Chapter 57
Chapter Fifty-Seven
Savannah
How Do I Fix This?
I have a smile on my face when I wake up in Noah’s arms. The sun is shining in through his giant window, but I’m pretty sure it’s the kisses he’s peppering down my neck and on my shoulder that wake me up more than the light.
“Good morning,” he says into my shoulder blade when he realizes I’m awake.
A huge part of me was terrified he’d regret his decisions from last night by this morning, but he seems to have doubled down.
He’s kissing me and lazily running his fingers in patterns down my arms like he hasn’t a care in the world.
And honestly, I don’t think I’ve ever been happier.
I want to tell Clay he was wrong, that Noah just needed a little more time.
I want to introduce him to my brothers. Maybe this can be when someone shocks the world by caring more about me, even after he knows…
“What are you doing next Sunday?” I ask, trying not to sound nervous, or like it’s a big deal. “I know you have a game, but after?”
“I’m not sure how…can I let you know on Sunday?”
“Of course.” I don’t think Dallas would mind getting a ticket for me that doesn’t end up getting used, but I try to hide the hurt that I’m still a last-minute decision for Noah, not someone he wants to plan future things with.
Last night’s milk and cookies used up all the milk, so we go to Words and Lattes for breakfast. Noah holds my hand the entire walk over, wraps his arm around me while we wait in line, pays for our order, then brings me to sit in his lap instead of across from him in the booth.
“Scared I’ll run away?” I ask, mostly teasing, but also trying not to be nervous about what feels like a very momentous first sober outing as a couple.
“Just reassuring myself this is real.” His tone is also teasing, but his eyes find mine and the vulnerability in them makes me kiss him. Which gets us some looks from the other patrons, but honestly, at the moment, I don’t care.
Our food arrives, but Noah keeps me in his lap, which is awkward, but I don’t mind. Every time I bite my bottom lip, Noah kisses me, as if to say he’ll always reassure me from my insecurities.
“You know what? I don’t care,” he says after one of those kisses.
“About what?” My phone buzzes in my pocket, but Noah left his at home, so I’m ignoring it.
“Whatever it is you want me to do after the game next Sunday—”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“It does. It means something to you, and that means everything to me, so if you want me to be there, I will.”
“You mean it?”
“Of course.” He doesn’t look happy so much as determined, but my heart swells.
A group of students walk in and start pointing as soon as they spot us. One of them has her phone out, like she’s about to take a picture, so I prepare to get off him and blend into the background, but Noah’s grip doesn’t loosen.
“She wants you, Noah, not me,” I point out.
“Doesn’t really matter when I just want you,” he argues.
“I’m not jealous,” I assure him.
“I might be,” he apologizes.
I smile, because I have never been this happy, but my phone plays Dallas’ ringtone.
“I’ll just be a minute.”
I get up and walk away from the table, but by then I’ve missed his call.
I go to call him back, but I have hundreds of notifications and texts.
A new one pops up with an Instagram comment, so I click on it and find a picture of me, Kinsey, Dallas, and Clay.
I look terrible in it, covered with pimples and wearing glasses and braces, but you can tell it’s me.
Kinsey went through the trouble of tagging me, and my brothers, as well as their teams, the Wolves, and Wynchester University.
The photo has been liked, commented on, and shared by numbers that have a K at the end.
I’m hyperventilating, and I think I’d prefer to pass out than deal with this right now, but I need to tell Noah before he finds out on his own.
“Callahan!”
I’m halfway to Noah when Tanner, who was in line, spots him and makes his way over.
“Can you ask her about a signed jersey now, or do we still have to wait?”
My entire body stiffens. I don’t think I’m breathing. I come up with excuses and apologies to the questions Noah is about to ask, but instead he looks over to me. And he doesn’t seem shocked or confused – he looks guilty.
“Savannah, this isn’t—”
Noah gets up from the booth as Tanner turns around and spots me. His face drops.
“I didn’t realize you were here, or I never would have…” He sighs, then puts a hand on my shoulder, as if comforting me after a loss, which really, this is. “I’m so sorry, Savannah.”
I push past him and run out the café, trying my best to block out whatever Noah is saying as he tries to stop me.
“Savannah!” Noah calls after me. “Please, wait, I can explain.”
I don’t want to stop, because I don’t want him to see me cry, but he curses and then it sounds like he slips, so I turn to yell at him that I don’t want his explanation while also making sure he’s okay. He ran after me in his t-shirt.
“You’re going to freeze to death,” I reproach.
“I don’t care about the fucking weather, I care that I hurt you, when I was just trying not to.”
“Was your plan to say all those things last night to butter me up so I’d get my brother to give you a signed jersey?” Even saying the words makes me sick to my stomach.
“They want to donate it to the silent auction, but no, not at all. There was no plan. I told everyone to pretend like you weren’t even related, because I knew that was what you wanted.”
“Of course, you know me so well that—” He looks so guilty. I’d assumed he must have figured it out when my face was plastered on the screen after Dallas’ Christmas win, but now I don’t think so. “How, Noah? When did you find out?”
“I don’t care, Savannah. It has zero bearing on how I feel about you.”
“How long, Noah?” I ask before he’s done.
“Was it before Christmas?” I can feel my heart pounding in my chest, but contrary to every other time he’s had me feeling this way, it hurts.
And I can’t breathe in a bad way, because though I can’t come right out and ask if he knew before we had sex without showing how much it hurts, the look on his face tells me he did.
“Before we started being friends with benefits? Before you kissed me? When we met?”
“Parker’s birthday,” he admits, and just like that, it hurts more than if he’d found out at the end-of-term party.
“When you walked me home,” I say like it means nothing, but that’s the first time I really felt that he wanted me, not someone to watch his sister or do friends with benefits, but me.
“Fuck,” I curse. It seems like the thing to do when everything you thought you knew comes into question.
But it doesn’t make me feel better. At all.
“It’s not like you ever told me about them, Sav. You didn’t want me to know, so I pretended I didn’t, and as the guys found out, I made sure they did the same.”
“I don’t care if people know about my brothers, Noah, I care how they treat me after they find out, compared to before. If they try to get closer, if they stick around, if they suddenly go against everything they’ve been saying for months and suck me in with lies and—”
“That’s not what this is,” he stops me. “It had nothing to do with him, I promise.”
“You changed when you found out, Noah. You walked me home. You slept over, and it felt like we were more than just a research project. Now I don’t know if that’s because of him, or me.”
“Then ask me.”
I want to believe whatever his answer would be, but I’m doubting everything.
“When I found out, more than anything, I was relieved, because it explained why Parker was so close to you. How you figured out our door handle faster than we did. You weren’t someone’s one that got away, you were someone’s sister.”
“He’s not just someone, Noah. He’s a guy on your dad’s favorite team, who’s last name is your dad’s first,” I repeat what Izzie told me about why Dallas was her favorite player.
“How do I fix this?”
“Do you even want to?” I hate how my voice cracks with the question, and the tears I hastily wipe away, glaring at Noah when he looks like he wants to step closer and wipe them for me.
“Come on, Peaches, you know how I feel about you.”
“I know who you are when we’re alone in a bedroom, but I also know you don’t do relationships.
That we can be friends with benefits, but you still introduce me as your sister’s babysitter, if you introduce me at all.
You have literally pretended not to know me to avoid introducing me to people.
And even after last night’s promises, you still couldn’t give me a straight answer on whether you want to see me on Sunday, like you were waiting for a better option. ”
“Is that what you think I’m doing? Fuck, Savannah, that’s just me—”
“Keeping your options open. I guess I should be flattered I made the cut so often, but it felt like I was right back in high school with Kinsey, getting added to plans at the last minute.”
“That’s not at all what I’m doing.”
“I was clearly too late, and that’s on me, but inviting you next Sunday…that was me trying to let you in. To bring you to family dinner and a game so I could introduce you to everyone. Instead, you just reinforced why it’s so much easier when I don’t.”
“Of course, it’s easier, Savannah. If you don’t let anyone in, you can’t get hurt. I get that authors live vicariously through their characters, but you hide behind yours.”
It feels like a slap because it’s true. My entire life, I’ve written about the things I wished for, like having a sister or finding love, but after a few abysmal failures every time I tried to join in on things in high school, I started playing it safe, letting my characters take all the chances I wanted to.
It’s so much easier when I decide the outcome.