“Can you clarify what you’re asking?” He drops his arms and adopts a casual stance. The movement feels deliberate, as if he’s already assessed the situation and knows he needs to proceed with caution.
I’m sure that prudence is a great quality in a businessman. The ability to assess situations, to read a room and proceed accordingly. He doesn’t get heated; he doesn’t work himself up with worry. He just calmly presses forward.
A great quality in a businessman—but not what I need right now.
My silence stretches on as I consider. Alex says nothing, but his body tenses. Had I thought his stance casual? I realize now that it’s anything but. As he stares back at me, his face tightens, his lips turn down. That crease between his eyes deepens.
I look down, movement snagging my attention, and just barely catch the way he flexes his hand, as if it’s itching toward a motion he doesn’t dare allow.
“I mean, whatarewe? What is this thing between us? Is it a relationship? Or are we just friends who enjoy making out?”
Slowly, Alex’s tension eases until there’s a small uptilt to his lips, though his eyes are still confused. Or maybe concerned; I can’t quite tell.
“Do you want this to be a relationship?”
“I asked you first.”
“You asked what weare, not what I want—and I can’t begin to say what we are without knowing what you want us to be.”
“Isn’t it obvious?”
“With you, Joey, I’m not sure anything’s ever obvious.”
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
“It means that if you want something from me, you’re going to have to spell it out.”
This is it. A moment that could be a turning point. I can feel it all around me, the weight of importance to the words I’m about to say, and I wonder if moments this big are always so charged, like you can tangibly feel them, or if some are sneakier, flimsier, and slip right by without anyone ever noticing.
How many moments like this have slipped right past me? And how lucky am I to recognize this moment for what it is as it’s happening?
I open my mouth to say that I’m done taking things slow, to tell him exactly what I want and how I want it. To take charge of the moment.
I chicken out.
I feel the weight of the moment, and I chicken out anyway.
“I don’t know what I want.”
I want to slap myself as soon as the words come out of my mouth. I want to reach out and take them back. I want to erase that specific combination of words from existence, wipe them from my memory, and make it so I can never utter them again.
This was my chance to put myself out there. I open my mouth to do damage control, but even knowing I’ve fucked up, I can’t quite get myself to speak.
“You don’t know what you want,” he repeats flatly.
“I want to know what you want,” I say, even though it’s an easy out. I should admit that what I just said was wrong and that I know exactlywhat I want. But it’s hard to be vulnerable, and besides, I was already forward and sexy and take-charge with a boy once in this second life, and it blew up spectacularly in my face.
I expect this to be the end. I expect a fight or, worse, a retreat. I expect him to drop some emotionally evasive line about keeping things casual or needing time or not being ready. The kind of line that college boys always seem to be so good at. Instead, what I get is—
“I want you to be my girlfriend.”
A sentence that I definitely didn’t expect.
“But if that’s not what you want—” he continues, but I cut him off.
“You want me to be your girlfriend?”
“Yes.”
