Chapter 14 Nora
NORA
There were plans scattered all over my kitchen table.
I had removed all the chairs, so that I could walk laps around it while I worked to get a different perspective. If this didn’t work, I’d tape them in a different order on my wall and stare at it for an hour.
The process was annoying, but it always worked.
“What are you looking for, exactly?”
I jumped. “Shit, Rae, I totally forgot you were even here.”
She slowly chewed her popcorn. “Sorry, it’s just that you’ve been walking around that table forever and I’ve been trying to be quiet, but I can’t take much more.”
Moving one of the papers, I examined it in the light.
“The reception area isn’t working for me. I need it closer to the front door, and there should be bathrooms here, in case the homeless need to access them, but don’t want to interrupt anything.”
Rae walked closer, still snacking.
We hadn’t talked about anything but these plans for two days straight and it was wearing on me. While my back had gotten better, I was still trying to be careful with it.
“I agree.” Rae nodded, looking over the plans. “Okay, the last thing we need to go over is the flooring.”
I finally slumped onto my couch and stared at the fire that had been going all day.
“Why don’t we take a break and go down to the diner? My dad just made your favorite pie.”
Perking up at her suggestion, I set down the plans.
“The berry crumble one? Because you always think I like that lemon flavor, and I don’t. I hate it, and yet, you’ve effectively used it to lure me to your parents’ diner several times. I’m not falling for it this time.”
She slumped next to me, holding the metal tin of popcorn.
“It’s the berry one, I promise!”
“Okay, fine.”
Ten minutes later, I was walking into Mac & Millie’s, the local diner, owned by Rae’s parents, Roger and Millie.
Once we sat down, her dad brought us over pie and ice cream.
“Okay, you need to spill Colson details ASAP.” She dug into her pie, her engagement ring catching on the Christmas lights. It was still strange for me to see that on her. Because of the community center, we hadn’t even had time to talk about it.
“You sure you don’t want to talk wedding ideas first?”
Her blue eyes went wide and for a single second, I thought I had her, but she lifted her fork instead. “Nice try, now spill.”
Darting a quick look around to ensure we wouldn’t be overheard, I leaned forward.
“So, I did what you suggested…”
She licked the fork clean before it registered with her.
“You were honest with him about how you feel?”
Nodding, I scooped the vanilla ice cream and smeared it over the top of the pie, then broke and shook my head.
“No, I’m lying.” Dropping my fork, I confessed. “After the back injury thing, we had a really good day. I mean like falling for him so hard type of day, and that night…well things got physical, but before the physical stuff, he started asking me questions about my plans and stuff.”
My best friend’s mouth dropped.
“Oh my gosh, so he cared for you all day, asked about your future, and thennn he. . .” Her eyebrows jumped suggestively.
Smothering a laugh, I nodded with a little groan. “Rae, he’s like Ice Barbarian huge for real. We didn’t even have sex like real sex and I’m sore.”
“You didn’t have sex…then how?” She trailed off with her brow puckered.
Leaning into whisper, I explained, “He just…sort of stretched me by going all the way in and then he…you know.” I sat back, grabbing my fork again.
“Finished.” She bent forward, whisper yelling, “As in, he finished inside you?”
I nodded, keeping my eyes on my plate so she’d move past this.
“Nora, you are the queen of not letting guys finish without being wrapped. How could you let him…”
“Because he’s Colson, okay?” I snapped, hating how defensive I was.
Rae leaned back with a warning look. “Girl, fine…you’re an adult. You know what you’re doing, but I also know you absolutely are too far gone for this man to be letting him spread his seed without buying some property first.”
Her eyes narrowed as her fork clanked to the plate. “Unless…did he declare his love, ask to be your boyfriend?”
This was where my heart stuttered to a stop, thudding pathetically slow at what had occurred.
“No, he didn’t.” Toying with a blueberry in the cobbler, I took a deep breath and explained, “I suggested we should be casual…have no strings attached sex.”
Rae’s face fell flat, her mouth turning down and her brows following.
“Nora Petrov, you did not.”
I nodded sheepishly, knowing my best friend was going to verbally kick my ass.
“Tell me he didn’t agree.”
“He did.”
We both inhaled collective sighs as the bustle of the diner drowned out our silence.
“Do you think he’s just doing it because you said it first?”
I had considered that it was possible that I had shot myself in the foot by saying it first, but…
“He has to know with how he’s treated me over the past year that I’m on defense…and if he wanted to change his play, he would have to be the one to do it. He would have to make it abundantly clear how he felt because every time I have, he’s made me feel like an idiot.”
She gave me a sad nod, then dug back into the flaky crust of the pie.
“So, how far will you take this?”
Shrugging, I watched a flurry of snow fly around outside.
Across the street was a tiny shop, all closed up with brown paper covering the windows.
I knew Rae’s fiancé owned it now, but for as long as I could remember, it had been my mother’s.
I used to come into Rae’s parents’ diner, sit here with her while we did our homework, or help her journal about her larger than life and completely impossible crush.
Which happened to be Davis, the man she was now engaged to.
It was all simpler back then. My parents were my entire world, my everything…
and now they were leaving soon, and I honestly didn’t feel like I had them at all.
Which only made this test with Colson that much more painful.
Part of me preferred it though, it was easier to handle heartbreak when you knew what you were gambling.
But going in blind? That was something I didn’t know if I’d ever be able to do again.
“We can date other people, and we can have no strings-attached sex. We’re having fun.”
Rae watched me carefully, finishing her pie until she finally pushed it away.
“I asked how far you were willing to take it.”
I didn’t know.
“I think it might depend on him, he’s been silent for two days and I refuse to make the first move. So, if he’s over it, then it’s done.”
“But…” My best friend narrowed her eyes. “If he shows up tonight and asks for hot and heavy sex, you’ll say…” She held her hand out, encouraging me to continue.
“I don’t know, probably yes. The man is talented with his tongue.”
Slapping the table with her palms, she angrily scolded me. “No, Nora. The answer is no, you will not.”
Rolling my eyes, I argued. “But why?”
“Because you’re in love with him, you’ve been in love with him…
you forget that I found your Pinterest Wedding board that you had created for him.
You can’t do no strings, because you have nothing but strings with him.
You’re tied to him emotionally, and letting him stick his dick inside you, then go on a date with someone else will kill you. ”
Feeling frustrated at how right she was, I slid out of the booth and tossed a few dollars on the table. “Let’s go visualize the spaces at the community center before it gets too dark.”
Rae followed but not without a warning. “We aren’t done talking about this.”
I knew she was right.
The point of me telling him how I felt was to see if he was being genuine with the whole savior act, or if it was more of an obligation to him.
Which now that I hadn’t done that, I had no idea where he stood.
I knew this had an expiration date, but I couldn’t explain it, there was some place deep within me that wanted this tiny piece of him.
Even if it was the only thing I’d ever get.
Once Rae and I were finished with the community center, and she had left, it allowed me the opportunity to process the fact that Colson hadn’t stopped by.
I had heard him leave in the mornings, but now that my life wasn’t tied to his in the way of needing heat, a tree removed, or assistance with my back, we sort of seemed to slip back into the way things were.
Maybe he was already done with me...
It was too frustrating to think about, so finally calling the workday to a close and emailing the finishing touches to Rae, I put on Vampire Diaries.
I was right in the middle of settling into the couch when someone knocked on my front door. Assuming it was my best friend who had probably gotten my email and hadn’t left town yet because she was a workaholic, I huffed an irritated breath.
Refusing to get up again, I snuggled deeper into the cushions and yelled, “Just use your key!”
When the lock turned a few seconds later, I pressed play, thinking my assumption was correct.
“Hey,” a deep, very un-Rae-like voice said from the entryway.
My head spun so fast, I might have given myself whiplash.
Colson appeared in dark jeans, brown work boots covered in snow, and a gray flannel that buttoned all the way up to his throat.
He had a day’s worth of scruff along his jaw, and his eyes looked tired.
All I wanted to do was jump up and hug him, ask how his day was and why he’d stayed away from me for two days.
Instead, I shoved all that way down and asked, “How do you have a key to my house?”
Colson smirked, dipping to unlace his boots.
“You don’t have one to mine?”
Already annoyed with him, I returned my attention back to the screen. “I don’t even have your cell phone number, why would I have a key?”
Walking over in his socks, he dropped right next to me on the couch.
“Well, I stole mine…figured you had done the same thing when you broke into my house.”