Page 60 of Reclaim Me

Setting her fork down, Rae nods. “I mean, I’m just going back for auditions. I’m not sure it’ll turn into anything more.”

“It will!” Indigo assures Rae, coming off a little too overzealous even to me. “And then you’ll be out there on your own, living your dreams and figuring out how to be independent.”

“I mean, the pay isn’t that great,” Rae says, her brows furrowed. “If I do get the job, I’ll still probably have to have four roommates to afford to live there.”

Indigo’s eyes take on a dreamy look. “That’s part of the charm, though, isn’t it?”

“I guess.” Rae shrugs, picking up her glass of water and taking a sip before muttering, “If you find poverty charming.”

“No, not at all!” Indigo places a reassuring hand on Rae’s arm. “I just meant that the whole roommate thing is part of the New Yorker aesthetic. You know, the struggling artist with the fifth-floor walk-up, working their ass off by day, sleeping around at night. I mean, you must be chomping at the bit to get back out there on your own, so you don’t have to worry about this guy choking all your dates out, am I right?”

I’m not sure which part of that little diatribe is the final straw for Rae, but as soon as Indigo finishes talking, she stands, tossing her napkin onto her plate. “I’m going to go call Will and see if he’s okay,” she says, lying through her perfect teeth.

We watch her walk away, and Indigo turns to me with furrowed brows. “Why doesn’t she like me?”

“She likes you just fine, Indie.”

She scoffs. “Don’t lie to me, Hunter. I see the way she looks at me even though I go out of my way to be friendly. I mean, you see that I’m trying to be friendly, right?”

“Maybe you shouldn’t try so hard.”

The sound of Indigo’s fork crashing onto the ceramic plate in front of her draws the attention of nearly everyone in the dining room. Concerned eyes linger on us for a moment before everyone goes back to what they were doing.

“I try hard because I care about you, and you clearly care about her. Do you think I want to be friends with some twenty-something who thinks she knows everything about life already, Hunter? Hmm? Well, I don’t. I just want you, but apparently, I can’t have you without her, so I’m trying, and it’d be nice if you encouraged the little brat to try, too.”

“Don’t call her a brat.”

She looks at me like I’ve spontaneously sprouted a second head. “Are you serious right now? I say all of that to you, and all you care about is me calling her a brat?”

Her voice is growing louder by the second, and tension lines my shoulders as I think of all the ways this situation could go wrong. I’m a big, Black man with a history of drug addiction in the middle of a fancy, mostly white restaurant with a woman screaming at me, so there are a lot of them.

“Lower your voice, Indigo.”

“Do you love her, Hunter?” She asks, her tone only marginally softer.

I know the answer to that question like I know the way back to my house. It comes to me easily, as natural as drawing my next breath, but I don’t dare speak it out loud. I won’t let the first time I acknowledge how I feel about Rae be wasted on a woman I shouldn’t have gotten involved with in the first place.

“She’s my best friend, Indigo.”

“That’s not what I asked, Hunter.”

“But it’s the only answer I’m willing to give.” I reach across the table and grab her hand, but she snatches away. “Listen, Indie, this isn’t working out.”

Her open palm collides with the side of my face, and my head turns from its force. The lady at the table across from us gasps in shock, and I swallow the urge to laugh.

“Fuck you, Hunter!” Indigo shouts before storming out.

After she’s gone, our waitress appears, her cheeks red with second-hand embarrassment. “Will you be needing any boxes, sir?”

I glance at Rae’s uneaten plate. “Just one and two orders of your crème brûlée to go, please.”

Once I’ve settled the bill and secured the leftovers and dessert, I set out to locate Rae for the second time tonight. When I find her, she’s sitting on the bench outside of the entrance with her legs crossed and an odd expression on her face.

“I saw Indigo leave,” she says, taking my hand when I extend it to her and allowing me to pull her up off the bench. “She seemed pretty upset.”

“I told her it wasn’t working out.”

“Oh, I’m sorry.”

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