On Dublin Street(68)

“You want to disabuse me of that notion and tell me exactly why I got out of the shower this morning to find you’d buggered off?”


“I-I had stuff to do.”


Braden grew scarily quiet. “You had stuff to do?”


“Yup.”


“You know until this moment, you’ve never really acted your age. I thought you were more mature than this, Jocelyn. I guess I was wrong.”


“Oh don’t pull that crap,” I replied irritably. “I’m not the one getting my knickers in a twist because my f*ck buddy didn’t stick around for a cuddle in the morning.”


At the flash of something in his eyes, I felt my stomach drop. The look was gone as fast as it appeared and his features hardened against me. “Fine. It’s done. Forget about it. I need you to get Saturday, two weeks from now, off. I’ve got DJ Intrepid, a famous DJ from London, playing at Fire for Freshers week,” his rumbling voice sounded detached, empty, and all that distance was directed at me. I didn’t like it. “I want you there.”


I nodded numbly. “Okay.”


“Okay then. I’ll text you later.” He strode toward me and I waited tensely for his next move. He didn’t even look at me. Just reached for the door and brushed past me.


He didn’t kiss me goodbye.


I felt sick. Now who was making things complicated?


***


Dr. Pritchard took a sip of water and then cocked her head at me once I stopped talking. “Has it occurred to you that you may be developing deeper feelings for Braden?”


I sighed heavily. “Of course it has. I’m not stupid.”


“And yet, you’re determined to stay in this arrangement with him knowing and championing its end?”


My smile was definitely without humor. “Okay… maybe I’m a little stupid.”


***


I know I’m hardheaded. I get that about myself. I know I have issues a mile long, and I know those issues aren’t going away any time soon. But living these last few months on Dublin Street, with a little help from the good doctor, I was able to see myself in a different light. I had been convinced I had no real attachments in this life because that’s the way I wanted it. Slowly, but surely, I was coming to terms with the fact that Rhian and James were an attachment, and Ellie was definitely an attachment. I might not want to care about them, but I did. And with caring comes all kinds of crappy stuff… like remorse.


I apologized to Ellie for snapping at her. She, of course, accepted it graciously.


But all day, I was plagued by guilt and I kept seeing Braden’s face flash before my eyes. That guilt brought back some bad shit, and I found myself locked in the bathroom, seeing myself through a pretty awful panic attack.


You see, I’d realized something. Something terrifying.


It might just be sex with Braden, but that didn’t mean I hadn’t formed an attachment to him.


I might not want to care about him, but I did.


That’s why, as I was leaving for work, I sent him a text that said something I had never said to a guy before.


I’m sorry x


You have no idea how fast my pulse was racing after I added the kiss. One little kiss and my hands were shaking.


***


Craig and Jo were not happy with me that night. I messed up a couple of orders, spilled half a bottle of Jack and knocked over the tips jar into the spillage getting a couple of notes wet. When I checked my phone on break and still hadn’t received a text back from Braden, I gave myself a good talking to.


I could not turn into an inept idiot because some guy hadn’t accepted my apology. I had shown some real growth sending that text, I nodded angrily to myself, and if he couldn’t see that, then fine! To hell with him. I was Joss Butler. I took no shit from no man.


I returned to work feeling defiant and determined, and I managed to do my job without any more incidents. I explained away my clumsiness, telling the guys I’d had a migraine but was feeling much better. They swallowed that since I started joking around with them like normal, doing what I had always been good at, and shoving my feelings down under the steel trapdoor inside of me.


Holding onto this was key, because one slip, one crack and that door would come flying open again and I just… well, I just couldn’t handle that.


We finished up the night and Jo and Craig kindly offered to let me go early since I ‘hadn’t been feeling well’. I wasn’t going to argue. I grabbed my stuff and said goodbye to Brian at the door and headed up the steps onto George Street.


“Jocelyn.”


I spun around and found Braden standing on the sidewalk by the club. My stomach was back to churning again. We stared at each other silently for a minute until I found my voice. “You were waiting on me?”


He smiled a little as he approached. “Thought I could walk you home?”


Relief I wasn’t willing to admit to for too long poured over me, and I grinned up at him. “Does that walk happen to conclude with us naked in my bed together?”


His laughter was low, rough, and it floored me like always. “That’s what I had in mind, yes.”