Searching for Neverland

by Alexander, Monica

  But I also enjoy the fact that we have a strictly platonic relationship. Thankfully my feelings for him never returned, since that might have made living together just the teensiest bit awkward, but more than that, I’m looking for something serious with a guy, and Josh changes women every few weeks.

  Truthfully, I feel like he might be a little bit lost. When he first graduated college, he’d been on the fast track to career success. He had his MBA and a great job at a major bank making well over six figures by the time he turned twenty five, but then his best friend Jeremy was killed in a motorcycle accident, and soon after Josh quit his lucrative job in banking and started working at a bar in Buckhead. It was almost like he felt like life was too short to spend it behind a desk, and he set out to change things about his life before it was too late.

  Of course that’s just my assumption. Josh doesn’t talk much about his life in Atlanta, but it doesn’t make sense that someone with an MBA, who is pretty damn intelligent, would be content serving drinks on a daily basis. In the rare times I’ve brought up the subject of why he still works at the bar, Josh has always clammed right up. But I guess it doesn’t matter, because he’s happy, and him being unambitious means I have a fun, single friend to hang out with, and I get free drinks – win-win.

  And Josh is a great friend. It’s why he plays relationship counselor to me on a regular basis. I’m not sure he applies any of his sage advice to his own life, but that’s not really my concern.

  I sighed, bringing myself back to the present where my roommate was eyeing me speculatively.

  “I’m sure I’ll meet someone eventually,” I reasoned. “I mean, I can’t be single forever. Or maybe I’ll get lucky, and Alex will come back around.”

  “Tay, seriously?” Josh asked, a distasteful look clouding his face. He wasn’t a big fan of my ex-boyfriend.

  “Yes,” I said definitively. I’d never really gotten over Alex, and Josh knew that. “Alex was the last guy that I really liked. I’m sorry, but it’s true.”

  Alex Brockman had been my boyfriend during my senior year of college and again three years later. We’d broken up the second time, because I’d wanted to take things to the next level and he wanted to be single. I still missed him, and a part of me hoped he would change his mind about us, but we’d broken up so long ago that it was stupid to even think about him wanting to be with me again. If he wanted to be with me, he would have called. It was that simple.

  “Taylor, you can do so much better than that dipshit. Seriously,” Josh said, as he got up to go into the kitchen. Both of our beers were empty.

  He just had set my new beer down on the coffee table in front of me when his phone dinged to let him know that he had a text message. He walked over to the hall table where it was plugged into the charger. I cracked open my new beer, took a big swig, and attempted to push Alex from my mind. I knew it was unhealthy to think about him. I’d wasted too much time doing just that, and it hadn’t done me any good.

  “Holy shit!”

  There was so much shock in Josh’s tone that it startled me, and I forgot for a moment that I was supposed to swallow the beer that was in my mouth. I closed my almost over-flowing mouth quickly, and my cheeks bulged out as I looked up at him. I took a minute to swallow as he was still staring at his phone in shock.

  “What?” I called out as soon as my mouth was free again.

  “Corey proposed.”

  It took me a few seconds to register what he’d just said and what it meant, but when I did, my jaw dropped and my eyes bugged out.

  “Shut up!” I screamed, as I jumped up from the couch and crossed the room to where he was standing. “Let me see that.”

  I reached for his iPhone so I could see the text from Allison. There it was, plain as day – I’m engaged! with a picture of the ring on her finger.

  “Oh, my God,” I said, my hands flying to my mouth. I knew the excitement in my voice was mixed with something that I couldn’t pinpoint. I hated to admit that it was something bordering on jealously and pity for myself. “I’m so happy for her.”

  Josh instinctively saw how disjointed the words sounded and put his arm around me. “It’s okay to not be a hundred percent thrilled about this,” he said, reading my emotions. He really knew me way too well.

  I felt a tear slide down my cheek. My best friend was engaged. Okay, so I knew that was going to happen eventually. She’d been dating Corey for four years, and they were moving in together in a few weeks, so it was probably about time he proposed, but for someone who couldn’t even find a boyfriend, the news really sucked to hear. I’m not going to lie.

  Dammit. I was a shitty friend.

  I looked up at Josh, as I swiped the tears away, trying to hide them, but he’d already seen how upset I was. His bright blue eyes were slightly clouded as he looked down at me with concern.

  “Okay, you can’t tell Allison that I was crying when I found out. You can’t tell her. I want her to think I’m happy for her – which I am, it’s just . . .” I trailed off as fresh tears started to fall down my face again.

  “I know,” Josh said, as he put his arms around me and pulled me against his chest. “I know you’re happy for her, but I know it’s also hard to hear.”

  I nodded into his chest. I felt so secure with his arms around me, and I was suddenly so grateful that he was there. I knew that if I checked my phone, there would be an identical text from Allison. If I’d been alone when I’d read that message, I would have been so much worse off.

  It took me a few minutes before I felt calm enough to pull away from Josh. The tears had stopped, but I still felt like shit. I instinctively reached for the beer in his hand and took a big gulp. I went to hand it back to him, but he waved in dismissal.

  “Keep it. You need it more than me.”

  “Thank you,” I said, looking up at him through wet lashes. He was eyeing me pensively.

  “You know if you really want a boyfriend, I’ll volunteer.”

  I started for a moment before I started to laugh uncontrollably, so much so that I almost fell over I was laughing so hard. When I pulled back to look at him, trying to get my giggles under control, he looked offended, but I knew it was in jest.

  “Aww, are you seriously offering?” I giggled, knowing he was kidding.

  He kissed me on the forehead. “Not in the slightest. Besides, Kimmy would probably get upset if I start dating someone else.”

  I raised my eyebrows. “Kimmy?”

  I had no idea who he was talking about. He hadn’t told me he was seeing someone new which was odd.

  “Yeah, Kimmy,” he confirmed.

  “And who is Kimmy?”

  He swallowed hard. “Um, my girlfriend. I thought I told you about her,” he said quickly, and I took note that the word ‘girlfriend’ didn’t roll off his tongue so easily.

  I narrowed my eyes at him. “Girlfriend?”

  Josh didn’t have girlfriends – at least since I’d been living with him. I’d never even heard him use that word.

  He cleared his throat, and all of a sudden it was like he was visibly uncomfortable with the conversation.

  “Yeah, um, I’ve been seeing her for a few weeks, and she wanted to be exclusive, so I sort of agreed. I thought I told you about her.”

  I shook my head. “No, you definitely did not.”

  “Oh, sorry.”

  I looked at him in confusion. “Josh, do you even want a girlfriend?”

  It was the first time I’d heard him label someone he was dating. He usually saw a girl for a few weeks before he moved on, but he would always keep things really casual and never, ever labeled the relationship. Hell, most of the time he was seeing a few women at once.

  “I’m thirty-one,” was his response.

  “Yeah, so.”

  “Well, I figure I should probably stop screwing around and be serious. I do want to get married or at least have someone who’s a permanent fixture in my life. And that’s not going to happen if I don’t
attempt to be monogamous.”

  “And Kimmy’s the one you think you’re going to end up with?”

  I couldn’t see it, and I hadn’t even met the girl yet. Just her name alone made me squirm. Kimmy. What was she, twelve? But even beyond that, Josh looked too uncomfortable to be serious about this girl. It was like just talking about the fact that he had a girlfriend was wigging him out.

  Josh shrugged. “I don’t know,” he mumbled, and I knew I should stop hounding him, but I just couldn’t. This was too bizarre.

  “Okay,” I said brightly, changing tactics. “Tell me about her. What do you like about her?”

  “Well, she’s a lawyer. I met her at the gym. She’s cute and funny and nice.”

  Yeah, that gave me so much to go off of. I knew immediately that she wasn’t the one for him. Maybe because I knew Josh so well, or maybe it was his tone, but either way, I knew Kimmy wouldn’t be around long.

  “And, she goes by Kimmy?” I asked skeptically.

  I couldn’t imagine taking a lawyer named Kimmy seriously.

  “To her friends. At work she goes by Kimberly.”

  I smirked, and he shoved me in the shoulder, relaxing for the first time since he’d revealed this monumental news.

  “Sorry,” I said, as I righted myself. “I won’t be mean about Kimmy anymore. Are you going out with her and DJ later?”

  I laughed at my own joke, as visions of Kimmy Gibbler from Full House danced in my head.

  “Ha, ha,” Josh said, as he reached for the beer I was holding. “You’re hilarious. It’s no wonder you’re still single.”

  I smacked him on the chest with the back of my hand and took the beer back from him, taking a long pull. “Jerk. That was a low blow.”

  “Aww, did I hurt your feelings?” he asked with mock comfort in his voice as he put his arm around me and pulled me closer to him.

  “Whatever.” I jerked away from him. “Your side comments mean nothing to me. I will one day find the most amazing man, and I will fall in love with him – faults and all – and it will all be perfect.”

  What the hell was I talking about, and why was I waxing philosophical? My dating exhaustion mixed with my beer buzz was making me stupid. It was definitely a sign that I needed to go to bed.

  “Good luck to you,” Josh said. “You just summed up what we’re all looking for.”

  He grabbed the beer we were sharing and raised it to me.

  “I thought you were happy being a bachelor,” I countered.

  I’d honestly always thought Josh had been content casually dating the girls in their early twenties that he usually went for because he knew there was no threat of them wanting to settle down. I figured he’d be single until he was at least forty.

  “Hey, I’m looking for the right person as much as the next guy, but unfortunately, that person is hard to come by.”

  “Maybe you should stop dating twenty-two year-olds,” I suggested.

  He made a face. “I do not just date twenty-two year-olds,” he defended.

  I raised my eyebrows. “Fine, maybe you should date girls your own age then.”

  He made another face, and I knew what he was thinking – they were all clock-watchers.

  “Well how old is Kimmy?”

  “Twenty-six,” he said confidently.

  “And she’s not ‘the one’?”

  He leaned back against the wall and appraised me. “Don’t know. I just met her, so we’ll see.”

  She wasn’t. I could already tell. And I hoped Josh would realize it soon. I wasn’t sure why he was forcing himself into a relationship when it was clear he was doing it for the wrong reasons.

  I sighed. “Okay, bedtime.”

  Josh grinned. “I’ll be up in a minute. Take off your clothes and wait for me.”

  I fake gagged at that suggestion. “Dream on, and please remember that you have a girlfriend now, so sexual innuendos made toward your female roommate probably won’t be welcomed gestures.”

  Josh blew me a suggestive kiss, and then his expression changed.

  “Do I want a girlfriend?” he asked when I was halfway across the room.

  I turned around to face him. “Sweetie, that’s something I can’t answer for you, but have fun pondering that inevitable question you’ve no doubt been asking yourself for the past ten years.” I blew him a kiss in return. “Goodnight.”

  “Night, Tay,” he said, and I could definitely see the wheels turning inside his head. Then when I was halfway up the stairs he finally answered his own question. “Yeah, I do. I want a girlfriend.”

  “Great! Can’t wait to meet her,” I called back, being the supportive friend I knew he needed me to be in that moment even though I was less than thrilled about meeting Kimmy.

  Chapter 2

  “Urgh,” I mumbled into my pillow.

  I squeezed my eyes tight in an effort to wish away the person who had suddenly perched themselves on the end of my bed. I wanted to go back to my dream where a really hot guy was giving me a full body massage.

  “Get up! Get up!” Allison said, in way too cheerful a tone for – I snuck a one-eyed glance at the alarm clock – nine a.m. on a Saturday. Grr. I wanted to go back to sleep.

  “Go away,” I growled.

  I felt my best friend bounce a little on my bed, making me rock like I was sleeping on a water bed. I did not like that feeling, especially with the way my head felt.

  “No way. I have to show you something,” she sing-songed, and I finally realized why she had found it necessary to wake me up at such an ungodly hour.

  My eyes flew open. Allison continued to bounce lightly on the end of my bed. I sat up straight and looked right into her sparkling brown eyes. She had the goofiest grin on her face. It was like she couldn’t stop smiling.

  “Let me see,” I said, suddenly awake, as I reached for her hand.

  She thrust her left hand forward, and I grabbed it. And there it was, looking all sparkly and perfect, the one thing all single girls dream about. I couldn’t believe how beautiful her ring was close up. It was simple, just a brilliant cut solitaire in a platinum setting, but damn if Corey hadn’t picked out the perfect ring for her.

  I suddenly really, really wanted one of my own.

  “Oh, my God,” I breathed. “It’s so gorgeous.”

  I looked up at Allison as I said that, and I could tell that she was just bursting to tell me the story of Corey’s proposal. Knowing him, it would be a good one. He was nothing if not romantic.

  I settled back against my pillows as she started to tell her engagement story, her eyes lighting up as she recounted a story she’d surely tell again and again. I felt privileged to be the first person to hear it.

  “So we changed for bed,” she continued, having just told me about all the times throughout the night that she thought he might ask and he didn’t. She said it got to the point where she’d resigned herself that she just wasn’t going to get engaged that night. And she’d been talking for close to five minutes

  “Sweetie, I love you, but get to the good stuff,” I encouraged her.

  She grinned. “Okay, so I went into the bathroom to wash my face, brush my teeth, etcetera. When I came out, I saw that he’d lit like forty candles all over his bedroom, turned the lights off, and was kneeling in the center of the room.” She giggled in a nervous, excited kind of way.

  My hand went over my mouth. I literally thought I might cry.

  “So, he was kneeling,” I prompted. I needed to hear the rest.

  “Yeah, he was,” she said, sounding goofily happy. “Now, mind you I have no make-up on, and I’m wearing my pajamas, and this is the point at which my boyfriend chooses to ask me to marry him.”

  I smiled. I thought it sounded really sweet.

  “What did he say?” I asked eagerly.

  She grinned widely. “Well, when I saw him, my jaw literally fell to the floor. He started talking as soon as I walked into the room. He was all nervous and speaking really fast, but he ba
sically said that he loved me more than anyone and he wanted to spend the rest of his life with me, and then he asked me to marry him.”

  “Oh, my God,” I gushed. It was your standard proposal, but when those words that had been said millions of times were said to your best friend, they took on a whole new sense of importance. “What did you say?”

  “I said yes. I had to walk over to him, since we were like ten feet apart. I sort of said yes and ran to him at the same time, and then he stood up and put the ring on my finger.”

  “Aww, I love how he did it.”

  We’d never really assumed he would propose at home. Corey was into bigger gestures, so he’d surprised us with that one.

  “I do, too. It’s more special that it was just us there. I actually questioned why he waited until I was in my pajamas, and do you know what he said?”

  I shook my head.

  “He said that he loves me the most when I’m just me – no make-up, no dressy clothes – but just me. Isn’t that the sweetest thing you’ve ever heard?”

  “Aww! Too cute,” I gushed, my hand over my heart. “Corey is so sweet!”

  I so wanted a boy to say things like that to me.

  “Isn’t he though?”

  He really was. I’d always liked Corey. He was perfect for her.

  “Okay, so bigger issue,” she said, suddenly looking serious.

  “What?” I asked, giving her a confused look.

  “Will you be my maid of honor?” she asked solemnly.

  “Hell yes!” I screamed and threw my arms around her.

  She hugged me back. “Oh, thanks Tay! I’m so excited. And don’t worry. I will totally let you have full veto power over the bridesmaids’ dresses.”

  I pulled back to look at my newly engaged best friend. Her light brown eyes were shining in excitement that I knew she couldn’t hide if she tried.

  “I love you for that,” I said, and she giggled.

  “What the hell is all this noise?” came a groggy voice from across the room.

  We both looked up to see Josh standing in my doorway. Actually, he was leaning against the door frame and looking like he’d been through hell and back. His hair was falling messily over his forehead, and he had a line across his cheek that told me he’d slept hard the night before. He was only wearing boxers which would have freaked me out if I hadn’t seen him walk around in the same thing every morning for three years. It didn’t faze me in the slightest, just as it probably didn’t faze him that I was sitting on my bed in my underwear and a tank top, which was what I always slept in. Although my eyes couldn’t help but stop on his tanned, toned stomach. I was human after all, and Josh had one nice body.