Problematic Summer Romance (Not in Love, #2)(94)
His words wrap around me like a hug, but I don’t want to give him the satisfaction of seeing what his openness does to me, not yet, and try to bite the grin off my cheeks. The problem is, he’s too close. This is too good. “You realize how insane that sounds? That after years of acting like a little shit—”
“A little shit?”
“—yes, precisely like, as I said, a little shit, you have just…changed your mind about us.”
He nods, slowly. Contrite, I think. “You have every right to be apprehensive.”
“Apprehensive? You will have to forgive me if I suspect this to be a case of the amyloid plaques’ buildup doing their thing in real time.”
He sighs. “You’re really having a field day with the aging jokes, huh?”
“You deserve it, since you made it your cause célèbre for this long.”
He can’t quite swallow his smile. And neither can I.
“Is it because of what Rue said?” I ask.
“What do you mean?”
“This morning, when she thanked Eli for being patient with her…Is that why you changed your mind?”
“No, Maya. Not at all. It was last night. Everything you said, I…” He shakes his head. “I think I knew all of it. The bits and pieces. When I told you that my decision to stay away from you was something that I had to renegotiate with myself every day, I didn’t lie. And every day my brain would come up with new reasons, insist that maybe I could allow myself to be with you, and I’d have to talk myself out of it. I’ve debated us in my head a thousand times, and I always took the side that wanted to shield you from a relationship with someone like me. And then, last night, you made me realize that none of my fucking bullet points mattered. I was trying to protect you from something that you never even considered a threat, when the only thing that really matters is…”
“The triumph of the free market?”
“You.” His laugh is soft. “The unregulated market can fuck a traffic cone, for all I care.”
I sit back in my chair. Study him. “Okay.”
“Okay?”
“Good.”
A slow nod. “Good.”
“So.” I try to sound solemn. Pretend there aren’t fireworks blowing up all over my body. “Since my brother is too busy sex-marathoning his new wife to assure the preservation of my honor, you’ll forgive me if I ask you a few questions.”
“By all means.” He gestures at me, confident.
“What are your intentions?”
A crease forms between his eyebrows. “Regarding…?”
“Well, we’re not dating, because you are too busy protesting American hegemony in all its forms and ideals. Am I your girlfriend, then?”
A nearly imperceptible pause. “If you want to be.”
“Stop saying—what would you like?”
“I…sure. I’d love for you to be my girlfriend.”
“Excuse me, but that doesn’t sound enthusiastic.”
“It is. I am.”
“If you just want to be fuckbuddies, you can say so.”
“I don’t—no, Maya.”
“I just don’t understand what it is that you—”
“I want to get married.”
All of a sudden, he’s leaning forward. A challenging, burning, searching light in his eyes.
I blink. Many, many times. “Well.”
“Yeah.” A sigh. “I’d love to get married tomorrow. But you are turning twenty-four in three months, and as I have been repeating ad nauseam, I am thirty-eight. The age difference is not your fault, and you shouldn’t be rushed into important milestones just because of…”
“Your geriatric status?”
“Precisely. And I don’t think it’s fair of me to demand a commitment of you this early on. Not after being so fucking stupid for three years.”
He’s right. I may be sick in love with him, but not so much that I cannot see it. “Then…?”
“Then, we…” He runs a hand through his hair, like this is a stressful topic for him, and often revisited. I wonder how many hours, days, weeks he’s lain in bed awake to figure out a solution that would allow us to be together without shackling me to him. “We start back from where we left off.”
My eyes widen. “Last night?”
“No, I—” His fingers find the bridge of his nose. “I meant, ten months ago.”
“Oh. So, we…talk on the phone like it’s the nineties and live on different continents?”
“No. Or, yes, if you want to. Maya, I will take as much or as little of you as you’ll let me have. But I stand by what I said last night. I want you to be in charge.”
“Conor.” My hand slides across the table, knuckles brushing against his. “If it’s pegging you want, you only have to ask.”
He hangs his head, but not before I notice his grin. When he looks up, he’s serious again. “There is a power differential here. I have and will again admit to having been a stubborn idiot when it comes to you, but to be clear, I do not think that the issues I brought up are no longer there. You remain much younger. I mean, I’d bet a good third of my assets that the waiter is currently wondering why I can’t look away from my daughter.”