Page 85 of Loving Leo

But of fucking course, my phone doesn’t give me that opportunity and breaks through the blissful silence with an annoying ping. I want to ignore it, but what if it’s a work emergency? I can’t just let my business crash. I worked too hard for all of it.

“Everything okay?” Leo asks and I sigh, seeing the time on my phone glaring up at me. It’s almost midnight. I don’t know who would be messaging me right now. But as soon as I see the name flash across my screen I feel annoyance bloom inside me.

My mother.

She’s been messaging me a few times a week, but I’ve been so consumed with Leo that I’ve managed to forget all about her. I didn’t ever respond either.

But now her name is glaring up at me and I can feel Leo’s eyes watching me intently.

“You going to answer?”

“No.” I say. I cannot deal with her right now. I don’t want to. All I want is to be here in my perfect little bubble with Leo. I don’t want to go tomorrow, which I’m sure is why she’s reaching out.

To make sure I’ll be there. To be the perfect little puppet I was raised to be. To face her.

Just as I think that Lana’s name pops up on my screen.

I can’t cope. Turning over my phone, I decide to ignore it.

I can do that. I won’t let them steal what I have with Leo.

My entire body is tense and I realize I’m squeezing Leo a little too tight, but he doesn’t seem all that bothered by it. His finger runs over my chest, circling my heart in a caricature heart motion. Over and over.

“Who’s Lana?” He asks, so softly I barely hear him.

My eyes slam shut because I don’t want to talk about her. I don’t want her in this room with us. Tainting what we have.

“She’s no one.” I say, my voice trembling. I hate her. I realize just how much right now in this moment with my sweet Leo in my arms, but I wasn’t allowed to hate her. I was just supposed to take it.

“Oh.” His voice is way too quiet. So unlike him.

I open my eyes to look at him and what I see there has my heart stuttering in my chest. He looks like he’s in pain. Worried. Sad. No. I won’t let him feel this way. That’s just simply unacceptable.

“Leo…” I start, but he won’t look at me now, choosing to stare at my chest instead of my eyes. His finger has stopped making hearts across my chest. “Leo, please look at me.”

But he doesn’t. “I mean, it’s okay with me.” I’m not sure what he means and he still isn’t looking into my eyes. “This thing with us…” I don’t like the way his voice wobbles. “It’s nothing serious, right? I mean we talked about this and really, how can it be?”

I want it to be. But I can’t say that. I can’t get the words to actually form. I want to tell him that he’s it for me, but I haven’t even toldhim that Lana may be there tomorrow. I wanted to ask him to go with me as my date, but how can I do that? To make him face my parents and all their stuffy, hateful friends. They’ll peer at him as if he’s under a microscope, asking him what career path he’s on, prodding into all the details of his life. I can’t do that to him. I don’t want him to have to experience that. It’s embarrassing for me and for him. Me because my parents are wretched and for him because I know he’s slightly insecure about the difference in our lifestyles. He hasn’t said it, but I can see it sometimes.

Sometimes he lets that slip through.

But also, I don’t want to hurt him like this. I don’t want him to think that he’s nothing to me. I reach for his chin and lift it so I can see into his beautiful eyes. “Leo, I promise you. Lana is nothing to me. She’s part of my past. She’s never going to be anything to me ever again.”

He studies me carefully and I don’t know what he’s thinking. He does look a little relieved though and that makes my heart swell.

“I don’t want anyone else,” I tell him because I don’t think he wants anyone else either and if the way he was just tearing up tells me anything, it’s that he didn’t like the idea of me with anyone else either.

That makes hope blossom in my chest. Maybe we can make this work. I mean, I don’t know how I’m going to go about it yet. I know we’ll have our challenges, but we have the future to look forward to. Right now, I just need to get through my parents’ party tomorrow, hopefully tell Lana off for good and that will be it.

Then Leo and I will be free to be together without any roadblocks, mental or otherwise.

Then we can commit to seeing where this will go and what our future will look like together.

“God this partyis so fucking boring,” Selena whispers around a glass of champagne as we stand in the backyard of my parent’s estate. My sister is wearing a form fitting black dress, her hair pulled up in a tight coif as I pull on the collar of my button-up shirt. I’m sweating under this suit jacket as well.

I just want to go home and cuddle with Leo under the covers.

“It is,” I say, pulling my hand away and forcing a smile on my face when I meet my mom’s gaze across the yard. She looks disapproving, as always. “And mother is being incredibly hawkish.”

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