Page 178 of New York Love Stories: Vol. 1

The comment doesn’t seem to bother her, but she is eyeing me. “Are you all right?”

“Fine. Yeah,I’m fine.So where’d you say you live again?” Subtle. As subtle as a bulldozer.

She levels me with a glare. “What?”

“Huh?” It’s not that I’m afraid of her, but I don’t want to lose what we’ve become.Whatever that is.

She gets up and heads back into the kitchen. “All that cooking has made me tired.”

I reach for her, but she eludes me. Setting her half-empty plate on the counter, she asks, “Do you mind if I clean the kitchen tomorrow?”

“Juni?” I stand, not sure what the fuck I’m doing. I could destroy everything if I’m wrong. If I’m right, she already did. I just wasn’t made aware until it was too late. “Where do you live?”

“Why are you asking this at five in the morning?” She starts for the bedroom. “Let’s get some rest, and we’ll talk in the morning.” There’s a noticeable tremble to her voice, and she moves quicker.

She’s doing what she does best—distract from the topic at hand. I struggle not to let her win. Anything I do to disrupt the status quo means I lose, even asking her. “We said honesty and trust were pillars of our friendship.” Stopping with her back to me, she crosses her arms over her chest. “Now we’re more, or I thought that was the direction we were headed.”

When she finally turns around, she says, “We are. Last night was so good.”

“Then why won’t you tell me.” She makes no move to come forward. “Do you live downstairs?”

“Yes.” I barely hear her. She crosses her arms and tugs her bottom lip under her teeth.

Offering nothing more, I ask, “Did you know this entire time we’ve been seeing each other?”

“I didn’t know at the park. I didn’t know at the coffee shop.”

I don’t know why I’m so angry, but it’s hard to keep inside. But with a steady voice that I conjure from dealing with work catastrophes, I say, “Our relationship doesn’t span years, not even months. We’re a few weeks in, and you’ve already lied. And for what? There’s always a gain in play, a reward for winning. What’d you win, Juni?”

“I’ve wanted to tell you?—”

“Then you should have.”

“It was a lie that snowballed.”

“I’d call it an avalanche. The one thing I don’t do well is allow people into my life. I allowed you.”

“I don’t understand why you’re upset.” A plea coats her tone as she covers the distance between us. “So I live in the same building.” Touching my chest, she says, “That’s good news, right? Now we can be close.”

She makes it so hard not to comfort her, to make the welling tears that glisten in her eyes go away. I resist. “This wasn’t a little lie.” I move to the window, remembering all the times just outside. “You dragged it out. You walked down the sidewalk like you were going to another building. You know Gil and pretended you didn’t.” I rub my temple and take a deep breath. “Look, Juni, I have enough stress in my life. I got caught up in this chaos, but I think it’s best we end this now.”

“End it because you don’t like me, or end it because you do, and that scares you?”

I cross my arms over my chest, digging in my heels. “It doesn’t matter now.”

Her lips part, but she struggles to speak, her eyes closing as if in disbelief. When she reopens them, a glare full of daggers is aimed at me. “You’re upset because you have feelings for me. Well, guess what?” When I don’t say anything, she adds, “I did, too.” She pads down the hall in bare feet, leaving me to stew in the feelings I was so close to denying.

It doesn’t take but a minute before she has her skirt pulled on and her shoes, purse, and sweater in her hands. She looks smaller in her pain. Stopping in the doorway to the hall, she doesn’t look back, but says, “This is why I didn’t tell you.”

“And that’s why we’re saying goodbye.”

The door closes, and the automatic bolt locks in place—me on one side, her on the other, and deceit left between us.

24

Juni

That didn’t go as planned.

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