Maybe Someday(31)

I roll onto my back to let her off the bed, but instead, she’s slapping my cheeks. I open my eyes and look up to see Sydney hovering over me. Her mouth is moving, but my vision is too fogged over to see what she’s trying to say. Not to mention that the strobe light isn’t helping.

Wait. I don’t have a strobe light.

I sit straight up on the bed. Sydney hands me my phone and begins to text me, but my phone is dead. Did we fall asleep?

The lights. The lights are going on and off.

I grab Sydney’s phone out of her hand and check the time: 8:15 A.M. I also read the text she just tried to send me.

Sydney: Someone’s at your bedroom door.

Warren wouldn’t be up this early on a Friday. It’s his day off.

Friday.

Maggie.

SHIT!

I hurriedly jump off the bed and grab Sydney’s wrists, then swing her to her feet. She looks shocked that I’m panicking, but she needs to get the hell back to her room. I open the bathroom door and motion for her to take that route. She walks into the bathroom, then turns and heads back into my bedroom. I grab her by the shoulders and force her back into the bathroom. She slaps my hands away and points into my bedroom.

“I want my phone!” she says, pointing toward my bed. I retrieve her phone, but before I hand it to her, I type a text on it.

Me: I’m sorry, but I think that’s Maggie. You can’t be in here, or she’ll get the wrong idea.

I hand her the phone, and she reads the text, then looks back up at me. “Who’s Maggie?”

Who’s Maggie? How the hell can she not remember . . .

Oh.

Is it possible I’ve never mentioned Maggie to her before?

I grab her phone again.

Me: My girlfriend.

She looks at the text, and her jaw tightens. She slowly brings her eyes back to mine, and she snatches the phone out of my hand, grabs the doorknob, and steps back into the bathroom. The door closes in my face.

So was not expecting that reaction.

But I don’t have time to respond, because my light is still flickering. I head straight to the bedroom door and unlock it, then open it.

Warren is standing in the doorway with his arm pressed against the frame. There’s no sign of Maggie.

My panic instantly subsides as I walk backward and fall onto my bed. That could have been ugly. I glance up at Warren, because he’s obviously here for something.

“Why aren’t you answering my texts?” he signs from the doorway.

“My phone died.” I reach over to my phone and place it on the charging base on the nightstand.

“But you never let your phone die.”

“First time for everything,” I sign.

He nods his head, but it’s an annoying, suspicious, You’re hiding something kind of nod.

Or maybe I’m just being paranoid.

“You’re hiding something,” he signs.

Or maybe I’m not being paranoid.

“And I just checked Sydney’s room.” He arches a suspicious brow. “She wasn’t in there.”

I glance to the bathroom, then look back at Warren, wondering if I should even lie about it. All we did was fall asleep. “I know. She was in here.”

He holds his stern expression. “All night?”

I nod casually. “We were working on lyrics. I guess we fell asleep.”

He’s acting strange. If I didn’t know him better, I’d think he was jealous. Wait. I do know him better. He is jealous.

“Does this bother you, Warren?”

He shrugs and signs back. “Yeah. A little.”

“Why? You spend almost every night in Bridgette’s bed.”

He shakes his head. “It’s not that.”

“What is it, then?”

He breaks his gaze, and I can see the discomfort cross his face before he exhales. He makes the sign that indicates Maggie’s name. He brings his eyes back to mine. “You can’t do this, Ridge. You made this choice for yourself years ago, and I tried to tell you then what I thought about it. But you’re in it now, and if I have to be the annoying friend to remind you of that, so be it.”

I wince, because it kind of pisses me off how he’s referring to mine and Maggie’s relationship. “Don’t refer to my relationship with Maggie as being ‘in it’ ever again.”

His expression grows apologetic. “You know what I mean, Ridge.”

I stand and walk toward him. “How long have we been best friends?”

He shrugs. “That’s all I am to you? A best friend? Ridge, I thought we were so much more than that.” He smirks as if he’s trying to be funny, but I don’t laugh. When he sees how much his remarks have bothered me, his expression quickly sobers. “Ten years.”

“Ten. Ten years. You know me better than that, Warren.”