Chapter 13 It’s Complicated… Like, Really Complicated
It’s Complicated… Like, Really Complicated
Harlee
My new bedroom smells like fresh paint and cardboard and the kind of quiet you only get when you finally have a door that belongs to you.
It’s small. Not sad small. Just… realistic. Chicago-trying-its-best small. But the key is on my nightstand like a receipt from the universe: she did that.
Wynter is back from tour, unpacking the main bedroom like she’s moving into a penthouse and not an apartment with a thermostat that lies. I’m halfway through hanging up clothes when my door cracks open.
“Harlee? You decent?”
“Always,” I call. “But only if you brought pizza or wine.”
Wynter steps in with her arms crossed and a face that says she’s here to check on me, but also judge me.
Her lavender bob bounces when she moves, like it’s got its own personality.
She looks expensive and rested and annoyingly alive, like Europe didn’t drain her once.
Like she didn’t spend all summer turning stages into confessionals.
“I brought neither,” she says. “I brought a question. You still sure you’re cool with the smaller room?”
“For the sixth time today,” I say, “yes. You need the big room for your… outfits and your instruments and your emotional support boots.”
“They’re not boots. They’re art.”
“Your art takes up an entire wall. Besides seems fair, when your paychecks are triple the size of mine."
She looks around at my boxes and the lone suitcase sitting in the corner like it’s refusing to participate. “How’s unpacking?”
I gesture at the chaos. “I put my clothes in the closet. That’s basically adulthood. If I light a candle, I might unlock a 401k.”
Wynter laughs and tosses a garment bag onto my bed. “Here. That dress you asked to borrow.”
I unzip it and immediately feel broke. “This is expensive.”
“It’s just fabric.”
“It’s expensive fabric.”
She rolls her eyes. “You should use one of those new paychecks and buy yourself work clothes.”
“I’m buying textbooks,” I shoot back. “And paying rent. And eating. And trying not to combust every time Northbridge emails me.”
Wynter’s expression softens for half a second. “Okay, okay. Proud of you, though.”
My throat does that annoying thing where it gets tight, so I cover it with attitude. “Don’t get tender. It’s ugly on you.”
“It’s not ugly. It’s rare.”
“Exactly.”
She plops down on my bed like she lives here, which, technically, she does. “So. Pizza?”
“Yes.”
“Half veggie, half meat lovers,” she decides, already on her phone. “Extra cheese.”
“Fine.”
“And pineapple.”
“No.”
She looks up, offended. “Pineapple is elite.”
“Pineapple is a crime.”
Wynter points at me like she’s taking me to court. “Okay. No pineapple. But I’m adding anchovies.”
“That’s not even a threat. You don’t eat anchovies.”
Her smile turns slow. “Try me.”
I throw a sock at her. She dodges without flinching like she’s been training for this her whole life.
“Also,” she adds, casual, “did your ass get bigger while I was gone?”
I freeze mid-hanger. “Please don’t start.”
“Oh, I’m starting,” she says, sitting up. “Because the cheeks are cheekin’, Lee.”
“No they are not.”
“Yes they are.”
I turn, clutching the dress like it’s a shield. “Mind your business.”
“My business is you,” she says. “So either I need to turn vegan, or you been holding out on me?” She cuts me a look.
“No one is holding out on you,” I deadpan.
“That wasn’t the question.”
“You’d know if I was out here fucking,” I say, because I refuse to let my life turn into a soap opera. “I’m decentralizing men.”
Wynter makes a sound that’s half laugh, half disbelief. “No men? That’s dramatic.”
“It’s peaceful.”
She studies me for a beat. Not joking now. Just looking. Wynter can find the truth under my sarcasm like she’s got a map.
“I support it,” she says finally. “Sounds boring. But I support it. Protect your peace. Choose yourself.”
I lift my hand. “I choose me.”
She lifts hers to meet it. “Choose you, bitch. Aye.”
We clap palms, and like clockwork, the speaker comes on. Next thing I know, we’re scream-rapping Nicki’s verse on Monster like it’s a spiritual ritual.
The neighbors are already going to hate us.
They'll get over it.
The following Wednesday, I wake up early and feel… good.
I feel… at peace.
With my new job. With school. With myself, for once.
Everything is working out in a way that feels unfamiliar, like I’ve somehow ended up on karma’s good side after years of being on her watchlist.
It’s nice here.
Steam curls soft and slow around my bathroom mirror, the scent of shea and jasmine settling into my skin like something steady. I take my time moisturizing, moving slower than I usually do, like I’m not rushing to catch up to my life for once.
I pull on a skirt that says professional and a top that says I definitely slept eight hours—even though both of those are bold-faced lies. My curls are cooperating just enough, catching the morning light in soft, stubborn spirals.
Outside, the sun hits everything in that warm, golden way that makes the city look softer than it is—like it’s trying to mind its business for once.
Wynter drops me off at Mystery Bean in her G-Wagon like she’s running a luxury shuttle service, windows down, music low, the whole moment feeling a little too good to question.
“Text me if you need me,” she calls from the window.
“Thanks, Mom” I say with sweet sarcasm.
Wynter smiles like she knows I’m full of it. “Girl, bye.”
I grab my coffee, extra espresso, and head into the Kaplan building. Up to the 38th floor. To my desk. To the part of my day that always makes sense.
Numbers.
Numbers don’t flirt. Numbers don’t guilt-trip. Numbers don’t show up in your life and make you question your entire decision-making process. Numbers just sit there and wait for you to be smart.
And I am.
By mid-morning I’m deep in an audit, locked in, pen tapping while I track patterns across columns. JWM is growing fast. Not in a loud way. In a real way. Clean model. Aggressive strategy. Systems that make my brain light up because it’s not about hype, it’s about behavior.
A knock taps my desk.
Lori stands there with coffee in her hand and a smile like sunlight. “You look cute. Love that top.”
“Thank you,” I say. “You look like a daisy decided to become a person.”
She laughs. “You coming to all-hands with me? Oasis Room. Ten minutes.”
“All-hands?” I echo.
“Oh right, you’re new-new,” she says. “Come on.”
We head up the stairs with the rest of the crowd. My phone buzzes. It’s a picture from my sister.
I open it and immediately melt. Gavin is smiling wide in a bowtie and suspenders like he pays taxes and manages a portfolio. I show Lori.
“Oh my God,” she breathes. “Look at his little bowtie and suspenders. Too cute! Where do they live?”
“Hawaii. Gavin’s dad, my sister’s boyfriend, is stationed there.”
“Really? What part?”
"The Big Island."
Lori brightens. “No way. My family’s from Kauai. I’m Hawaiian and Japanese.”
That turns into a quick, warm exchange about island weather and Chicago cold and how the holidays hit different when you’ve lived both.
Then we step into the conference room and I get smacked in the face with the smell of catering.
My stomach growls like it has its own opinions.
Oh yes.
This is why people attend meetings.
“Is that sushi?” I ask, trying to see over shoulders.
Lori grins. “It better be.”
Aiden, another coworker, appears beside us like he’s been summoned by the word sushi. “What about sushi?”
“I love sushi,” I say automatically.
And immediately regret it, because my brain decides that’s the perfect moment to pull up a memory of a that time I let a perfectly built stranger wine and dine and eat me raw like sashimi.
I blink hard. Focus. Decentralizing men.
Aiden nods. “I can’t find a decent place around here.”
“Google,” I say, because I’m not about to explain how I know a place—how the last man I ghosted had me all over the city like he was collecting Pokémon.
And I, apparently, identify as Squirtle.
I shake the memory off as we find seats.
Something in the room shifts, and my body notices before I do, quiet but persistent, and I need something to ground it. My fingers reach for the mini Rubik’s cube keychain in my pocket, twisting it without looking.
“Looks like we got both of them this time,” Lori says, casually sliding her phone into the space between her arm and chest.
“What? Who?” My curiosity piqued, I glance around us, trying to catch a glimpse of whatever’s caught her attention.
A woman I don’t recognize chimes in, her voice bright and animated. “Guess someone’s back from South America.”
“South America?” Lori raises an eyebrow, looking over her shoulder. “How do you know?”
“Kristy told me,” the woman replies, a knowing smile playing on her lips.
What the hell are they talking about?
I follow the direction of their gaze. A small group near the front is laughing amongst themselves, but my focus narrows—locks—on the two men at the center.
One of them shifts.
And my heart stutters.
A tailored teal blazer molds to his shoulders like it belongs there, cognac pants doing something quietly illegal to his legs. He moves the same way I remember—unhurried, deliberate, like the room adjusts around him instead of the other way around.
My pulse spikes.
My gaze lifts without permission, tracing the line of his neck, the edge of his jaw, the familiar shape of his mouth like my body remembers before I can stop it.
August.
“Oh Fuck.”
And then his eyes find mine.
Green. Sharp. Certain.
Everything in me short-circuits.
Heat rushes up my neck, my palms going slick as instinct kicks in too late—I drop my gaze like that’ll undo it, like he didn’t already see me.
God, he looks good.
Better than he should. Better than he did that night.
My throat goes dry when I try to swallow. My leg starts bouncing under the table, nerves firing all at once, nowhere to go.
I want to disappear.
Run. Melt into the chair. Evaporate.
Anything but sit here—
caught.