened?” Before I could give him an answer, he powered on.
“Matt didn’t back off because of you. Nothing about you was the issue, and I hadn’t exposed some embarrassing childhood truth about you to him.
It’s not that he has anything against you.
He just, uh, didn’t realize until he came into the kitchen that I … that I cared about you so much.”
Wait. What?
“Care about me?”
I forced myself not to ask him, Like a friend, right?
I didn’t have to as I turned to face him on the couch.
Those little moments up to now all started to piece together like a puzzle.
His extra-long look at me that I’d pushed off as him seeing something on my face or just being polite when I was talking.
The moments when I had thought that maybe he liked me just as much as I liked him.
Though neither of us said anything.
Not now.
“Not just like a friend,” he said, as if reading my mind. He rubbed the back of his head. “Not just like my sister’s friend either. I’m pretty sure it’s obvious. I’m pretty sure that we are both obvious.”
Heat flared to my cheeks. “O-oh.”
“Oh …” He paused before a chuckle burst out of him, eyes wide. He swallowed shakily. “That’s what you are going to say after you pried it out of me?”
“I, um … I don’t know what you want me to say.”
“I don’t think I do either.”
We both sat there on the couch in silence as the television screen lit up between us.
I kept my gaze forward, locked on it, so I wouldn’t look at him again in the silence.
If I did, I wasn’t sure what would happen or even what I wanted to happen.
I could jump him. He could jump me. I could say something that I would regret. Likely that.
Most likely that.
But I thought I had it under control now, until my fat mouth and I couldn’t stand it anymore. “You—you know how I felt about you.”
Josh’s head snapped toward me. “Felt.”
“Yes.”
“Felt. Like before? Like you used to feel something for me, Brielle?”
“Yes.” My voice was tight. Controlled.
And I looked at him. Really looked at him. Into those eyes that suddenly felt like they were pulling me into something I couldn’t climb out of, even if I wanted to.
“Felt, Josh. I felt so much for you. The last time I saw you, in your laundry room, I told you. I showed you. I’ve always felt everything when it came to you.
And, sure, maybe I covered it up or pretended not to care.
But even when I hated you, I still …” I swallowed hard.
“I still cared. Not like a friend. Definitely not like I should’ve. ”
Josh’s expression didn’t move. Except in his eyes—those were flicking back and forth, like he was trying to decide if he was allowed to breathe yet.
“So … felt back then,” he repeated. “Not now.”
“Felt … always. Felt then.” My voice cracked, and I hated that it did. “Felt after. Felt a week ago. Felt a second ago.”
His hand shifted closer to me on the couch. He was leaning in. The heat of his body, the way his eyes dropped briefly to my lips—
“Feel now,” I whispered.
Josh didn’t say anything at first. His face was unreadable for half a breath. Then his jaw tensed, then softened. “I didn’t realize either,” he said, quieter. “But … I’ve kind of been feeling something too. More than something. I just didn’t know how to—how to deal with it.”
“We can’t deal with it.”
“Maybe not.”
“There’s no maybe about it,” I cut in. “You know how Gina would react.”
“Do we?”
“Josh.” I gave him a look. “And I’m not going to wreck this.”
“This?”
“All of this,” I said, gesturing between us. The apartment. Everything we’d rebuilt since he moved in. “I don’t want to ruin it.”
He hesitated. “How would Gina react?”
“She would …” My throat tightened. I didn’t want to say it out loud.
Didn’t want to break the fragile truth hanging between us.
“She would think this is a betrayal,” I finally said.
“She once ditched a friend sophomore year just because she’d admitted she thought you were cute.
And, yeah, that was high school. But this? This would be worse.”
Josh nodded slowly. But his eyes never left mine.
His voice was lower. Honest. “I like you, Brielle.”
“No, you don’t.”
“Yes, I do. More than like.”