AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Eighteen
Maritza
Just a Few Days Before Valentine’s Day
Things had been off between Jeremy and me. He wasn’t calling or texting me anymore or stopping by my office throughout the day. For the past week, he and Sakura had been having lunch without me. I’m not sure what made him start to detach from me on a personal level or why it hurt me that he did. I should have been grateful. This was what I needed, even if it wasn’t what I wanted. I was scared to feel anything deep for another man outside of my husband and that was happening with Jeremy.
Now that he’d hit the brakes, I felt like I was losing someone I cared about and was starting to love all over again. This time, it was worse. With my husband, I didn’t have to see him again. Seeing Jeremy daily and not experiencing him in the same way as I once was, was beginning to feel like torture.
I leaned against his opened doorframe, admiring him for a few seconds before gently tapping it to gain his attention. He looked up at me, and the smile in his eyes didn’t lower to his mouth.
That stung.
“Hey,” I spoke before gritting my teeth.
He looked so damn good in his olive-green suit. The fresh haircut he sported was begging me to scratch his scalp, but I couldn’t.
Those were the days.
“Hey.”
“Um… my daddy wanted me to invite you over to watch the Super Bowl game Sunday if you don’t have any plans.”
“Are you going to be there?”
Yikes.
“Yes.”
Jeremy sighed with a shake of his head. “Then I’ll pass, but tell him I said thank you for the invitation.”
It felt like his words were like little needles piercing my heart. My eyes watered, but I wouldn’t dare cry over his rejection. More than anything, I was hurt that I was angry because of it. Chuckling, I pushed myself off his doorframe.
“I was wondering when this would happen. When the you that everyone warned me about would show up.”
“You don’t get to do that,” he said firmly, standing and tossing his pen onto his desk.
“Dowhat?”
“Make me feel like shit for doing what’s best for you.”
“How is switching up on me what’s best for me?” I asked, voice slightly raised.
He released a hard breath, palms flat on his desk. “I don’t want to hurt you,” he muttered, and for a second, I was genuinely confused.
Closing his office door behind me, I walked over to his desk. “How could you hurt me?”
Jeremy’s head shook as he turned and looked out of the window, avoiding my eyes. “This that we’re doing… it needs to just be about the arrangement. All the extra time we’ve been spending together, that needs to stop.”
I agreed, but I still couldn’t stop myself from asking, “Why?”
“Because you don’t want me the way I want you.” My shoulders slouched as I massaged my chest. It hurt. “And I don’t want to hurt you by treating you in a way that would make you.”
“Jeremy…”
“You made it clear you didn’t want a real relationship. I’m going to honor that.”
I wanted to tell him that wasn’t what I wanted. That was theoppositeof what I needed. But I couldn’t do that to him or to myself. Instead, as I wiped away a fallen tear I whispered, “Thank you.”
