Page 141 of The Snowball Effect

Because she felt pretty damn desperate, right now. Desperate to know the truth. Desperate for Emma to tell Regan that she wasn’t delusional; that Emma not only felt this insane attraction but feltmore, just like she did. That it wasn’t limited to only Regan.

“Fine, Regan, I was upset. Are you happy?” Emma snapped back, the same desperation in her voice that Regan felt pulsing through her. “I was upset at the idea that you had someone in your room. The idea of you having sex with someone else in our apartment makes me feelcrazy, sick to my fucking stomach. Okay?”

“Okay!” Regan accepted, elated by the fact. She felt so… light. Like she could drift away with how happy this made her. “Great!”

“It’snot,” Emma denied, tossing her hands in the air as she looked at Regan like she’d grown a second head.

“Why?” She challenged, because she just didn’t understand. If Emma felt half as much for Regan as she did for Emma, then it wasamazingto know it was reciprocated! “I’ve tried so, so hard to respect your privacy when it comes to your feelings, I really have. I haven’t pressed you to talk to me about them, and I had no plans to. Butplease, Emma, if you want me to understand, I need you to lay all of your cards on the table for me. Just like I’ve done for you.”

Because, otherwise, Regan would never be able to wrap her mind around this. She wasn’t sure she’d understand, even after.

Emma stared at Regan, that expression of desire and attraction so clearly on display, even as it was marred with obvious internal conflict.

“I would never ask you to do something that I wouldn’t be willing to do, myself,” Regan continued, unable to stop the words from falling out of her mouth. “I’ll never ask you to bare your soul to me without baring mine, first,” she promised, her voice hoarse with how much she really, trulymeantit. “I know it’s not as easy for you as it is for me. I know you like privacy, and I know you’re scared to let people in, and–”

“If you were, somehow, a stranger to me, this would all be different,” Emma broke in, her voice so soft, but so easily commanding Regan’s full attention.

Confusion slid through her, and she tilted her head up at Emma with uncertainty.

“If you were a stranger I happened to meet three months ago at the café, then this would all be different,” Emma elaborated, shaking her head. “A stranger that makes me laugh the way you make me laugh, that makes me feel so comfortable like you do. A stranger that has gone through these ups and downs with my family and stood by my side the entire time, a stranger that goes out of her way to visit my gram andbakewith her. A stranger that took it upon herself to try to help my gram make friends?”

The look in Emma’s eyes was so intense, it stole Regan’s breath right from her lungs.

“A stranger that happens to be so cute when you smile at videos of animals on the internet, that it makes my heart flutter. A stranger with a mouth that makes me think such inappropriate thoughts, whose smile is like sunshine. A stranger who is not only the most attractive person I know, but who looks at me likeI’mthe most attractive personyouknow?” Emmapressed her hand to her own chest as she spoke, like she still couldn’t believe what she was saying was true.

Regan fell back into the counter, her knees feeling so weak as Emma spoke. The emotion in her voice was so strong, so compelling, and Regan’s head spun with it.

“If you were a stranger, I would be on myknees, begging you to give me a chance. That’s how I feel, Regan.” Emma finished, searching Regan’s gaze with her own, her chest heaving with every breath she took. Like laying that all out for Regan had taken so much out of her, and Regan – knowing Emma – knew that it probably had.

“You don’t have to beg me,” she breathed, her entire body buzzing with energy. “You don’t need to be on your knees–”

She cut herself off, choking on the word as the image of Emma on her knees in front of her – something new for Regan’s fantasies, but something very, very welcome – took over her mind.

Shaking herself out of it, she focused on what was important. What was right in front of her. The fact that Emma liked her back?!Thatmuch!

“I’m right here. No begging required. I’ve alreadytoldyou that I like you.”

“But you aren’t a stranger,” Emma shot back, dropping her head back with a groan that sounded literally pained. “You’re Regan. We share an apartment – an apartment that we could never truly avoid one another in. We share a best friend – a best friend that is undeniably closer to you than to me, and I don’t want to risk Sutton’s friendship. And I… I really like you, Regan. As a person. As a friend. As the only person in my life that isn’t my grandmother that seesme, that knows my entire history. It’s so much more complicated because youaren’ta stranger.”

Regan stared at Emma, wanting more than anything to reach out to her. To touch her, not in a romantic or sexual kind of way,but just to – to comfort that struggle evident in her face, to ease the tightness in her shoulders.

“Well, what do you want to do?” She asked, plainly. Because it was the only thing she could think of doing, now. “You know where I stand. Idothink you’re the most attractive person I know. I do want to touch you every time we’re together, just to feel close to you. I love to look at you. To spend time with you. But…” She rolled her lips, shrugging heavily. “I can try to push past it, like I said. I mean, knowing that you have feelings for me back is going to make it infinitely more difficult. And if you meet someone and bring them home to our apartment, I might need to, like, rip out their hair or something.”

Emma laughed, which then turned into a whine. “I hate that I find you so funny,” she admitted, before she sighed.

A visceral satisfaction worked through Regan at that. “Well, I love that you do. Furthermore, we can work out a masturbation schedule. I’ll let you know every time I’m going to really let loose, and–”

“Oh my god, please, don’t,” Emma cut her off, aiming a serious look at her.

“I don’t know what else to do, then.” Slowly, carefully – as if she were approaching a wild animal – she walked forward. And she took it as an amazing, wonderful sign that Emma didn’t step back. “I get it; it’s complicated. We live together. We share Sutton. We’re friends.”

She came to stand right in front of Emma, only inches away, and she stared up at her. Breathing the same air, feeling Emma’s body warmth, and Regan shivered at the proximity. “Just one date. Give me the chance to take you ononedate, and if it goes badly or we get the impression that things won’t work out for us in any way, then – that’s it. We’re three and a half months into our living arrangement, so we’re halfway through. If the datedoesn’t go well, then, that’s that. We know that we really can’t push this, and we will go back to normal.”

Regan had no idea that this plea to take Emma on a date had been going to leave her mouth; she’d never even let herself think about that as an option with Emma before.

But now that the idea occurred to her, she wanted it so, so badly. It sparked something to life inside of her, something sweeping and romantic, something she’d never really felt before.

It seemed that was par for the course with Emma, didn’t it?

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