Page 56 of Fighting Spirit

Chapter Twenty-Five

ROWAN

“You’re the dumbest man alive,” Trevor deadpans. I still have my forehead against the kitchen island, fingers laced together behind my head as if this could shield me from my own stupidity.

“I know,” I groan.

“They’re gonna tell stories about this for years.”

“I know.”

“Songs will be sung!” he gloats, and I can sense him dancing around out the corner of my eye.

“Trev, can you not?”

“A decade from now, kids are gonna ask about the guy to blow it the hardest anyone’s ever blown it, and someone is gonna open up their dictionary and show a picture of your face.”

I lift my head, a deep frown on my face. “That doesn’t even make sense.”

“My point still stands!”

“You don’t have a point!” I run my hands through my hair, the tangles catching on my knuckles. “I didn’t blow anything! There was nothing to blow!”

Trev’s face says everything he’s thinking. I grab a dishrag he left on the counter and hurl it at his head, trying to wipe awaythat stupid expression. Because however much he lives to give me shit, it’s also pretty obvious he thinks I’m full of it.

It’s not that I wish I hadn’t stopped Ruth, I don’t. At least, I don’t think I do.

I only wish I hadn’t been so fuckin’ awkward about it. She took me by surprise and I wasn’t able to handle it properly. Now she’s probably gone away thinking I’m mad at her or that there’s something wrong with her or some shit like that, and that’s not even close to the truth.

I just like being her friend. We haven’t known each other all that long, and it feels like the start of a really good thing. I’m not about to complicate it and risk fuckin’ it up.

The squeak of the stool against the laminate flooring alerts me to Trevor sitting across from me. He reaches across the space, pulling one of my hands out of the tangle they’re currently clenched in and holding it between both of his, giving me a gentle squeeze that I return.

“I thought you liked her?”

“We’re friends.”

He frowns, no longer teasing, just unsure. “Just friends?”

“Yes!”

Something like pity washes over him. I hate it. “Ro, you’ve never talked about anyone the way you talk about her.”

“How do I talk about her?”

“Constantly.”

I pause, pulling my hand back to pick at the dry skin on my knuckles. “I’m just not good at this.”

“At what?”

I wave my hand between us in a vague gesture. “All...feelings and stuff, you know, it kinda sneaks up on me; I never know for sure.”

Trevor and I have talked in the past about my demisexuality, the way I never feel attraction unless I know someone well first.It means I need time to figure out how I’m feeling and when I do, it doesn’t always look the way people might expect.

“But you think you might?”

“I don’t know,” I grumble. “Maybe? I guess?”

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