Page 20 of Bad At Love

She pulled back with a curse, her chest rising and falling. “Give them back. You’re acting like a child.”

“Me?” he said, holding them above his head. “You’re insisting on going to Pooja’s house at eleven thirty in the night. What the hell do you think she’s going to assume?”

A flicker of hesitation cut through her fury. “I already called her and left a couple of voicemails and texts.”

“What? When?”

“After my shower.” Her cheeks reddened, and he realized she’d done it because she’d felt bad about jerking off to him. “I want to explain to her, beg her if that’s what it takes. Clearly, she’s important enough that you’re...I will fix it.”

“There’s no fixing this. Not the way you think,” he said, his mind made up.

It wasn’t how he’d wanted to admit the biggest truth of his life but then when had anything involving her gone to plan? He’d fallen in love with her at their first meeting nearly twenty years ago, only to discover that she was engaged to one of his friends.

He threw the keys and phone down on the coffee table. “Pooja doesn’t want to go out with me anymore. Not unless I get my head screwed on straight, not unless…” he said, dropping to the couch and rubbing the heels of his palms over his eyes.

“Screw your head straight on?” Chaaru mumbled, squeezing herself between his legs and coffee table. “DP, you’re the most sensible, grounded man in the entire world. What the hell does she mean?”

DP looked up, his heart hammering in his chest so loudly that it should be a soundtrack. His stomach coiled and unraveled in painful pulses as if the rope he’d tied himself to had slackened. “She thinks I’ve got someone else in my head.” His mouth dried as he struggled to hold her gaze, and his palms turned clammy. “She’s not wrong.”

Chaaru leaned back as if to get a better look at him. “Another woman? But that’s…”

He simply stared back at her.

Slowly, it dawned on her. Her eyes searched his, breath escaping her lips in shaky pants. “Just because you answered my call and cut the date short? That’s bullshit.”

He kept his gaze on her, willing her to acknowledge the truth in his. “She said you always come first in my life and that it’s not fair.”

Something almost feral awakened in her light brown eyes, sending a sharp, near-painful spike of hope through him. “That’s not like Pooja.” Her words were a whisper, as if to not disturb the giant stomping elephant around them. “Didn’t you explain we’re just friends and that you feel sorry for me-”

“I don’t feel sorry for you and she’s right, okay?” His voice rose, thundering in the surrounding quiet. “My God! Why is it so fucking hard for you to understand that you’re in my head? You’re there, okay? All the time.”

The fear of losing her was a buzzing beehive in his throat. But now that he could see how pathetic he’d become in clinging to the margins of her life…he couldn’t go back. He couldn’t swallow it all back down. And once the words came, they poured out. “Pooja sees that I’m into you or attracted to you or whatever the hell people call it these days, okay?”

“But...” she said, grabbing his hands. And then jerked away, as if burned. As if reality had suddenly shifted into some extra dimension, with truth underlying everything between them now.

Turning away, he grabbed his umbrella, just to give his hands something to hold onto, an icy fist in the pit of his stomach. At the door, he stilled, his back to her. “All I wanted was some distance so that it doesn’t ruin our relationship, so that you’re…not in my head so much. I’m so tired of pretending like…”

“Stop, DP. Please.”

That she couldn’t even bear to hear his admission hit him like a body blow. “Okay,” he said automatically, every cell in him programmed to care for her. Even as he wanted to drive away to some far-off place.

He wanted a shred of happiness with a partner who wanted the same things as he did. It wasn’t too much to ask, he reassured himself. But that would never be possible with Chaaru around. Maybe moving away was the only choice left.

He turned the handle when she said, “I can’t, DP.” Tears croaked the words, but they still landed, crystal-sharp spikes on his soft heart. “We can’t go there. Ever. It’s not a line I’m willing to cross. If something went wrong, and it usually does with me, I…” she left the sentence hanging.

He thumped his forehead against the bright yellow door.

The color of happiness, she’d said years ago, dragging him through the paint store for hours, looking for the exact shade.

“I can’t…” she stammered, nearly choking on the words.

He hadn’t hoped for a different answer, rationally. But it seemed there was a tiny, fragile bud of hope. Crushed, it nearly took him out at his knees.

“I know, sweetheart,” he said, without turning. “And I never meant to put the burden of this on you. Or to make you feel as if you owe me a decision.”

She whispered, “I’m so sorry, DP,” over and over.

Even now, as he felt ragged and used up, he wanted to go to her. He wanted to hold her and comfort her and tell her she had ruined nothing. That he would always love her and…

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