After we brought the cat back to the condo, Scott ran to the market and came home with a disposable litter pan, food, and a cat toy, and the three of them—Scott, my mom, and Charlie—gushed over the fluffy feline all evening.
The damn cat had ruined everything.
Because now, in addition to being emotionally distracted by the beautiful way Charlie was a total sap for that cat, I could no longer avoid the obvious as I watched them love all over the kitten.
Scott was a decent guy.
He was sweet and thoughtful, even giving Charlie a chance in spite of all the things Charlie had done to antagonize him.
So how could I keep trying to mess things up? Especially when my mom seemed to really like him?
It was giving me stress, but when I thought about him being in our lives forever, that stress accelerated to the nth degree.
So much for the whole laid-back shit-happens vibe.
But as we flew over the interstate, I felt better than I had the night before because I now had a solid plan.
After lying wide awake for hours on that pullout sofa, thinking about my feelings for Charlie and obsessing about why they were terrible, the answer came to me.
It didn’t matter.
It didn’t. Who cared if I had a few new-and-confusing feelings for Charlie?
I’d gotten all tied up in the feelings themselves—What do they mean? Are they real? How can we be friends when I am suddenly crushing on him so hard?—before realizing that it wasn’t about the feelings themselves.
It was about what I did with them.
And I wasn’t going to do anything with them.
Because I knew Charlie didn’t feel the same way about me that I felt about him. I knew he liked me, I was pretty sure he had fun hanging out with me, and I was absolutely certain he enjoyed kissing me.
Gawwwwwwwd, the way he kissed.
But I’d never seen his face change when he looked at me the way it’d changed when he saw Becca at that party. And after the rejection I’d felt when Zack moved on after our breakup, I wasn’t willing to settle for “pretty sure” and “liked.”
I wasn’t willing to settle at all.
So I was going to take what I’d learned from my parents—the fact that feelings eventually faded, especially when new feelings were introduced—and ensure a change of heart.
“So I have an idea,” I said when we entered Lancaster County and I knew we’d be home in an hour.
“Uh-oh,” Charlie said, popping a few orange TUMS into his mouth.
“No uh-oh,” I argued. “No uh-oh at all. I was just thinking that now that the trip is over, it might be a good time for each of us to actually date in real life.”
When I said the words, I realized that—holy shit—I meant it. Not just as a Charlie-Bailey diffuser, but maybe it was time for me to try to move on from Zack.
“What?” he said, his voice tight as he glanced over at me, a wrinkle between his eyebrows.
“Not each other,” I quickly added, noting the look of horror on his face. “But… people.”
He rolled his eyes and looked back at the road. “Really, Glasses?”
“You said Eli wanted to ask me out, and I have a friend—Dana—who is gorgeous and smart and funny.” I tried sounding nonchalant as I said, “We should double-date it up.”
“First of all, please never say things like ‘double-date it up,’？” he said, chewing his antacid.
“Agreed. I regretted it the second it exited my mouth.”
“Second of all, what the fuck?”
Charlie looked irritated, which felt kind of good. Is he hurt by the thought of me going out with someone else? Was he mad that I was suggesting it after the weekend we’d just shared? I aimed for super chill when I casually asked, “What the fuck what?”
“What the fuck what? You have a gorgeous, smart, funny friend, and this is the first time you’re mentioning her?” His eyes stayed on the road, but he looked amused as he said, “You’ve been holding out on me.”
Heat flooded my face—hell, my entire body—and I was embarrassed by how quickly I’d fallen into wishful thinking. I ignored the unwelcome feeling in the pit of my stomach and said, “I guess I didn’t know you were looking.”
He did look at me then, but his expression was unreadable. “I guess I didn’t either.”
God, how was it possible that I missed my fake boyfriend already?
“So let’s set it up, then,” I said, remembering that forcing this was the best way to put our friendship back on solid ground, without any weird emotional tie-ups.
“Let’s,” he said. “We should do something stupid, like bowling.”
“Bowling’s not stupid,” I muttered. “I was in a Saturday-morning bowling league in elementary school, and it was the funnest.”
“A nerd says what?”
“Whatever,” I said, looking out the window. “I was on the Saturday Strikers, and we ruled.”
“I can’t hear through all the static of your lameness. Are we bowling or what?”
I shook my head and said, “We’re bowling.”
He glanced over and raised an eyebrow. “Now, you know you can’t kiss me when we’re on dates, right?”
I coughed out a laugh. “I am aware, yes.”
“I’m sure it’ll be tempting, now that you’ve tasted the Charlie Special, but—”
“Ewwwww—the Charlie Special sounds like a tongue sandwich on toasted bread,” I interrupted.
“Tasty,” he muttered.
“And you are the one who needs the kissing reminder, since you couldn’t keep your mouth off me over the weekend,” I teased, reaching into my bag for the SweeTarts.
“I really couldn’t,” he agreed, which made me look up from my bag in shock. His eyes were on the road, crinkled at the corners, when he grinned and admitted, “I fucking loved the kissing portion of our game.”
“Same,” I said, surprised by the honest admission from both of us.
He gave a nod. “Too bad you passed on the intensive training.”
“I think we had ample practice.”
He was quiet for a minute, then said, “Yeah, anything more intense probably would’ve killed me.”
I liked his face when he said that. It was soft and funny, like he was being candid about his own weakness. I didn’t know what to say to that, so I turned around and looked over the seat at the cat carrier. “Awww… Puffball’s asleep.”
“He had a rough weekend,” Charlie said with a little smile. “He needs his rest.”
When he finally pulled in front of our building, my mom and Scott were there, unloading their car. It was good, because I didn’t know how to not be awkward with the goodbye after everything.
But when Scott grabbed my stuff, my mom grabbed the cat, and we waved goodbye to Charlie as he drove away, I was instantly homesick for him as I watched his car disappear.
I wasn’t ready for our trip to be over.
When we got into the apartment, I ditched them as quickly as possible. Puffball and I took our things, went into my room, and closed the door, happy to be alone with our thoughts. Mr. Squishy kept meowing at my door—he knew something was up—but I ignored the old cat because I knew my mom would shower him with attention. I flopped onto my bed and pulled out my phone while the kitten walked around on top of my pillows.