Page 64 of After All This Time

Here goes nothing.

“I’ve never been in love before. What does it feel like?”

I look at Xander, his eyes opening wide like he thinks I’m crazy to ask him that question. “Why are you looking at me? I’ve never been in love.”

Our eyes land on Grayson who’s examining the wall behind him and pretending like he can’t hear me which I know is absolute bullshit. Clearing my throat, I successfully grab his attention.

He turns his head around. “Why are you both looking at me like that?”

“You heard me, dumbass. I’m not going to repeat it.” I stare at him.

“Well, I haven’t been in love, so I can’t answer your question. How unfortunate. We could reach out to random strangers and ask them instead,” Grayson says.

Xander and I understand this is an uncomfortable topic for Grayson to talk about, but I want to know. I need to know.

He rolls his eyes in an aggressive way. “Fine. You want to know what it feels like?” He looks down, his face getting out of frame. “What does being in love feel like? Okay, I can do this. You can do this Gray,” he whispers to himself, pacing back and forth.

“Dude!” Xander and I say in unison.

He’s scratching the back of his neck with his fingers and getting up off his bed to walk around his bedroom. “Okay, okay.” He pauses. “You want to know what being in love feels like? It’s an addiction. A drug you can’t get enough of. She consumes you. Her voice. Her laugh. Her smile. Everything reminds you of her. When you’re around her, you can’t help but smile. You’re giddy, nervous, and distracted all at once. You’re able to be your authentic self around her. One hundred percent yourself. She makes you fucking crazy. But, you don’t want to lose her. You can’t lose her. And you don’t know how to deal with that feeling. It’s both euphoric and dysphoric at the same time. It feels like you're losing your goddamn mind.” He sits back down on his bed, zoning out into space. “It's like you’re the only two people who exist on this planet. All you want is to be around her. There’s truly nothing like it. Nothing.” Grayson takes a moment to catch his breath, snapping out of his trance. He leans his head back, letting out a deep breath.

My mouth drops open as I take in my surroundings. Xander raises his eyebrows, puckering his lips out.

What the hell was that?

I’ve never seen Grayson so passionate before. Let alone open to sharing his emotions like that. I know that I’m not the guy who’s not fond of sharing his feelings with his friends but he’s much worse than I am. He can be very closed off which can be frustrating, but I understand why he’s like that.

“Wow. That was beautiful. Just beautiful. You should’ve majored in inspirational speech giving, bro,” Xander says with a hint of sarcastic undertones in his voice.

“Oh, shut the hell up,” Grayson says to Xander before focusing his attention on me. “Did that answer your question?”

It takes me a minute to generate an answer because my head feels like it’s spinning out of control. I think I have a headache now.

Then, it finally hits me.

I can feel the heat from the imaginary fireworks going off behind me. I pop up from the bed, bending my knees up to my chest. My arms rest on my knee. My chest rapidly rises and falls, and my mouth hangs open.

Grayson smiles like the idiot that he is.

Xander looks at him with a confused expression written all over his face. “Am I missing something here?”

“That, my friend, is the look of a man who realized he’s in love with a woman he’s known since birth. A woman who he thought was annoying as hell. Not anymore. Am I right?”

Fuck. He’s right.

I didn’t want to admit it to anybody. Most importantly, I didn’t want to admit it to myself. I don’t know why. Guess I thought it was crazy to be in love with Dani because she annoyed the shit out of me growing up.

She drove me absolutely insane. She still does, but in a different way.

There are so many words to describe Danielle Solomon. So. Many. Fucking. Words. But, I don’t think there’s enough time to do so.

“What the hell am I going to do?”

Grayson answers me immediately. “You’re going to tell her how you feel. You have to tell her.”

“I can’t tell her. Do you know how weird it’s going to be between us if I do? I know she doesn’t feel the same way about me.”

“How do you know? Have you even asked her?” Grayson asks.

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