Outside the Lines(48)

Ben made me breakfast in bed yesterday morning. We spent the whole day just lounging around, watching TV, talking, and making lame jokes we both found to be hilarious. Oh, and we had sex a few more times that day. Our goodbyes got longer and longer, words mixed with kisses and cuddles.

He doesn’t want to leave. I don’t want him to leave. It is like a high school romance where you can’t get enough of the other. But that’s how I feel. I can’t get enough of him. I’m comfortable around him. I’m myself. I don’t want to be anyone else when we’re together.

Being me—and probably being a realist—that dark cloud looms in the distance. We’re not exclusive. Nothing has been said, nothing has been promised or put off limits. He let me know from the start he goes out with other women.

Who am I to be the one to make him settle down?

I’m not. I’m just me, just little miss weird Felicity, a blunt nerd with occasionally poor social skills. After a long talk with Erin last night, she convinced me to enjoy what’s going on and let it go from there. I can’t control everything. I can’t key in commands like a computer and use hacks and cheats at life.

“I haven’t asked him yet,” I confess. “I’ve got time,” I say mostly to convince myself. I don’t see why he wouldn’t go with me. It’s just one night and it’s not that far, plus there is an open bar with top-shelf liquor. And cake. Awesome cake, made by my best friend, I should add.

“Yeah,” Mariah agrees. “You do.” Her eyes flick to the office door. Someone from corporate is doing an office visit today, and Cameron is going nuts over it, texting me how freaked he is when he gets the chance. He asked me to go out for drinks with him after work, like the minute we clock out.

I was hoping to see Ben again, but agree to drinks anyway. Maybe he can join us. He said he’d text or call me when he got done at the gallery today, whenever that is. I can’t get him out of my mind, and for the first time since I started at this place, I don’t finish my assigned work early.

The big wigs leave an hour before the office starts to shut down for the day, and the air is immediately less tense. I go back and forth between my work and Facebook, messaging some of my online friends to chat about random things.

I do twenty minutes of actual work, then switch back to Facebook to creep on Ben’s profile. He accepted my friend request not long after we met, and rarely updates anything. Lame. I need to creep, mister. He gets tagged in events and by other galleries, but nothing that sheds light on his social life. He does post a lot of his art to Instagram, and has an impressive amount of followers.

I’m about to switch to Pinterest when the little friend icon notifies me I have a request. I click on it and almost shit my pants.

Mindy fucking Abraham.

My mouse hovers over “delete request” but I stop myself. I’d rather just ignore it, or not let her know friending me on Facebook is a big deal. Because it shouldn’t be. It’s fucking Facebook and I’m a fucking adult.

Like an evil force has taken over my body, I accept her request. But it’s not because I want to creep through yet another profile. Everything was set to private before, though it isn’t hard to get around that. I click on her profile then close my eyes.

Nope. Not doing it. I already know how she will come across. Picture perfect. So picture perfect that it will make me wallow inside, wishing my teeth were that white, or my skin that clear. I’ll be jealous of her fake breasts, even though my real ones are better than hers. Just heavier, sweatier I’m sure, and slightly saggier.

But they felt better?

Yeah, sure. I can go with that. Instead of looking at her perfectly posed pictures of her perfect family, I unfollow her and exit out of the Internet. I should work. I’m at work, after all, and the day is almost over.





*





“So, give me deets,” Cameron says as we munch on chips and drink margaritas.

“We did dinner Friday night, saw a movie Saturday afternoon, then spend that night and Sunday just hanging out, playing video games and watching TV. Super laid back, but super enjoyable. And we fucked several times, of course.”

One of Cameron’s eyebrows goes up. He looks at his drink and grabs another chip, dipping it in salsa.

“What?” I ask.

“Oh nothing,” he says and flicks his wrist.

“Bullshit. What?”

He lets out a breath and looks at me, expression soft like he’s going to break bad news. “Nothing is exclusive yet, right?”

“Nothing’s been said.”

“And he still dates other women?”

“Not that I know of, but I mean, if we haven’t voiced the whole only see each other thing, then he can, right?”