7. Aubree

At least I don’t have to go to an office building. That’s one small consolation as I stare at my phone wishing a message would pop up. None do, but I count my blessings on the Uber ride back to my apartment, which is on the second floor of a neat brick building with a hair salon on the ground floor and a couple more units up above. I don’t mind the muffled sounds of the dryers and music coming through the floor. It’s still quiet when I shut the door and lock it behind me with an exacerbated sigh. Not early enough for the first clients of the day.

Thank God I don’t have a set schedule, because I desperately need a shower. There’s no way I can sit at my desk and go to work while I’m wearing clothes that smell like Jackson.

Maybe it’s pathetic, but I can admit it makes me a bit somber to take them off and drop them in the hamper.

I go through all the motions. Shampoo and soap and conditioner. I dry my hair and put on makeup.

Unsurprisingly, it doesn’t help. With a hot cup of tea at my side, I take my seat at my computer with a long to-do list and a mind that’s full of Jackson. And what we did last night. And how I left him sleeping on the sofa. And how I wish I were still with him. I should have pretended to be sleeping for as long as it took.

In my defense, I’m not good with hangovers.

Graphic design has nothing to do with the man I slept with last night. For fifteen whole minutes, I concentrate on my projects. A new logo for a company based in the city. A banner for an artist’s website. The background for a set of wedding invitations.

None of them are exactly presentable … but I try.

All of it takes way longer than it should, because I can’t focus.

The only thing that draws my attention is my phone. Every two minutes, I stare at it, willing it to ping and let me know Jackson texted me to tell me how much he wants a repeat of last night.

After about an hour, I find the tea cold and my thoughts turning on me.

I don’t know what’s worse. If Jackson texts or if he doesn’t. If he ignores what happened last night, then I guess that’s something to go on. If he texts and wants to talk …

Butterflies flutter deep in my stomach. It’s hard to tell if they’re the nervous kind or the excited kind.

Of course, there’s always the third option, which is that he texts and says we should pretend it didn’t happen and was a mistake.

I fly out of my seat so fast the office chair nearly hits the wall as it rolls backward and I put my phone on the kitchen counter, plugging it in to charge. After that, I buckle down for a solid hour of work. There’s not a chance in hell I’m going to miss a deadline and get laid off because I let my crush tear up my heart.

It doesn’t take long, though, for it to buzz from all the way across the apartment and I’m out of my seat before I can think twice. It’s silly to run across my little apartment just for a notification that could be a text from anyone, but I do.

Jackson: You ran off this morning. I should have at least made you breakfast.

Not even one emoji.

How am I supposed to answer this? How am I supposed to respond? I guess I’ll have to play it off like I’m fine and absolutely not obsessed with the outcome of sleeping with my best friend’s brother.

Aubree: Sorry—I just didn’t want to be late for work!

I sent the exclamation mark before I can think twice. Damn it, I should have changed that to a period.

The typing indicator dots appear on my screen and hover there for what seems like forever. He could say anything right now.

Option A: Let’s forget about it. See you Sunday.

Option B: We shouldn’t say anything about this. Keep it between us.

No, I correct my thinking, it’s too late for that. Cheryl saw. She knows we left together. Everyone who was still at the bar knows. And even if they didn’t, there’s no way we’re pretending it didn’t happen.

Jackson: Let me buy you dinner tonight?

My heart’s racing slows up slightly, hope in sight. I send a message back without thinking.

Aubree: You don’t owe me food just because we had sex :)

I mean it as a joke, but no new dots come up on the screen.

Jackson doesn’t say anything.

Not right away. And not in the next hour. Or the hour after that.

The afternoon crawls by. It’s the slowest day I’ve ever lived through. I leave my phone in the kitchen and force myself to work on my projects. This is not a good productivity hack, but it does mean my list gets smaller and smaller as the minutes pass. I answer emails I should have responded to a month ago and put in a couple bids for new projects.

I even cold email a handful of companies I think would like my work that have been on my to-do list forever. Sending cold emails is basically a new record for me. I put it off as long as possible because I hate writing those emails—they seem salesy and weird. I know putting myself out there is a big part of my job, but I still don’t like it. I’m supposed to bring in a certain number of clients so I have to. But cold emailing ahead of the deadline … I am … desperate for a distraction.

All this to avoid deciding what to do about Jackson’s text.

Do I say something? Ask for clarification?

Send him a message talking up last night as a joke?

That probably wouldn’t play very well. Or—I don’t know, maybe it would. He’s always been laid back and funny. We’ve never had this much pressure between us.

In the afternoon, I give up trying to work and check his socials. He hasn’t unfriended me. Hasn’t posted anything there, either.

“Oh, God, Aubree.” I bury my face in my hands. He’s probably working. It’s Monday. Jackson works in finance and it’s always busy, even when it’s not the craziest part of tax season. He’s busy, that’s all it is. This isn’t a disaster.

We’ve avoided disaster lots of times. When I first moved back to town, I had a boyfriend. We were going to do the whole long-distance thing and stick it out together. It didn’t last longer than three months. My feelings for him cooled once we weren’t in the same town. And … my feelings for someone else were heating up.

Jackson.

I felt myself falling for him every Sunday at the football games. I waited for his calls and blushed when I got texts. When Cheryl and I would hang out with him, I tried to be the best, shiniest version of myself, all while I told myself I was being casual. The real me. At some point, those two people got mixed together. I got more comfortable with Jackson.

Too comfortable, to the point that I broke up with my boyfriend, intending to tell Jackson how I felt.

I was too late. He was already seeing someone else.

What’s a girl to do? I told myself it was a crush. You don’t bring up a crush to your best friend’s brother when he’s dating someone else. It was a reasonable crush too. Jackson had treated me well. He’d been kind to me instead of brushing me off as one of his sister’s friends, and it would be hard for anyone not to feel something.

And he was sweet. And funny. And he liked flirting with me. But it wasn’t … real.

Defeated, I sit back farther in my chair, pulling my legs up and letting the swivel rock me back and forth.

I still feel him all over me from last night. It doesn’t matter that I’ve showered. Doesn’t matter that I have fresh clothes and a day of work behind me. The imprints of his kisses are still on my skin. The places where our bodies met are still buzzing from the contact.

When I glance at the clock next, it’s five fifteen.

I take my teacup to the sink and wash it. It’s probably the most thorough bath the teacup has ever gotten in its life. Work’s over. There are no new messages from Jackson on my phone. Nothing laughing off the text I sent him, or asking for a reply.

If he hasn’t messaged by six, I’ll text him and put myself out of my misery. I can’t let this hang over my head all night. Or for the rest of my life. I can’t go to the game next weekend feeling all twisted up inside, like I’ve ruined something.

I haven’t, really. The way to think about this is as a nice, onetime thing. We both enjoyed each other, and that’s enough. It’s a choice to make it awkward with him. I can choose to make it normal instead.

Right?

Although that doesn’t explain why I feel this sense of loss inside my chest. This ache for something more.

A knock at the door makes me jump.

I can’t deny that it causes a flood of feelings. Embarrassment, because I’ve been waiting for this knock. Fear, because what if it’s not him? And hope—hope that it’s Jackson standing on the other side. Who the hell else could it possibly be, though?

I place the teacup in the drying rack as gently as my nerves will allow me and head to the door with even strides so it doesn’t sound like I’m running. It might not be him, anyway.

I get up on tiptoe to look through the peephole. My heart beats fast and feels skittish. I’ve never had a crush as strong as this one. Not even when I was a teenager and all my hormones were out of control. The guys in my high school had nothing on Jackson.

Jackson’s in the hall outside my apartment, waiting patiently, a bag of Chinese food raised in his hand. “Hey,” he calls out. “You hungry?”