Erin McCarthy - Sweet

He took it from me and put it to his mouth. “True. But I have to tell you, Jess, Riley doesn’t let girls get close to him. He’s put himself out there for you.”

I looked at my feet, still bare from getting into bed with Riley. I needed to redo my pedicure. The paint was chipped. “I know. I’ve put myself out there, too. And Riley used that against me.”

The back door flew open, and Riley stood there, looking enraged. “We need to talk.”

“I have nothing to say to you.”

“Get in the goddamn house,” he said.

Like that was going to make me comply? I bristled. “Screw you.”

“Not tonight.”

That was so out of line, I grabbed the pack of cigarettes and threw it at him.

He caught it in his left hand.

I should have whipped the glass ashtray at his head instead. It would have been a lot more satisfying to knock him unconscious.

Headlights flooded the driveway and I hopped off the table, grabbing my purse. “I’ll talk to you later, Tyler.”

Tyler didn’t say anything.

I gave Riley a glare. “You, I don’t want to talk to at all.”

“Don’t walk away, Jessica, I’m not kidding.”

He started toward me and I ran.

Robin and I curled up on her sofa under a squishy comforter and drank chocolate milk, watching The Notebook . She was crying. I felt numb.

She was already living in the house that we had rented for the following school year with Kylie and Rory. The previous tenants, graduating seniors, were still living there, but Robin had the one empty bedroom that had belonged to an overachiever who already had secured a job in finance and moved into a trendy apartment.

My parents were supposed to pay for my portion of the rent once the fall semester started, but I had no idea if I was going to be able to manage that on my own now. I had figured I would let my friends rent my spot to someone else and I would stay with Riley, but how could I do that now?

I wanted to cry, but it was like the tears were trapped inside me, along with a scream of frustration. It was like my heart had actually been removed from my body and left back at Riley’s, beating on the kitchen table. I was feeling weird and morbid and not like me at all. Like I was so angry that it was smothering all my other emotions.

Robin hooked her arm through mine and leaned on my shoulder. “Do you ever wonder if you have any idea what you’re doing?” she asked, her voice melancholy.

“Um, yes, daily.” That was the problem. I was sure I had convictions, but I couldn’t figure out who I was supposed to be. Who I wanted to be. Who I could be.

Riley was blowing up my phone with “I’m sorry” and asking to see me. I wasn’t answering. I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t know how to explain that what he had done had seemed like a huge betrayal. That I had spent my life seeking approval, and never getting it, and I needed it without question from him. I needed to trust that he not only loved me and was attracted to me, he liked me.

“I did something awful,” Robin said in a small voice, her eyes red and weepy, hair falling out of her sloppy bun.

Looking at her curiously, I said, “What?”

She shook her head. “It doesn’t matter. But I’m wondering if I even know myself at all.”

“You do,” I reassured her. “But we all fuck up sometimes. It’s okay. You just have to forgive yourself.”

“We need to forgive other people, too,” she said, giving me a long look. “Stop being so angry all the time.”

That was a direct hit at me. I knew there was truth to it.

Anger was an easy emotion to control. It was a powerful one. It didn’t allow you to be passive or dominated or hurt. You couldn’t be vulnerable if you were lashing out at someone.

Yet it also kept me from ever reaching that place of trust I was looking for, the place I was demanding Riley arrive at, without me.

But if I opened up that box I tightly kept my emotions, in who knew what might come spewing out?

In the middle of my Sunday night shift at work, my hair slipping from its bun, I rushed to the table that had just been seated. “Hi, my name is Jess—”

I cut off when I saw that it was Riley sitting at the table by himself, giving me a sheepish smile.

“Hey,” he said.

“What are you doing here?” I asked uneasily, glancing around the restaurant. No one was looking at us.

“Eating?” He shrugged. “You won’t answer my texts or my calls. I needed to talk to you.”

I should have known that he wouldn’t accept my silence. Truthfully, I knew I couldn’t keep ignoring him, but I needed more than a few hours to get my head on straight. The plan had been to talk to him on Monday, after he got off work. “This isn’t the place.”

“What was I supposed to do? Look, I’m really, really sorry about last night. I talk before I think and shit comes out that shouldn’t. I was half asleep, it just slipped out.”

He wasn’t getting it. That wasn’t really the problem. “Except that you obviously were really bothered by the idea of how many guys I’ve been with, so I needed to hear that, to know that. You obviously don’t respect me.”

“No, it’s not that.” His hand came out, like he was going to take mine, but he stopped himself. “It’s pure jealousy, which is totally different from judgment. I know being jealous is wrong, I know that, and I want to get ahold of it, but the thing is, Jess, I’ve never felt the way about a girl the way I feel about you. I love you.”

Oh, God. I took a deep breath, my heart squeezing. It was so hard to think when he was looking at me like that, his brown eyes so big and sincere and pleading.

“I want to be important to you. Special.” He shook his head and gave a soft laugh. “Do you know how stupid I feel saying that? I think my balls just dropped to the floor.”

My fingertips were shaking, and I wanted desperately to kiss him, to lean forward and feel his mouth on mine. He loved me, and I believed him. “It takes a real man to be honest. And you are important to me. The most special guy I’ve ever met. The guy. But last night I needed you to be there for me, and you put that jealousy on me.”

“I know, and I’m so sorry. Please come home tonight. Please. I’ll pick you up after work.”

“It’s not my home,” I said, though I wasn’t even sure why I said that. It wasn’t the time or the place to get into it.

“Yes, it is. And I owe you a true apology in it.”

“Jessica!” One of the other servers went rushing past me, giving me an exasperated look, her tray filled with drinks. “Table thirty-seven.”

Shit. “Give me five.” I rushed off to the bar to put in orders from the table I had greeted before Riley and I ordered a beer for him.

“Who is the hottie you were talking to?” Mandy the bartender asked, with a speculative look over at Riley.

“That’s my boyfriend,” I told her because I already knew I was going to go home with Riley and I was going to listen to what he had to say. I was going to give him the ear that I never got with my family, the right to explain himself without having already made my decision.

“Oh, wow, lucky you.”

She had a point, because how many other guys did I know who would have come to a restaurant by himself to beg me for forgiveness? None. Tyler was right—Riley had put himself out there for me.

So I walked carefully in the shoes I had borrowed from Robin, which were a half size too small, since I’d run out without clothes, and went back to Riley’s table. “Okay, you can pick me up tonight. I’ll come home with you.”

“Really?” He looked so ridiculously pleased that my heart swelled. “Cool. Awesome.” He picked up the bottle of beer a server over twenty-one had brought him. “Thanks for the beer, by the way.”