Page 21 of All Our Almosts

“Yeah,” I breathe. “Me too.”

7

I get home after work the next day to find Andy seated in the corner armchair. He’s been working out of that chair all week since I commandeered his home office, but he seems comfortable enough. There’s a standing lamp next to him, casting warm golden light across the side of his face and onto the manuscript in his lap.

His brow is furrowed in concentration, and part of me wants to place my finger there and smooth out the deep crease.

But I don’t, because that would be crazy.

In defense of my crazy thoughts, it’s been a hard day. Not just because of my presentation to the board—which could have gone better—but because I kept catching myself thinking about last night at the Gardener. The feeling of my cheek against Andy’s chest, the press of his fingertips on my back, then the abrupt way he pulled back, stopping tipsy-me before I could make things weird between us.

I really don’t want to make things weird between us. Especially when I’m living here. Especially when, even after all these years, I still want to reach up and gauge my own eyes out every time I think about the night I made a move on him and was soundly rejected.

I was very drunk, in my defense! But the rejection was… so awkward. And we’re much better as friends, anyway. Uncomplicated and easy.

Importantly—as I keep reminding myself—nothing actually happened last night. He saw that I was stressed and gave me a hug. That’s the end of it. Especially now that Elliot’s not in the picture, why should I feel guilty about a hug? Friends can hug. Friends can totally hug.

Andy glances up at me over the top of his glasses, and I realize I’ve been staring at him.

I snap my eyes away way too fast and say, “Hey, I’m home.”

“Yeah, hey—Soph, shoes.”

“Oh, right.” I backtrack a few steps to take my boots off before I can traipse salt all over Andy’s nice floor.

“You good?” he asks.

“Yeah, sorry, just a hard day and I’m feeling kind of out of it.”

“What made your day hard?”

I didn’t actually mean to bring that up. Rats.

“Just the board meeting was stressful, but it’s fine. I’m gonna decompress in my room.”

I start heading that way, but Andy interrupts my momentum when he says, “Decompress out here. I’m just gonna be reading. I have a little work to finish.” He gestures to the manuscript on his lap.

I’m scanning my brain for a sentence that means I think I should give us some space after last night’s prolonged public snuggle without using any of those words, but I’m not quite fast enough. Andy notices my hesitation and responds with a heartbreaking, “I mean—but—if you’d rather be alone that’s fine.”

And we can’t have that.

Because here’s the thing: You know how sometimes you meet a puppy and it’s fresh-faced and new to the world, and it loves you instantly because it loves everything? And it comes up to you all wiggles and licks and sunshine, and you pet it and scratch it and coo and smile, and then it goes on to offer wiggles and licks to the next person too because it's only ever known good in the world?

Andy is not like that.

Andy is your friend’s fifteen-year-old dog who hates toys and is blind and will probably bite if you move too fast. It has never liked a single house guest, and usually gets locked in the bedroom when people come over.

But when that elderly, satanic, gremlin of a dog comes up to you for a tentative sniff, you bet you’re going to offer your hand out slowly, on its terms. And when—one day—it finally cuddles up next to you on the couch, placing its scratchy little dog butt against your thigh because it’s decided you’re safe—that’s when you feel truly, irrefutably special.

And yes, Andy and I have been friends for almost a decade, so it’s not like if I say “I’d rather read alone in my room tonight” he’s going to think I hate him or something. But I just don’t have it in my heart to turn down any offer of affection extended by him, even if that offer is simply reading in silence together.

So I say, “No, I don’t want to be alone.”

The better part of an hour goes by before Andy finally closes his work for the day. He excuses himself to change into pj’s and comes back out in a black t-shirt and red flannel pants. I’m already in my very stylish gray cotton athletic shorts, wool socks, and a purple t-shirt with Hudsonville Read-A-Thon across the front.

Once he’s sat back down on the far side of the couch, he taps my knee with his socked foot and asks, “How’s your book?”

“It’s good,” I say, folding in the edge of the dust jacket to hold my place, “but it’s the only one I brought so I’m trying to make it last.”