Chapter 5 245 a.m. Was A Choice #3
Sheets rustle on her end. The quiet inhale of someone who was deep asleep thirty seconds ago and is now very confused.
“…What?”
“Why didn’t you text me back?” I repeat, slower.
“Who is this?”
I laugh under my breath. Bitter.
“Don’t do that,” I mutter, dragging a hand down my face. My palm smells like lime and whiskey. “Don’t answer a question with a question. I asked you first.”
Silence stretches.
I picture her squinting at the phone in the dark, hair everywhere, trying to figure out which idiot decided two-forty-five in the morning was a good time to start an argument.
“…August?”
“Ding, ding, ding. You’re a winner.”
“Oh my God,” she groans. “Are you drunk?”
“Nope. Super-duper sober,” I say, staring at the ceiling while the room tilts a little. “Just calling with a simple question.”
I tap the air with each word.
“Why. Didn’t. You. Text. Me. Back.”
A soft thump on her end. Like she just dropped back against the headboard.
“August,” she says, voice sharper now, “it’s 2:45 in the morning.”
A beat.
“And you’re clearly drunk.”
Another beat.
“Get off my phone.”
“Nope,” I say, popping the p. “Not until you answer.”
“Because I didn’t want to.”
That lands clean.
The room tilts again.
“That’s not true,” I say, quieter now.
“It is,” she replies easily. “If I wanted to text you back, I would’ve.”
I sit up too fast and grab a throw pillow like a life raft.
Pathetic.
“August,” she sighs. “We met once. You’re a stranger who texts like a teenage girl.”
Well, if she’d text me back, I wouldn’t have to resort to such prepubescent measures.
“Damn. You don’t even wanna be friends with me?” It comes out smaller than I intend.
“Not particularly, no.”
Blunt. Not cruel. Just honest.
I laugh and rub my face. “First time anyone’s ever turned down my friendship. I feel attacked.”
“I’m sure this is a deeply humbling experience,” she says dryly. “Even someone as cute as you doesn’t always get what he wants.”
Cute hits like a live wire.
“You think I’m cute?” A grin spreads across my face.
“Don’t act like you don’t already know that,” she mutters.
“I didn’t,” I say. “But I’m flattered.”
“If there’s nothing else, I’d really love to go back to sleep.”
“Wait,” I say quickly. “How was your day?”
She laughs. “You did not call me at three in the morning to ask about my day.”
“Yeah, I did.”
I wander into the kitchen, bare feet on cold tile, grabbing the gallon of water like it’s holy.
“What? Friends can’t ask that now?”
“We’d have to be friends for that to track,” she says. “And we’re not.”
“Yet,” I counter. “Are you alone?”
“Who says I’m alone?”
That lands low.
“Ouch,” I mutter.
“Are you offended?” she asks, sounding amused now.
“Not in the slightest, beautiful,” I say lightly. “Just hurt you lied to me. Not a great start to our friendship.”
“Who said I lied?” she says. “I asked a question.”
“That’s an implication.”
“That’s your interpretation. Not my problem.”
She’s quick. Sharp.
I exhale. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have called this late.”
“You’re right.”
“But I did,” I say, softer now. “Because I can’t stop thinking about you.”
A beat.
“How drunk are you?” she asks.
“Maybe three drinks over the limit,” I admit. “But it’s true. Haven’t stopped thinking about you since the park.”
Silence stretches.
“My day was shitty, actually,” she finally says.
Relief loosens something in my chest.
“Yeah? Mine too.”
“Really?”
“Not important. Tell me yours.”
She sighs. “Just stupid people. Stupid shit. I’m glad it’s over.”
“I’m sorry,” I say. “For what it’s worth, talking to you is the best part of my day.”
She snorts softly. “You’re ridiculous.”
“Maybe. But I’m not lying.”
“This is weird,” she says. “It’s 3 a.m., you’re drunk, and we barely know each other. Why are we talking?”
“Because I called you.”
She huffs.
“I don’t do this,” she says. “Let people in. Especially men who call my phone at creeping hours.”
“Then don’t,” I say. “Not all the way. Yet. Just let me prove I’m not like everybody else.”
She’s quiet long enough that I think I pushed too far.
Then— “You’re really something else,” she mutters.
“I’ll take that as a compliment.”
“It wasn’t,” she lies.
I grin at the ceiling.
“Wanna play a game?”
“What are you, Jigsaw?” she chuckles.
“Less murder,” I say, leaning back against the pillows. “Just trying to keep you on the phone.”
“It’s the middle of the night.”
“Technically it’s almost morning,” I argue.
A sigh crackles through the speaker.
“You are unbelievable.”
“Yet you answered.”
“That was a mistake.”
“Was it?”
A beat.
The screen flickers as she shifts her phone. Moonlight filters through her blinds, striping her skin in pale silver. Curls everywhere. Big T-shirt slipping off one shoulder.
She looks half asleep.
And somehow even prettier than she did at the park.
“Hello, gorgeous,” I say.
“You’re staring.”
“Can you blame me?” I lick my lips, as my mouth goes dry.
She covers her mouth to hide a smile.
“You called me to flirt?”
“I called because I couldn’t stop thinking about you.”
She squints at the screen like she’s deciding whether to hang up.
“That’s a bold thing to say to someone you met once.”
“Technically we collided,” I say. “Very romantic origin story.”
“That was not romantic. You body-checked me.”
“You ran into me.”
“You’re enormous. It was physics.”
I laugh, the sound echoing softly through the quiet room.
She studies me again, quieter this time.
“So what’s the angle here, August?”
“Angle?”
“You called a woman you barely know at three in the morning to tell her you’re thinking about her.”
Her brow lifts.
“That’s either confidence… or bullshit.”
“Confidence,” I say.
“You’re sure about that?”
“Positive.”
She tilts her head.
The sharp edges fall away after that and we drift.
Somewhere in there she tells me grad school is offensively expensive and society is probably a pyramid scheme. I counter that capitalism is just a very elaborate group project where nobody does their part.
She laughs at that.
We argue about whether ambition is noble or just socially acceptable greed.
She says people chase titles so they don’t have to sit quietly with themselves.
I say people chase comfort so they never have to become who they’re supposed to be.
At some point we’re debating whether love is a chemical reaction or a cosmic accident.
She votes chemical.
I say chemistry still counts.
Her laugh gets softer the later it gets. Sleepy. Unfiltered. The kind of laugh people only give you when they forget they’re being observed.
And the strangest thing happens.
For the first time in a long time, nobody asks what I do.
Not my job.
Not my lineage.
Not my money.
Just… me.
My favorite books. The places I’d run away to if nobody needed me. The kind of life I’d build if I stopped trying to impress people.
I don’t even realize how rare that is until it’s happening.
And it’s easy.
Dangerously easy.
Her curls keep falling into her face and she keeps blowing them away with this sleepy little puff that’s way more distracting than it should be.
At some point I’m stretched across the bed, phone balanced on my chest like I’m sixteen again instead of a grown man with investors and meetings and a schedule that usually owns me.
And I’m smiling.
Actually smiling.
That should probably concern me.
Outside, Chicago slowly starts waking up.
Black sky fades to charcoal.
Charcoal softens into deep blue.
Traffic hum builds beneath the windows like the city clearing its throat.
“Oh shit,” she mutters eventually.
“What?”
“The sun’s coming up.”
I glance at the clock.
6:12 a.m.
Three hours.
Three hours talking to a woman who called me a giant asshole the first time we met.
And somehow it still doesn’t feel like enough.
We say goodnight eventually.
The screen goes dark.
The room feels bigger without her voice filling it.
I stare at the ceiling for a long moment, the ghost of her laugh still echoing in the quiet.
Next Friday.
Dinner.
Not a date.
I shake my head and laugh under my breath.
Yeah.
I’m already in trouble.