Page 119 of Betting on the Best Friend
No more bad decisions. No more regrets. No more getting this wrong.
I push away from her to sit against the headboard. My chest heaves as I press the heels of my hands into my eyes, trying to reorient my senses in the inky dark.
There’s a rustle and the mattress moves as Ruby sits up. “You’re going to take off.” It’s an accusation.
I let it sit there for several seconds before I confirm. “Yeah.”
“Don’t.”
But I’m already climbing out of the bed. I need fresh air that doesn’t smell like peaches.
“You can’t keep running away.”
“I’m not running away. I’m not mad. But I need to think.”
“About my question?”
“About a lot of things. May I be excused, Miss Ramos?”
A sigh. “Yes.”
I change into jeans, and less than a minute later, I close the hotel room door behind me on a very loud silence and escape.
Chapter Forty
Charlie
I don’t have anywherein mind to go, and at almost 4:00 in the morning, the hotel lobby has an abundance of empty chairs, so I choose one in a corner, away from the non-existent traffic flow.
I set a whole plan in motion for Ruby to fall in love with me when she didn’t seem to get it on her own.
That plan was designed to give her an epiphany. To be thunderstruck.
Then I decided it was sneaky. I’d rather keep our friendship over anything, and I was honest with her.
She was thunderstruck that I was in love with her. She was not thunderstruck by love.
We made missteps. We moved back toward each other. We were maybe figuring it out.
We kissed.
Ruby declared that she’d been thunderstruck.
And I told her chemistry didn’t count. That real love wasn’t an epiphany. That it grows organically. That no one has to make you see it.
More kissing.
More distance.
A hotel room with one bed. Another Ruby confession. Another rejection from me.
A bolster on the bed and a warning.
And a dream came true, perfect because Ruby was in it. Perfect when I woke up because she was still there.
What if . . .
. . . I just believed her?
