Page 66 of Late Nights

Me: That’s weird. There’s a girl who keeps me up late playing video games too.

Demi: SHE keeps you awake?

I smile, able to picture the exact look she would be giving me right now if we were talking face to face. Her brows would be lifted in a pointed stare, her arms crossed against her chest.

Me: Yeah, she keeps me awake most nights.

Me: Like tonight.

It wasn’t smart to send those texts, but I couldn’t help it. The barrier of texting always made me say more than I normally would.

Demi: But you didn’t even play video games with her.

Me: I know.

Demi: Is she why you’re not sleeping now?

Me: Yes. She’s all I can think about.

Me: I know I have no right to tell you that, but I didn’t want you to think you are the only one having a hard time reconciling your feelings with why I think it’s best for us to stay friends.

Demi: It would be a heck of a lot easier if I did think of you as just a friend.

I shouldn’t have smiled at the text, but I did. It was wrong of me to be so happy that she was still struggling to put me back in the friend zone. I recognized that it made no sense that I was demanding only friendship from her, but I didn’t want her to think of me like that at all.

Me: It would be a heck of a lot easier if I thought of you as just a friend too.

Me: And if I stopped thinking about our moment on the dock.

I squeezed my eyes shut and smacked myself in the forehead. I really shouldn’t have texted that. I blamed it on how late it was and the boldness I only had when texting in the dark.

Demi: I knew you’d be a good kisser, but I had no idea it was going to be that amazing.

Demi: So really, it’s your fault that it’s so hard to go back to being just friends.

I chuckled, glad we could still tease during such a serious conversation.

Me: My fault? No way. You were too tempting.

Me: I’d be able to go to sleep tonight if I didn’t remember how good it felt to have you in my arms, to know how amazing your lips felt on mine.

There was a pause in our texting, and I worried I had said too much. But then her response came through.

Demi: You said you didn’t regret kissing me, and I want you to know that if friendship is all we ever have, I don’t regret it either. I don’t think I could ever regret anything with you.

An emotion I couldn’t put my finger on washed over me, a warm tingling feeling. The pinprick sensation in my eyes had me blinking fast to compose myself. I read her words over and over.

She couldn’t really mean that. Could she?

My mind wanted to immediately go to how I’d somehow fooled her into thinking I was a better man than I was, but Demi knew me. She knew me in some ways more than West.

Another text came through while I was stuck on her previous one.

Demi: With that being said, I want you to know I respect your boundaries and will not do anything to cross the line between friends and something more.

I was both grateful and disappointed with her text. Gosh, I really was messed up. How was I supposed to respond to that?

When I thought back on our time together over the last three and half weeks, I realized she’d never once done anything to push us to be more. It wasn’t until I had kissed her that she had wondered why I wasn’t willing to try to take the next step with her. And she had every right to ask me that after I had kissed her.

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