Page 32 of Love Me Boldly

“Yeah. I mean…” He paused, swiped at his hair, and then blew out a breath. “We’ve been friends a long time. She’s…well…snotty is the best word, but she’s got a heart of gold beneath all of that. We’re just friends, though. That’s all we’ve ever been.”

His tone became more strained as he tried to explain.

“She made it sound like more.”

His expression turned pained, and I was about to let it go because this was another one of those things he seemed like he didn’t want to talk about, but then he grumbled something I couldn’t hear.

He closed his eyes. When he opened them, I expected to see the same playfulness he usually showed me, but there was something dark in them. Something cold. Like he was in the room physically, but he’d gone somewhere entirely else in the span of time it took him to blink.

“We lost someone last year. Someone important to both of us. Since then…I don’t know. I think my family had always thought I’d end up with our friend, but she and I hadn’t wanted that. Now that she’s gone, Piper’s been…territorial of me? I don’t know if that’s the right word. But yeah…I’m sorry if she said anything. I can talk to her.”

“No.” I shook my head. She’d questioned me, she’d made implications, but she also hadn’t been wrong. I wasn’t anything special, and whatever this was wouldn’t be long-term.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered. Because the pain of losing someone was difficult, and the way he said it made it seem like that loss was final. “Did you love her?”

It was absolutely none of my business, but Eli’s words came back to me loud and clear. This explained his hard year. This explained why Piper said he never talked to girls. Was he…mourning?

“Yes? No? I mean, yeah. In a way, but not that way. We were just really good friends. Her dad and mine were super close. They hung out together all the time, so we were always together. And then Piper’s family moved into our neighborhood when she was seven or something, and then it was the three of us. We were G, P, and Fee because parts of all of our names rhymed. I got older and obviously got guy friends and teammates and stuff, but for Piper, it was always Fee. She’s taken the loss harder and changed. I don’t blame her for it. For me, it kind of opened my eyes to what I wanted out of life. Piper, well, she’s struggling.”

Now that I understood, I could sympathize with her. I didn’t exactly want to feel bad about a girl who’d been rude to me, but we all struggled with something, and her current pains seemed to be pretty major.

“I’m sorry,” I said again. I knew the pain of losing people, even if mine were still alive. It didn’t make the loss easier knowing they chose to go away.

Graham shrugged and then took another pull of his water. I let him take the time he needed, drinking my own water, until he came back to me with that friendly grin.

“Did I scare you off yet?”

Bending my legs, I brought my heels to the couch and rested my cheek on my knees while facing him. If I was looking to leave, which I should have been, it would have been the perfect excuse. And yet, that’s all it would have been—an excuse.

The more Graham opened up, the more I realized I was starting to fall for this guy, and not only was I doing it without a safety net…I couldn’t bring myself to pull the cord, release my parachute, and get myself off this crazy trip.

“No. Not yet.”

Had I been standing, his answering smile would have sent my knees wobbling.

NINE

HOLLY

Chipotle came. I was only mildly embarrassed by how quickly I devoured it along with the mess I made. Considering Graham ate his burrito bowl in half the time and we both annihilated the chips, queso, and guacamole, I wasn’toverlyembarrassed by my lack of manners or clean eating.

He put on a reality show where people lived on cruise ships, but most of the time, we talked. I moved us away from the loss of his friend after telling him I wasn’t leaving, and somehow, that seemed to help him relax. I asked him if he wanted to go to that hockey party, and he asked if I drank.

When I said no, he shrugged. “That answers that then.”

“I do go to parties. And we met at a bar.”

“Yeah, well, I don’t feel like going somewhere where people are already half drunk and stupid if we’re both sober, so it’s more for me.”

“But you drink,” I pointed out.

“Maybe one. Usually I sip a beer until it gets warm and then set it aside. I used to, but I think losing someone the way I have puts things in perspective. My friends know they can call me if they need rides, though.”

He was more of an open book than I would have anticipated, and he kept surprising me. It wasn’t only the kind of guy he was or how much I was learning we had in common.

To some, maybe the heavy would have been too much, but I’d lived with heavy my whole life.

Perhaps that was why my mouth opened, and I found myself saying, “My mom took off when I was seven.”

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