The Cheat Sheet

This is not Dream Bree. This is real-life, actual-consequences-if-I-pull-her-under-the-covers-with-me Bree. And I need to quickly backtrack.

I look up and see her swallow her nerves. I feel her hand trembling in mine. We might have kissed the other night, but this is different. This is alone. In my room. I have no excuses here for talking dirty or holding her hand—and what I had planned just now is definitely not on the romance cheat sheet.

I tug her down a little so her shoulders hunch toward me, and then I pretend to flick something off. “I thought you had a spider on you. It was a piece of lint.”

“And you were just going to wait all day for it to bite me?” She slaps my bare shoulder. Crisis averted. “Some friend you are.”

Okay, time to switch gears. My brain is in a fog, but I force myself to clear it out. I sit up straighter and throw the covers off, swinging my legs over the edge of the bed so I can rub my hands over my face. My breath is rank. That should have been clue number one that this is real life.

“What are you doing here this early?” I ask her, digging the heels of my palms into my eyes. I stand up and stretch.

“I couldn’t sleep. So I thoughtwecouldgoonarunearly…” All of her words end in a pileup.

Turning to her, I see her unblinking gaze locked on my body. Right. I sleep in boxer briefs. Kinda forgot about that when I stood up. Bree looks like she’s in some sort of pain. Her mouth is still open, unfinished words dangling off her tongue.

I step toward her, trying not to smile. “Bree?”

She’s that famous painting now. She doesn’t move, but her eyes follow me around the room. “I shouldn’t be seeing you like this.”

“Probably not.” I don’t normally feel embarrassed in my underwear. I’m pretty used to my own nudity at this point. I’ve done ads for Jockey underwear, and also, you know, that whole form issue thing where I was completely naked. But this is Bree, the woman of my dreams, staring me down in an intimate way I don’t think anyone else ever has before. It’s like she’s matching puzzle pieces together to finally see the whole picture. Nathan loves strawberry Twizzlers + ah, that’s where his tan lines live. It’s unnerving.

“You’re…” Her words end there. She’s yet to look at my face.

Before I can stop it, embarrassment slides over me. I feel my face heating. “Can I have my clothes?” I extend my hand toward the bundle she’s clutching, but she holds it up and away from me.

“Not yet.”

I sputter a laugh because I don’t know what else to do. She’s ogling me. Very openly. This is new—and I’m not sure how to proceed. This is not on the list. “Do you think I’ll get them any time soon?”

“I suspect so, but the jury is still out.” She sounds like someone hit her with a tranquilizing dart.

“Okay, enough.” I step forward to take my clothes, but she holds them behind her back. She’s not going to let me have them. “What are you doing?” I ask, sounding just as amused and confused as I am.

“I don’t know.” Her eyes are bright. Excited. Fearful.

Our kiss the other night is humming intensely between us.

“Can I…” Her words hesitate again, and she sounds like she’s trying to keep all the air in her lungs. “I just want to…”

I suck in a noisy breath when Bree steps closer, raises her hand, and presses it onto my pectoral muscle. The palm of her warm hand is directly over my heart, and I know she can feel it knocking against her skin. I raise a brow and tell everything in my body NOT TO REACT. She swallows, staring at the place her hand is touching me, and then she abruptly breaks contact, foists my clothes into my arms, and dashes through the room toward the door.

“GREAT. MEET YOU DOWNSTAIRS.” My bedroom door gets slammed shut.

The front door slams next.

I blink and look down at my crumpled running clothes. “What. The. Hell. Was. That?”

I’m pacing the sidewalk outside Nathan’s apartment. Up and down I go, back and forth. I’m contemplating just taking off running and never coming back, because…I just touched him. Nathan. Nathan’s bare body. I reached my greedy little hand right out and felt the man up. What was I thinking?! (I was thinking he was ripped, that’s what!) It was so forward of me! I might as well have taken spray paint to his wall and wrote I LOVE YOU NATHAN with a big heart around it!

The sun is peeking over the horizon just as Nathan exits his apartment building. I whip my head away from him. I can’t meet his eyes yet. I know I should be mature and apologize for what I did back there, but I prefer being childish and pretending it never happened instead.

“Ready?” I ask, bobbing my gaze anywhere and everywhere besides in the direction of his face. “Let’s go!”

I take off at a bri

sk jog and he has no choice but to catch up. In two seconds flat he’s beside me. His gaze is heavy on the side of my face, I can feel it, and I want to scream I DON’T KNOW, OKAY?! I don’t know what I was doing back there! I’m in love with my best friend, and I’ve been hiding it from him for ten zillion years, and now all of a sudden I’m deciding to not hide it and see what happens, but I’m too scared to own it, and what if he doesn’t love me back! *insert giant inhale here*

See? I’m losing it! I’ve lost too many fries from my Happy Meal!