The weight of my feelings flips something over inside me, and before I’ve even realized it I say: “Do you want to come over tonight?”
Oliver closes his eyes for a beat, trying to smile, but it barely curves his mouth. “I don’t think—”
Oh God. My insides have liquefied in horror. “Shit, never mind. Sorry. Of course you don’t.”
Oliver takes a step back, looking helplessly around before rubbing his face and turning back to me. “Don’t play games with me.” He looks at me, eyes searching. “Please. I can see in your eyes you’re still sort of a mess. I can see you don’t really like what you’ve done, either. It just . . . days later, it feels too late to come to me in this blur of feelings and panic, and I can’t help but feel like it’s related to you hearing about Allison.”
“No, Oliver, it’s not—”
He continues over me, shaking his head emphatically. “I’m not sure if you were really afraid this relationship would interfere with your career or were hoping to stall it before you loved me. And either way, I’m not sure what to do about it. Both options suck.” He bends, kissing me just beneath my ear, and continuing quietly, lips barely an inch from my skin: “I’m in love with you, Lola, but I’m also terrified you’ll ruin me.”
Chapter FIFTEEN
Oliver
I HAVE ABSOLUTELY NO idea how to behave around Lola. And clearly, neither does Joe.
I hadn’t seen her in the store in over a week, and when she finally walks in the morning after our awkward talk at Fred’s, immediately making her way back to the Marvel section with only a wave in my direction, Joe doesn’t even call out to her or propose in front of the entire store. I can feel him watching me, gauging my reaction.
“Lola’s here,” he says finally, lifting his chin to where she’s disappeared down the aisle.
My heart has swerved to the edge of my chest. “So she is.” She’d asked me to come home with her last night—and fuck it was tempting to imagine putting it all aside and falling into bed, relishing the sex—but not in a hundred years could I have said yes. I could practically feel her guilt, her regret last night, but Lola has no idea what she wants right now; she’s an emotional land mine, and not one I’m prepared to walk over willingly.
Joe comes around the counter to stand beside me. “You’re not going to go over there?”
“Not that it’s your business, Joe, but no. Maybe in a little bit, but it looks like she’s here to look at books.”
“I don’t get you two at all,” he says under his breath.
“I’m not going to fret over the opinion of a man who spent much of an evening out watching cows being milked before moving on to videos of men pulling trucks using ropes tied to their dicks.” It’s easier to joke, because what more can I say? Right now I reckon I don’t understand, either.
There’s a part of me—the adoring part that has long felt like Lola can do no wrong—that wants to take responsibility for all of this, sensing that I should have anticipated her panic over work versus us, that I should cut her some slack for what she said, that having dinner with Allison looked bad. But the conversation in her bedroom—where she wanted me to simply hang around while she focused on getting her work done—showed me how young she really is. Naïve, even. I knew it, truly I did, but I never really thought how it might slap me in the face.
Naïve myself, I suppose.
I want Lola to have all the success in the world, but am still bewildered over why she thought I would somehow get in the way of any of it.
And maybe more than a little wounded. I’d been Lola’s biggest fanboy and loudest cheerleader—hell, I even wear my Razor Fish T-shirt whenever it’s clean. I was the most devoted lover, too . . . even though it was only for a week. It stung to be so easily set aside.
Still, with her near, I’m aware that I’ve never needed or wanted anyone like this. It’s a pull, nearly a physical draw to be close to her. Just knowing she’s in the store, a swarm of bees has taken over my chest until it feels like I’m shimmering inside. Her hair is down, lips full and bare. I remember the drowsy tilt of her head, watching me kiss my way down her body, the feel of her thighs over my shoulders, the honey of her cunt on my tongue.
Lola looks up from behind her comic, catching me staring, and waves limply. I wave back, then turn and find Joe right behind me, his eyes skipping from me to Lola before he shakes his head.
“Well this fucking sucks,” he says.
“It’s fine.” I crack open a tube of pennies and dump it into the register drawer.