Always Never Yours(36)

He steps back from the bookcase, a flush of red rising up his neck. “I know, I know,” he mutters. “It’s the reason I’ve never had a girlfriend.”

I wait for the “until now,” but it doesn’t come. Will continues to look at the other shelves in my room, and I’m left once again wondering what he considers me. I told myself it didn’t matter if I’m his girlfriend or just his hookup buddy, but I kind of want to know. Before I get the chance to ask, he turns back to me, the confident glint back in his eyes.

“Not everyone can be like you,” he says, nodding to the photo. “Beautiful then, too.”

His words push the question from my mind. We’re obviously on the same page, because he wraps an arm around my waist and pulls me to his lips. The kiss somehow feels different, charged with both of our expectations. For the first time, it’s the first step to something else.

Breaking off, I lead him to the bed and slide off his jacket, my lips still stinging. I lightly push him onto the mattress and close my laptop on my desk. “I don’t think we’ll need the pretense,” I say, kicking off my boots and climbing on top of him.

“We wouldn’t have watched much anyway,” he breathes before I grab him and kiss him again.

His hands slide down to my waist, and I feel his fingers pressing into the small of my back. I run my hands down his chest when he moves to kiss my neck, his hand inching up the hem of my dress. Then I’m pulling off his shirt. Then I’m lifting my arms over my head, and my dress hits the floor. Then his fingers glide up my back.

Then my phone buzzes.

“Shit.” I jump off the bed. The phone vibrates a couple more times, and I know Dad’s upset. The rule was me texting him, not him texting me. “Give me a second,” I tell Will. “I forgot to do something.”

Dad’s sent exactly the same text three times—Where are you, Megan?—and then an accusatory line of question marks.

im home, I shoot back.

I set down the phone and start to climb back into Will’s lap. Just as we’re picking up where we left off, my phone rattles from my desk once more. I sigh angrily and scramble off Will again. “Sorry . . .”

It takes me a second to make sense of what my dad’s sent. The first message reads, What do you think? and below it are three images too small to discern on my phone’s lock screen. I slide it open, and my heart plummets.

Three photos, each a different angle of a badly lit sidewalk view of a house. Chesapeake Lane, reads the sign on the street corner.

What do I think? Like it matters what the house looks like. Whatever house they choose, it’ll be a perfectly nice place for Erin and the baby to grow up, and for me to stop by on holidays to sleep uncomfortably in an impersonal spare bedroom.

looks fine, I send back.

I toss my phone not gently onto my desk and turn back to Will, eager to put Chesapeake Lane out of my mind. I crash into him again, and he’s pulling me closer, and I’m reaching for my bra. But I can’t bring myself to do what I wanted to. He’s sitting underneath me, and he’s gorgeous, but I feel hollow.

He’s noticed my hesitation and caught the look on my face. “What is it?” he asks.

“It’s nothing,” I say, because there’s no reason to tell him more.

I clamber off him and pick up my dress off the floor. I’m pulling it over my head when I hear him say, “Wait, what?”

“I’m sorry,” I say in a flat, unconvincing voice. “I’m just not in the mood right now.”

“Okay . . .” He sounds skeptical, even indignant. I watch him get dressed. “Guess we’ll do this another time.”

If he even wants another time, a familiar voice says in the back of my head. With the way Alyssa’s been acting around him, and how I just totally screwed tonight up, I’d understand if he didn’t want to give me a second chance.

He walks out of my room, and I don’t bother seeing him to the front door. I pause uncertainly in the middle of my room, wishing I could have ignored my dad and just focused on Will.

But even now, I find myself staring at the photo Will and I were looking at minutes earlier. I survey the plays on my bookshelves, the coat rack in the corner, the playbills pinned to my bulletin board. In a matter of months, everything will be packed into cardboard boxes and shipped to New York, and the room I grew up in will be empty.

I collapse onto my bed, where a hard corner digs into my back. I reach under me and pull out the DVD case of Shakespeare in Love.

My plans for the night come back in an uncomfortable rush. I feel unsteady. And I know it’s not only because of the impending New York thing. I run a hand through my hair impulsively, trying to iron the tremble from my fingertips. What was I doing with Will? What felt promising and exhilarating and right an hour ago feels upside down now.

I thought I could do this. I thought our relationship status wouldn’t make a difference. I thought I could have sex with Will right now and capture the connection, the closeness that I’m desperate for—a little too desperate, I guess. Part of me wonders if I didn’t know deep down it wouldn’t work.

Part of me wonders if the texts from Dad weren’t the only reason I stopped things.

I’m glad Will and I didn’t go further, I decide. But everything’s in limbo now. My relationship’s not a relationship. My home won’t be for much longer. Everything’s lurching out of reach, and I’m in territory I don’t recognize.