Once I’m up on the second floor and making my way towards her apartment, I stop when I reach her door hear what sounds like yelling coming from her apartment. I move closer to the door to try get a better listen to what’s going on inside.
I’m about to raise my fist and knock on her door but stop when I notice the yelling inside is coming from a man. It takes me a minute to recognize the voice as Brett’s. It sounds like he’s yelling at someone about some kind of information he needs, but I don’t hear Harmen’s voice so I’m not sure if she’s home or not since I didn’t see her car out front.
If he’s yelling at Harmen, this guy’s got another thing coming. I decide to nip it in the butt and loudly knock on the door. I hear Brett’s hushed voice telling someone to hold on. I knock again when he doesn’t answer the door right away but stays quiet.
Why would he be yelling and not think about people hearing him? This guy must really be stupid. And more than that who is he talking to? I don’t hear any other voices in the apartment so he must be on the phone, but why is he in Harmen’s apartment without her there?
I give it one more shot and knock loudly on the door again to see if he will grow some balls and answer the damn door, but it doesn’t surprise me when there’s no answer. I decide to just leave the flowers outside the door and hope that she will see them when she gets home and know they’re from me. I slowly make my way back downstairs still listening to see if I can hear Brett start talking again. After a couple seconds I hear nothing but silence coming from the coward inside the apartment.
It pisses me off that he’s there without her. I know she told me a while ago that he mentioned wanted her to move in with him, but it still bothers me that he’s at her place without her being there. I don’t even do that and I’m her best friend. And who was he yelling at? I know he works at some fancy pants lawyer office in town, but why would he be yelling at someone after hours. It’s probably just something work related, but I can’t shake the feeling that if he yells at his coworkers like that maybe he does it to Harmen too.
Once I get into my car, I make the decision that I am going to do whatever it takes to keep my best friend happy and her heart safe, no matter the cost.
Chapter 6
Harmen
This week has been the longest Gray and I have gone without talking, but I still can’t bring myself to answer any of his calls or messages. I don’t know what it is about this fight that’s harder for me to let go of but I just can’t seem to get past it. Maybe it’s because a small piece of me understands where Gray is coming from but the bigger part of me wants to and will stand by my relationship, until I have no other choice but to give it up.
It’s Friday morning and I just got done with my early morning class. As I’m leaving the building I see Gray making his way towards me. It’s not that I’ve been avoiding him this week, okay fine I’ve been avoiding him. I just want things to go back to how they were before he opened his big mouth and put his ginormous foot in my relationship. I wish he would have just continued to keep his thoughts to himself like he’s been doing for the last two years apparently.
I contemplate taking off around the side of the building or trying to hide in plain sight, but who am I kidding. I’m about as fast as a fat kid after Thanksgiving dinner, I’d never make it around the corner before he spotted me and I’d probably pass out along the way from the sudden exertion. Maybe my baggy sweatpants and sweatshirt that’s two sizes too big will hide me from my traitorous friend.
No such luck, I’ve now taken too long contemplating my escape options that I didn’t even notice he was now in front of me. Son of a bitch.
“Hey Har, I’ve been trying to talk to you all week but you keep ignoring and avoiding me every chance you get.”
“Psh I wouldn’t waste the energy avoiding you and I lost my phone that’s why I haven’t called or messaged you,” I say with a tight smile just as my phone rings and decides to make its presence known. Ugh karma really is a bitch sometimes, isn’t she?
After a dramatic eye roll for good effect I look up to see Gray looking at me with his stupid gorgeous face that’s currently plastered with a smug smile. I hate smug smiles, especially from him since they show off his dimples. And I hate dimples… said no one ever. Ugh.
“What do you want Gray? Want to tell me how I’m wasting my time with my relationship or how I’m basically a puppet doing everything Brett wants. Oh wait, or did you just come to grovel so you can return to being my best friend?” I cross my arms over my chest and stand up straight in hopes of coming off as intimidating like I’m ready to fight if I have to.
“Relax Har, we aren’t going to have a show down right here for everyone to see, you can put your arms down.” Ugh I hate this boy and how well he knows me sometimes. “I just wanted to see you and say that I miss talking to my best friend,” he says as a look of sadness crossed his face.
He knows I hate it when he’s sad, I swear sometimes we know each other so well it kills me. “I miss you too, but that doesn’t mean I’m just going to forget about everything you said to me.”
“I know and I don’t expect you to, I just wanted to see if you’d be willing to be around me long enough so we could talk and maybe get some coffee?”
How am I supposed to say no to him? Oh that’s right I almost forgot, I can’t. “Fine, let’s go.”
I start walking down the stairs toward the small coffee shop down the block. I don’t have to look back at him to know he’s following me. I also know he’s got that damn smug smile of his back on his face because he thinks he won, but he did not. Not even close.
Once we get inside the coffee shop I go up to the register and order my regular hot chocolate and chocolate chip muffin before Gray even gets to the counter. I know he will offer to pay and I don’t want that right now. I’m still supposed to be mad at him and if he starts buying my food and acting like nothing happened I know I’ll fall right back into our old routine and I can’t let myself do that.
“If you wouldn’t have run all the way here and walked like a normal civilized person I would have bought your stuff,” he huffs while coming up behind me as I hand the lady my card to pay.
“Exactly, we aren’t best friends right now so therefore I’m not going to let you buy me anything.”
“Really? That’s how you’re going to play it? You’re still that upset with me that you won’t even call me your best friend anymore?”
“Yes. Right now I am that upset with you. Deal with it,” I say with some added sass just because I know it pisses him off. And by the sound of his sigh behind me I know it had the exact effect I wanted it to.
I make my way to the booth in the back corner after the lady behind the counter hands me my hot chocolate and muffin. I’ve already dug into my muffin by the time Gray finally sits down.
“So what did you want to talk about?” I ask to try move this conversation along.
“Did you get my flowers?”
“What flowers?” I ask completely bewildered.
“The ones I left outside your apartment door last week after our fight,” he says like I’m not completely lost.
I must look like I have no idea what he’s talking about because after what feels like a couple years of staring at me he finally says, “You did get them right? I left them in a blue vintage vase that I thought you’d like.”
Hold up. What? Is he seriously talking about the flowers Brett gave me? No. He wouldn’t try to take credit for them. Is he doing this just to piss me off some more? No he wouldn’t do that. Just thinking of him doing something like this just to piss me off makes me laugh.
Pretty soon I can’t hold back my laughter anymore and I’m basically rolling around on the floor of the coffee shop because I’m laughing so hard. I mean come on, Gray purposefully taking credit for something Brett gave me just to piss me off? It’s laughable. Hence me doubled over laughing with tears streaming down my cheeks.
“Seriously Harmen, what’re you laug
hing about?”
“That’s a good one Gray, that’s a really good one,” I say wiping the tears off of my cheeks after finally getting my laughing fit under control.
“Harmen. Seriously what’re you talking about? I picked them up because I know they’re your favorites. When I was leaving I saw the vase and thought since I was an asshole earlier, a nice vase for the flowers to sit in couldn’t hurt my chances of getting you to forgive me. But if it was seriously that funny that I wanted to do something nice for you then I guess I won’t anymore.”
Whoa, hold up. Is he seriously upset right now? No he can’t be, it makes no sense.
“You’re not serious right? Come on Gray, I know they weren’t from you so you can stop messing with me,” I say with a little laugh and wiping the last tear from my cheek. Apparently that wasn’t the right thing to say. Now he just looks down right pissed. I’m pretty sure I can see some steam coming out of his ears like a tea pot.
“What do you mean you know they weren’t from me?”
“How do I know? Well I know because they were sitting on my kitchen table when I got home from class. And on top of that my boyfriend was waiting for me at my place so he could take me out. He said he got me the flowers to make it up to me because I talked with you about cutting back on our time together that morning and he wanted to thank me for it. So how about you tell me why your saying they were from you when they clearly weren’t.”
I can honestly say I have never seen so much rage on a person’s face as I do right now. I’m pretty sure I can feel the heat coming off of him because of how upset he is by my statement. Why is he so mad? Yeah, I’m not really sure. I’m as confused as he is apparently. Except, if anyone is upset it should be me. I mean, he’s trying to take credit for something my boyfriend gave me for crying out loud.
“You’ve got to be shitting me,” he says with a humorless laugh while rubbing a hand over his face. “That asshole boyfriend of yours gave them to you didn’t he?”
“I just told you he did. Why does that make him an asshole? Because he cares about me enough to get me my favorite flowers? Really, Gray?”
“It makes him an asshole because I’m the one who bought them. I knew you were still pissed at me so I got you your favorites thinking that may help lessen the blow a little bit. I left them right outside your door because when I knocked you didn’t answer. But now that I think about it, I did hear him inside your place yelling at someone. When I knocked he stopped talking like he didn’t want me to know he was there even though I had already heard him,” he says with a huff.
“Well I’m sorry to break it to you, but Brett wouldn’t take credit for something he didn’t do. So I’m not sure what kind of game you’re playing but I quit,” I say standing up. I’m officially done with this conversation. And I’m officially done with my best friend who is trying to sabotage my relationship. “See ya later, Gray.”
I don’t make it very far before I feel him grab my arm and spin me around to face him right by the front door. “Har listen to me for a second. I don’t know why he said they were from him but I promise I left them by your front door. I heard him yelling at someone when I got to the door and thought it was you so I started knocking and that’s when he stopped talking. I figured you were there with him and you guys were fighting or something. I’m not trying to play a game; you know me better than that. Can you honestly say I would try to take credit for something your boyfriend did?”
I don’t know what to believe. I honestly don’t think my best friend would do something like that, but then I don’t want to think of the possibility that my boyfriend of two years took credit for something Gray did for me. I feel like I’m being pulled in two completely different directions.
My heart wants to believe my best friend but my head is saying to believe my boyfriend. Why can’t they just agree on one of them? That’d make this ten times easier on me. I want so bad to believe my amazing best friend, the guy I’ve loved most of my life, but for some reason I just can’t.
“I’m sorry Gray. I don’t know what to think at this point,” I say as I turn and pull my arm out of his hold and walk out the door. As I get closer to my apartment I can’t help but wonder how he even knew I got flowers in the first place.
Chapter 7
Grayson
What the hell just happened? Am I in an alternate universe? Oh, maybe I’m on one of those prank television shows and someone is going to jump out and yell, “Gotcha!”. I hope that’s what this is otherwise I’m at a complete loss for what the hell just happened.
I was almost giddy, I know that makes me sound totally unmanly but trust me I’m a total man, when I saw Harmen standing outside of Berg Hall on campus after her class. I know she saw me, but to my surprise she didn’t run away when I started making my way toward her. I’m sure she was trying to plan her escape but just never got a chance to execute her plan by the time I made my way to her. I probably had a look of complete surprise on my face when she agreed to go to the coffee shop with me.
It’s not that I thought she would ignore me forever, but I also know my best friend and she tends to shy away from talking about things that might make her uncomfortable or upset. Hence her ignoring me for almost a week because I pissed her off and she probably had this notion in her head that’d it’d be awkward to be around me after that. She just doesn’t know that it’s always hard and a little awkward for me to be around her when all I want to do is yell at anyone that looks at her or comes within ten feet of her that she’s mine. Even though she is Brett’s.
I figured that the flowers I left by her door would have gotten me out of the dog house for a little bit at least, but when I didn’t hear from her I kind of gave up hope that they would. That’s why I asked her to go get coffee with me, besides just missing her I wanted to know why she was so mad. I mean I get it, I was a complete ass with my approach the week before but I was just trying to look out for her, and maybe turn her off of Brett a little bit if I’m being honest.
But as luck would have it the prick hole decided to take credit for the flowers I got my girl. I mean seriously, I know he was a slimy snake for the beginning but taking credit for my flowers? Yeah that just pisses me off.
In the process he is pushing Har and I further apart and I know that’s what he’s been trying to do since the beginning, which is bullshit because she’s my best friend and always will be. Even if she never again sees me as more than a friend I will always be in her life and will always do whatever it takes to keep her safe, especially from someone like Brett.
I just don’t get what he is getting at besides trying to push us apart. I’ve never liked the guy, but lately there is just something I can’t put my finger on that seems off about him. I remember the day Harmen and I were at the bookstore, which was the first day she met him. There was something is his eyes and the way he looked at her that gave me a strange feeling. At that point I didn’t know I was head over tennis shoes in love with my best friend, but I still didn’t like the way he was looking at her.
He almost looked at her as though she were a game of some sort. I know people say guys like to chase girls, but he wasn’t looking at her like she was a challenge. He was almost looking at her like he already knew her, which makes no sense since neither of us had a clue who he was. The day they went on their first date was the same day her parents died in a car crash and he has been around ever since. He’s like a nasty bug you just can’t get rid of, always around and ugly as hell.
At this point I feel like I have to save face with Har or we are just going to push each other away with all this fighting. I think it’s time I cinch ‘em and go talk to the man of the hour myself. I should probably bring my fly swatter though, just in case he gets a little crazy and I need to squash him like the bug I know he is.
Seeing as how I don’t have the spawn of Satan’s phone number and I didn’t really want to ask Harmen for it, so before I know it I find myself in the lobby of the law firm he works for. I a
sk the pretty petite blonde at the receptionist desk where I can find the one and only, Brett Worthington. She tells me his office is up on the fifth floor and to just take the elevator to the left.
I make my way over to the elevator and ride it up to the fifth floor. I figured his cubicle or small desk would be on one of the lower floors, not up on the same floor as the partners. But what do I know, obviously nothing.
When I step off the elevator, it feels like I walked straight into heaven, but I know it’s really hell. The whole floor is open with a seating area in the middle, while different offices run around the perimeter of the floor.
Each office looks like it has floor to ceiling windows that make the whole floor light up. It makes me question why they waste the money on lights when there’s so much natural light it’s almost blinding. It also makes me question how a guy that’s two years out of college, with no law school under his belt got a job here.
Harmen’s mentioned a few times that Brett is considering going to law school probably once she graduates, but that he wants to give himself a couple years to see if it’s a field he wants to be in long term. I mean sure, that’s sensible. But at the same time, how the hell did he wind up here. Har told me that both of his parents died in a plane crash a few years ago so it’s not like his daddy could have gotten him the job.
I look around at the different offices to see if I can spot him. I see his name on the outside of a door straight across from the bank of elevators. As I reach his door I see him working on his computer, I watch him for a couple seconds since he hasn’t noticed me yet. I probably look creepy to anyone else on the floor, but I promise I’m not. I just want to take advantage before he notices me. Just by the looks of it, he seems more like a partner at the firm rather than a lousy assistant.
If Only I Knew Page 5