Page 5 of The One for Me
“I know what you’re asking, and I have never thought of him in any other way than . . . Sean.”
“And how is that?”
My heart is pounding loudly. Everything feels as though it’s falling apart around me, and I don’t know how to stop it. I rest my hand on my neck, playing with the necklace Sean gave me when I was sixteen. And for some reason, that single unconscious movement tells me the truth.
“He’s my best friend.”
Oliver nods. “And that’s all I’ve ever wanted to be for you.” And that’s no less than he deserves. I watch him, swallowing hard, but his face is a mask I can’t read. “You know what this means for us, right?”
A tear falls down my cheek, and I nod. “I’ve broken us.”
“It’s not the kiss. I could get over the kiss,” he says with a laugh. “How sad is that? I’m here, telling the woman I planned to ask to marry me next week that I could forgive her kissing another man.”
I open my mouth quickly to try to say something—anything to make this better. “Ollie.”
“I can’t do this to myself, though. I can’t love you when you love another man. If I asked you to choose between us, you’d pick him.”
Denying it is all I want to do, but it would be a lie. I may not love Sean the way he thinks I do, but I love him enough to know that if Oliver made me choose, I would never let Sean go.
Which leaves us at this impasse.
Ollie rests his hand on the table, palm up. “Take my hand, Devney.” I place it in his. “I won’t lie and say that I’m not hurt. Your friendship with Sean has always been hard on me, mostly because I don’t understand it. However, I accepted it. I love you and want to marry you, but I can’t marry him too, do you understand?”
I nod. “I would never ask you to.”
“But you have. You love him even though you have never allowed yourself to feel it. Maybe not until now. The friendship you have with him is unbreakable, and I am always competing for the top spot in your heart . . . the one that belongs to him.”
Sean is always the man I measure people against. He’s the guy I look to when I’m hurting or alone. I don’t know why I try to pretend otherwise. “I wanted it to be you,” I confess, letting the tears spill. “I wanted for it to be us.”
“I did too.” Oliver’s voice shatters at the end. “I just knew that I was fighting a losing battle.”
God, how horrible I am. “Do you believe me that I didn’t know?”
His lips turn to a sad smile as his thumb rubs the top of my hand. “I’ve known you were in love with him since the first time I met him. I knew that you both were in love, and I prayed that I could make you love me.”
My lip trembles. “I do love you.”
“I know.”
“Do you?”
Oliver nods but pulls his hand away, leaving me feeling bereft. “But now, you’ve seen something else, and I don’t have a chance. So, I’m going to do what’s right for both of us and walk away while we can still be friends.”
“Ollie . . .”
He stands, placing his napkin on the table, and comes around to my side. His lips press against the top of my head. “I want you to be happy. I want you to heal and find a way through whatever it is that troubles you.”
My heart is pounding hard in my chest as Oliver walks away.
I’ve just lost the best man I’ve ever dated.
The mistakes just keep piling up.
* * *
“So, you told Oliver?” Sydney asks as I sit by her bed. She had a few false contractions, and Declan refuses to let her out of bed other than to pee.
Which she apparently does often.
