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“It’s 10:00 AM. We overslept for work. You need to get up,” I say as I shift to sit on the edge of the bed, abandoning any sense of temptation to crawl back into the sheets with her.
Hannah lays there for a moment longer, but I can see the exact moment my words register on her face only seconds before she shoots up to a sitting position and yanks the sheets off of her bare body. “Shit! Why didn’t you wake me up?!” She shuffles around the room in a frantic, discombobulated state.
“That’s what I was literally doing…” I stand to start my shuffle around the space too, thankful that I had the forethought to bring clothes for today.
I finish getting ready in record time, pulling my socks on as I stumble from Hannah’s room, my shoes hanging from one hand as I attempt to pull the cotton over my feet. Unfortunately, I don’t realize until it’s too late that Sage is home.
“Fancy seeing you here…” Sage grins up at me from behind her cup of coffee, the steam from the mug’s contents billowing up around her chin.
“Don’t start with me, Sage. I’m in no mood.”
“Should be—at least from what I could hear, you should be in a great one.”
Mortification doesn’t even begin to explain the feeling crawling up from the pit of my stomach. I’ve been intentional in my quest to prevent people from knowing about me and Hannah. When people know, it encourages scrutiny; scrutiny I’m not ready to try to combat. However, there isn’t much denying what happened last night.
“People hook up, don’t read too much into it.” I scoff as I pull on my left shoe. “I’d appreciate it if you didn’t tell anyone about this. Doesn’t have to be a big deal.”
“Yeah, no big deal.” Hannah’s voice carries from behindme and, if I didn’t know any better, I’d say she sounds disappointed at my response.
She can’t really be wanting people to know at this point, could she?
“I won’t say a thing…besides, I’m not sure anyone would believe me if I did say it.”
Mine and Hannah’s tumultuous friendship, if you’d call it that, has never lent itself to the idea of us being together…or involved, as I’m not entirely sure what we are at this point.
As I shuffle around in my bag, the busted zipper rendering its contents on full display, I realize I don’t have a tie with me. I could have sworn I’d brought a tie. While wearing a tie is encouraged, and I always wear one to work, people often forgo it for a more modern vibe, so I guess I can lean into that.
“Here.” Hannah returns after disappearing back into her room, a blue- and white-striped tie in hand.
“Why do you have a tie?” I raise a brow, which pulls a laugh from Hannah.
“Okay, pervy…” She tosses the tie around my shoulders to sit across the back of my neck before she begins crisscrossing the fabric over itself, shifting her voice into an almost-whisper. “No, this tie isn’t for that. Although, you’re more than welcome to delve into that image another time. It was a gift for Jackson for the rehearsal, but I can get another.”
As if I could forget that Sage is sitting mere feet away from us, she clears her throat, making it clear that Hannah’s attempt at being quiet was not successful. Despite my irritation, I shrug Sage off.
She loves a good piece of gossip, but is fiercely loyal when it comes to things she’s told in confidence or is asked to keep under wraps. Sage will be the first to tell you about hercousin’s sister’s brother-in-law’s infidelity, but she would never divulge our secrets.
If anyone was to bear witness to this, I’m glad it was Sage and not Savannah.
“Ready to go?” Hannah taps on my shoulders after crafting my tie into a Windsor knot.
“Yeah,” I say quietly, grinning down at her, still stuck on the fact that she managed to tie the knot so perfectly. It took me years of experience to make it not look like a five-year-old did it.
“Bye, you two,” Sage yells as we head out the door, the amusement in her voice grinding my gears.
In the parking garage, I instantly start looking for my car.
“Oh, we can just take mine.” Hannah speaks so matter-of-factly I almost say yes.
“No, I’ll just take my car.” I clear my throat as I reach for my keys. “We can’t show up at the office together.”
Hannah doesn’t appear to like this answer as she huffs and walks away to her car without so much as a kiss goodbye.
Even if she might not like it, my refusal to flaunt whatever this is is with the intent to protect us both from the ridicule it would ignite. Not only would our families have a field day, but she works under me at not just my job, but my dad’s company. It’s so unprofessional it isn’t even funny, but I can’t shake the way the look on her face made my stomach plummet.
I find my car quickly and speed over to the office, thankful it’s only about a fifteen-minute drive from Hannah’s now that rush hour is over. Swerving in and out of lanes littered with parked cars and pedestrians, I find my parking spot in the garage with ease, thankful no one chose today to disregard the sign markedLiam Park.
My loafers clack against the tile floor as Istep out of the elevator, the front desk of Baker & Park more of a warning than an invitation. I have no doubt in my mind that, despite Jackson’s insistence that he’d keep it under wraps, my dad knows I was late today.
