Phoebe Berman's Gonna Lose It(88)
I raise an eyebrow. “Do I?”
“I think so.”
“Okay…” I hesitate. “I’m listening.”
He clears his throat. “Right before you came charging up to me in the garden,” he starts. “I was thinking about you.”
“Really?”
“Yup,” he says with a nod. “I was brooding.”
“Now that you mention it, I remember your back looking kind of broody.”
“It was the second time you’d canceled, and I was starting to think I was misinterpreting everything.”
I frown. “I hate that I made you feel that way.”
He shushes me playfully by pressing a finger to my lips. “It’s fine. That’s not the moral of this story.”
I zip my lips with a gesture.
“If you haven’t figured it out by now, I was pretty hung up on you.”
“Was?”
“Am, was, will be—you know what I mean. Well, I was in the middle of telling myself that maybe I should try and move on when someone tapped me on the shoulder.”
“Perfect timing.”
He agrees with a nod. “I turned around and there was, quite literally, the most beautiful girl I had ever seen.”
I turn scarlet. “That can’t be what you were thinking.”
“It was,” he attests. “In fact, she was so beautiful that for a second I thought, okay, maybe it won’t be too hard to move on from Phoebe after all.”
“Hey!” I playfully kick him and he traps my leg between his.
“Then I realized that she was you. And that’s when I knew that I wouldn’t be moving on anytime soon.”
“Matthew…” My throat constricts. “I hope you know that I was thinking the same thing when I saw you.”
“That I was the most beautiful girl in the world?” He smirks.
I giggle and press my forehead to his. “Yes. Exactly that.”
“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you how beautiful you looked that night.” He frowns. “I still think about you in that dress.”
“It was a nice dress.”
“Do you have it here?” he asks.
“Yeah.” I point to my closet. “In there.”
He lifts an eyebrow suggestively. “Maybe you can put it on?”
“Really?” I grin in anticipation. “Why?”
His eyes darken. “So I can take it off.”
I have never jumped out of bed so quickly.
29
Wednesday
(Zero Days Left)
“HAPPY BIRTHDAY!” Jonathan and Matthew begin to sing as soon as I open the front door to the apartment. There’s a pink balloon tied to one of the dining room chairs and a donut with a candle in it on the table.
I rush over to collect them into a group hug. “Aw, thank you, boys.” I take a bite of my donut. “Why are you home so early?” I direct my question to Jonathan.
“Because it’s your birthday and I hate my job.”
“Can my birthday present be you quitting?” I ask. I’ve tasked Matthew with trying to convince Jonathan of the merits of being a working creative. After all, they both majored in film and have a ton of similar interests. Jonathan spent the entirety of last night playing around with Matthew’s camera and asking a million questions about his job, so I think we might be getting somewhere.
“Maybe next year,” he responds. Matthew casts me an apologetic look. “Because I already got you a present for this year. It’s in your room.”
“Jonathan…” I begin making my way up the stairs eagerly. “You didn’t have to get me anything!” I look forward to his birthday presents every year. I don’t know how he’ll top the gift he gave me for my twenty-ninth. It was my label maker.
I open the door to my room and immediately fall to my knees. In the corner, next to my velvet chair, is a beautiful wooden bookshelf.
Its shelves are packed tightly with my collection of books that I thought I had said goodbye to forever.
“How! Someone took them!” I think back to the ache I felt in my chest when I saw that all the bags of books had disappeared from the curb.
“I’m someone,” Jonathan answers from behind me. “I found them outside the day you came to my office. I had just enough time to hide them in the trunk of my car before you got home. I figured you’d want them back.”
I collect myself from the floor and throw myself into his arms. “Thank you,” I whisper through my tears. “The bookshelf…”
“I know a woodworker.” He winks. I’m about to ask if that means he and Finn have started talking again, but Matthew comes up behind us and snaps a picture.
“Sorry.” He shrugs apologetically. “For the memories.”
I have a feeling there are going to be a lot more pictures to hang on the fridge now that Matthew’s around.
“By the way,” Jonathan starts. “We’re going to meet Meg and Alex at Jeffery’s in half an hour.” This catches me by surprise.
“What?” I ask. “I thought they were coming over here for Chinese food later.” A night in where I could cuddle up next to Matthew on the couch had sounded glorious to me, an opportunity for everyone to get to know him better.