by Jessica Roe
Her eyes roll skyward for a second. “Lunch dinner?” she guesses after a moment.
I wrap my arm around her shoulders as we begin the hike back down to where we left the car. “Naw, you know me so well.”
Chapter 10
Walt
“SO WHEN DOES Jem move in?” I ask Reid as we grab a beer in McCaulley's, an old pub style bar we used to hang out a lot in before Jemma came into our lives and we all somehow migrated towards fucking Kandy's. Yeah, that was before Jemma brought around Ibbie and turned my whole damned world upside down.
Who am I kidding? I wouldn't change a thing. I'm even admittedly fond of Jem these days, and we definitely had a rocky start.
“Not 'till January,” he grumbles. “Dahlia's new room mate can't move in 'till then and Jem doesn't wanna leave her in the lurch.”
“You sure you've thought this through?” I joke, because getting Jemma to move in with him has been the only thing the guy's been able to talk about for goddamned months when she hasn't been around.
“You know it. When you get a girl like Jemma, you do everything you can to hold onto her. Trust me.” He gets a text on his phone, eyes me for a second, then speedily replies. I'm about to question him when we're interrupted.
“Hey guys,” Christen greets as he and Fábia join us in the booth. Tonight it's the original gang, just like old times. Not going to admit it to these fuckers, but I kind of miss the others.
Fábia smirks. She's always smirking about something. “Oh good, the annoying kids aren't hanging around tonight.”
“Be nice,” Christen chides playfully, because you can never take anything Fábia says seriously. That girl likes to be a bitch just for the sake of being a bitch. “Besides, you like 'em all really.”
She rolls her eyes at him, but she doesn't deny it. Aside from Blair, who seems to have had a worse upbringing than most of us, Jemma and her friends were never the kind of people we'd thought we'd end up being friends with. They're more the kind of people we'd have sat back and made fun of. Truth is, they've all grown on us.
“Anyway,” I lift an eyebrow at Fábia. “don't think we don't know what's been going on between you and Dahlia.”
Christen almost spits out his drink. “You and Dahlia? I didn't know you swing that way.”
She shrugs. “It's the twenty first century, Christen. I can swing whichever damn way I want.”
The next thirty minutes is filled with Christen trying to persuade her to share the details, and me and Reid laughing our asses off when she reaches forwards and twists his nipples so hard he screeches like a little bitch.
“HEY YOU!” We all turn in surprise at the sound of the loud, angry voice and I almost fall out of my seat when I see Ibbie storming towards us across the room. She's got just about every male eye in the bar on her, and not just because she looks so out of place here in that little floral dress. No, she's got every male eye on her because she looks fucking glorious when she's all furious and revved up like she is right now. Even I can appreciate that, and all that anger is focused right on me. I resist the urge to stand up and start yelling at all those sleaze bags to get their eyes off my woman.
I check my watch, realizing that she must have come here right after her show tonight. My stomach flips just at the sight of her. I've damn near obsessed about her these last few days; obsessed over the feel of her body, the taste of her lips, that startled look in her eyes when I finally came clean about wanting to be with her. I've been tearing myself apart, half of me desperate to skip the month I promised her and just go do my best to win her, and the other half regretting being so forward with her. I've been acting chicken shit about the whole situation, I'm not gonna lie.
She comes to a stop before me and I stand automatically, opening my mouth to shoot off something shitty like I've grown accustomed to but finding that I've lost my voice. I thought I had a month to figure this shit out, to figure out what I was going to say to her!
“Hey, Ibbie,” Reid calls, giving her a little wave.
Ibbie smiles back at him, but her expression morphs into a snarl when she turns back to me.
“Miss me already?” I drawl when I finally remember how to talk. “How'd you find me?”
“Reid told me.”
He shrugs when I turn to him. “Sorry,” he says, obviously not sorry.
“I can't even. . . Ugh!” Ibbie pokes my chest hard, not caring that we're in a bar full of people and our friends are watching on in amusement. “What the frigging hell is your deal, you big. . .you big. . .jerk?! You can't just say all those things to me and then not say anything at all! Who even does that? You do that. This is such a you thing to do. I'll bet this is just an elaborate scheme to mess with me, right? That's your deal, you're messing with me.”
My heart yells at me to tell her my deal is that I'm crazily, uncontrollably in love with her, but my brain points out that it's probably a little too soon for those kind of declarations. She's not ready to hear me say that. So instead I give her a small smile, deciding that if she doesn't care about airing this out in front of everyone then neither do I. “I like you, Ibbie,” I admit. “This isn't a game.”
This time when those two pink dots that I love so much appear on her cheeks, it's not because I've pissed her off. “Yeah, well I got that when you stuck your tongue in my mouth the other night.”
Fábia, Christen and Reid all visibly perk up, watching our interaction with shit eating smirks on their faces. I hadn't told anyone about what had happened.
I said I didn't care, but I start to become uncomfortable under the scrutiny of our audience. Stepping closer to Ibbie, I lower my voice and ask, “Can we maybe do this somewhere else?”
“A million percent nope.” I should have known she'd be difficult.
Letting out a long, hard done to sigh, I decide to just man up and get this out there. “I don't just mean that I like you physically. I mean that I fucking like you. All of you.”
She starts poking my chest again. It hurts, but it's so damned adorable that it's impossible to keep the grin off my face. This only serves to enrage her further. “You're so frigging ignorant, that's what you are. You're frignorant! How can you say that?! How can you say that you like me when all you've ever done is hate me?”
I shrug, masking my desperation with amusement. “Well obviously I'm just not great at showing it.”
“You're not even funny, Walt. Stop trying to be.” The finger assault stops and she takes a step back from me, pouting. If she wasn't so serious right now, I'd kiss that pout right off her face. “How can I even believe you really like me when you've been so horrible to me? You've called me names, harassed me with texts, pulled stupid pranks on me-”
“So have you,” I point out.
“-and you've never even been to my show, not once.”
“Actually I've seen it like, five times,” I admit, and then I really do get embarrassed when she looks at me like I've gone bat shit crazy.
“No you didn't. When? I never saw you.”
“I sat at the back.” God, I'm a pussy.
“Wow.” She raises her eyebrows, looking almost impressed for a moment. “You must really like Pride & Prejudice.”
I roll my eyes at that. “I like YOU, idiot.”
“This is getting really boring,” Fábia complains. “I thought there was gonna be more fighting or somethin'. Scratch his eyes out, Ibbie. It'll be funny.”
“Fábia, leave 'em alone,” Reid complains, though it's a halfhearted effort. The girl's never going to learn to play nice.
I glare at my friends, because they're really not fucking helping. It occurs to me that none of this is coming as a surprise to them, the kiss aside, like the fact that I'm mad about Ibbie isn't news to them at all. I guess I haven't been as good at hiding my feelings as I'd thought. From everyone except Ibbie, that is.
“Why didn't you just say so?” Ibbie demands, ignoring Fábia. She's still clinging onto that last little shred of anger, but it seems to ha
ve faded some now. “How do you expect me to just know when all you ever do is act like a butt head?”
Overwhelmed by the need to touch her, I reach out to grab her hand. She doesn't pull away. “Can we please just go somewhere private to talk now?”
She glances over at the others watching us, then down at our clasped hands in surprise. When she looks back up at me with those big, blue eyes, I can no longer find any trace of anger in them. “Okay.”
+++
WITH AN UNSPOKEN agreement, we make our way back to Ibbie's apartment in Hell's Kitchen. In fact, we don't speak at all the entire journey home. Not walking down the street, not on the subway, not in the elevator in her building. We do hold hands though. . .the entire time. That gives me more hope than anything ever has.
Her cousin, Sabrina, is sitting on the sofa when Ibbie lets us in. Her blonde hair is piled haphazardly up on her head and a pair of glasses have slipped down to the end of her nose as she studies a pile of papers scattered around her. Even at such a later hour, she's still working away. She arches a shocked eyebrow when she sees me standing next to Ibbie, our hands entwined. “I thought he wasn't allowed back here after the underwear incident?” she says to Ibbie. “You said if I let him in again you'd snap all the heels off my Louis Vuitton's.”
“He's. . .” Ibbie sighs, sneaking a peek at me and blushing. “He's the reason for the pink shirts.”
This makes no fucking sense to me whatsoever – though not much does when it comes to women – but clarity suddenly dawns on Sabrina's face. Her eyes widen knowingly. “Ohh. Really? Him? Never saw that one coming.”
Ibbie gives her a tiny smile. “Me neither.”
Sabrina gathers all her papers up and stands. “Well then. Guess I'll be in my room. Holler if you need me. But try not to need me.”
We watch her go, then turn to face each other in silence. For the first time all evening, Ibbie lets go of my hand. My fist clenches, missing her contact. The main lights are off, but Sabrina had a couple of lamps on and they cast a warm, low light around the room. In the background something is flashing on the TV, but the volume is turned down so low that I can barely even hear it.
“You okay?” I ask her doubtfully.
“Just ducky.”
She opens her mouth to say something else, but I interrupt before she can. I need to get this out there. “When I met you, you threw me for a loop. You drove me crazy,” I confess. “and I didn't handle it well – which you probably noticed. When I'm unsure about something, I usually just act like a dick.”
“Yeah, might've noticed that,” she replies, a sparkle in her eyes.
“You made me feel things I'd never felt before. When I realized that I liked you, I. . . Fuck, I didn't know how to act around you so I just kept being an ass. I fucked up. I'm sorry, Ibbie.”
“That might be the first time you've ever apologized to me.” She smiles impishly. “I'm sorry too. I'm not exactly faultless either. Though you totally had it coming.”
I chuckle. “Yeah, no one's ever given me my shit right back like you have.”
“How long?” she asks suddenly, surprising me.
“How long what?”
“Have you liked me? How long?”
Blowing out a puff of air, I rock back and forth on my heels. “A while. A really long while. I just had know idea what to do with it.”
She takes a deep breath then, psyching herself up, and steps closer until we're toe to toe. When she looks up into my eyes from beneath those long lashes, my heart skips a beat. “Well maybe you shoulda tried something like this.”
And then she leans up on her tiptoes and kisses me softly, sweetly. Almost innocently. No part of our bodies touch except our lips, though every inch of me feels like it's ablaze. I'm scared to move, scared to hope.
When she pulls back, those pink dots are back on her cheeks.
“Ibbie. . .” I swallow. “Don't. . .if you don't. . .'cause I can't. . .if you don't really mean it then. . .”
“I mean it. I mean, I'm not really sure what I'm doing right now,” she professes, reaching out for my hands. “But I know that you've been on my mind ever since you kissed me. Well, you've been on my mind every day for the past year – but this time for good reasons.” We both laugh at that. “But I really like the Walt I met the other night. So I mean it. I really mean it.”
I close my eyes, tugging her closer so I can rest my forehead against hers. “So what now?”
“Well right now I just want to explore this further,” she tells me. “I can't think about anything beyond that, not yet. Let's just. . .get to know each other. Can that be enough?”
Letting go of her hands, I grab a hold of her hips and pull her against me. Can that be enough? It's more than I ever fucking dreamed I'd get with her. So much more. And the rest of it, the falling in love with me part, it'll come later. I'll make damned sure of it.
“That sounds incredible,” I assure her, and then I press my lips against hers.
Chapter 11
Ibbie
THINGS BETWEEN WALT and I are new, tentative, exciting. I'm reluctant to call what we have a relationship at first, still wary of the past, but as the weeks pass by Walt wins me over and I warm to the idea. Walt Vega is officially my boyfriend – he made me promise to stop calling him my bae.
And what we have. . .I like it. I like it a whole lot.
Walt isn't perfect, he never will be. He's still grumpy and sarcastic with almost everyone he meets and we still make fun of each other all the time – though our cuts are much less harsh than they used to be. And me, I'm not perfect either. The two of us are perfectly imperfect, and I think that's what makes things between us so. . .perfect.
It turns out Fauna did forgive Aleix after he'd explained everything to her. Well, sort of. She made him take back his engagement ring, but she agreed to date him on a trial basis. He's working hard to earn her forgiveness.
Fauna came up to the city to meet with me one day to make sure I knew that she held none of the events against me. She wanted to make certain that things were good between us since it's likely we're going to be in each others lives for a really long time. Somehow we ended the afternoon as pretty tight friends. It's probably the strangest way I've ever befriended someone, but I think it all worked out pretty well.
I saw Aleix again too. Since I'm dating his brother, it's not like I could avoid him for the rest of our lives so I agreed to go to lunch with him so he could apologize to me. When I saw him, I felt. . .nothing. Absolutely nothing. Not sadness, not regret, not even anger. I don't know if it was because we'd only dated a few weeks, or if it was because I'm sort of majorly into someone else now, but it was pretty frigging great. Walt glared daggers at his brother the entire time, but I forced them to make up in the end. I don't have siblings so I've never really experienced that bond, but I'd hate to be the reason two brothers grew apart.
As much as I really like Walt, I keep firm to my one month wait when it comes to sex. A girl's gotta stick to her principles, after all. And Walt, he is seriously awesome about that in ways that other guys I've dated were definitely not. He doesn't push me, doesn't guilt me into giving more than I'm ready to, doesn't ever even try to take things further than the boundaries I've set. To me, that just makes him sexier.
Yet even though we haven't had sex, we've spent almost every night together at his place or mine, even if it's just to fall asleep curled up in each others arms at the end of a long evening.
The more time I spend with him, the more essential he's becoming to me. I wouldn't have it any other way.
+++
“HEY, BABE.” WALT grins when he opens his apartment door to me, reaching out to kiss me frantically like it's been weeks since we last saw each other instead of days. He grabs the front of my dress and tugs me into his apartment, his lips still firmly attached to mine. I kick the door shut behind me. When he pulls back, he looks down at me and cringes. “Oops, my bad.”
I glance down, unsurprised to find
black charcoal fingerprints all over my purple dress. Luckily I'm more than used to this by now, because when Walt is at home his hands are covered in charcoal at least seventy percent of the time. It's his favorite art tool. “It's okay,” I tell him, reaching up to wrap my arms around his neck. “Did you have a nice Christmas?”
“Was okay. I fuckin' missed you though.”
“You saw me Christmas Eve.”
“That was three whole days ago.”
I roll my eyes at him, but the truth is – I missed him just as much as he missed me. Three days felt more like three months.
“So I got you something for Christmas,” he says, letting me go and suddenly looking about ten different shades of awkward.
“You did?”
“Well. . .I made it. Sort of. I guess. Fucking hell.” Moving over to his kitchen table, he picks up a frame he'd left there. It's unwrapped, because he's still Walt, and it's pretty big – maybe about the length and width of one of my arms. He holds it out to me, his cheeks growing pink. It's probably strange how much I love when he gets all shy and embarrassed like this, but it's so unbelievably frigging cute.
I take the frame he offers out to me, blinking rapidly as I look down at the beautiful painting of myself on stage, all dressed up as Lydia Bennet. It's. . .gorgeous. Breathtakingly gorgeous, and so fantastically detailed. He's caught me mid pose, with one gloved hand on my hip and the other holding onto a splayed fan. A little smile tilts up one side of my mouth as I peek at the audience out of the corner of my eye.
“It's from your first performance,” he explains when I don't say anything.
“I. . .I didn't even know you were there.”
He nods. “I was. I painted this from memory – this is the image I have of you in my head every time I think of you up there on stage. You probably think it's lame, right? I can get you a better Christmas gift, I-”
“Don't you dare,” I break in, finally looking up and giving him a watery smile. No one has ever done something so wonderful for me before. “I love it. You made me look so beautiful.”