Page 48 of Me Three
What is he so upset about? I told him I’m willing to step aside, and that’s how he reacts? What is wrong with him lately? Always so irritable every time we talk. It’s like we can’t even be in the same room anymore. How the hell are we supposed to date Tru if we can’t be in each other’s presence?
I slam my laptop shut—it’s actually so hard that I cringe a little and have to check it’s still functional—and march up to his door.
I knock on it and his “what” comes out muffled and sharp.
I open the door and see him sitting at his desk, both hands on either side of his face with a book under his nose.
“What did I say?”
“Nothing,” he replies but doesn’t look at me.
“Don’tnothingme. The whole point of asking you now is so that I don’t get more involved and get us all hurt in the process. You want Tru, you can have them.”
“Carter, go away. Please,” he says, still pretending to be reading.
I walk up to him and pull his hands away from his head so that he has to turn to me.
“So I agree to date them, you’re not okay with it. I agree to step aside, you’re not okay. What do you want me to do? I don’t understand you, Everett. What the hell do you want?”
Ev stares at me, his chest inflating and deflating for the moments of silence between us.
Then, he stands up and turns his back to me, walking away.
“Talk to me, for fucks sake,” I shout and grab him by the shoulder, trying to make him face me, but he keeps on walking. Walks out of his own room. “What do you want from me? You want me out of your life? Is that it? Are you fed up with me? Of being my friend?”
“Shut up, Carter,” he mumbles and heads for the bathroom.
“Then what. Do. You. Want?”
I hate the volume and color of my voice, but it’s so frustrating, so heartbreaking watching him walk away from me that I can’t take it anymore. This is me losing my friend. And I don’t know how to stop it.
“You,” he grunts, and he spins on the spot to look me in the eye.
Did he just… What did he say?
“Me?” I croak.
Ev exhales and shakes his head as if he’s frustrated with himself.
So all this behavior… all because he wants… me?
“What do you mean ‘me?’”
“What do you think it means?” he mutters. Then he shakes his head again and turns to face the bathroom door again. “Forget about it, Carter.”
“Wait,” I say. “You want… me? Since when?” His shoulders tense and then drop.
“Since forever.”
“You’re lying. You don’t want me,” I say.
How can he be joking about this kind of thing?
“I’m not.”
“You are,” I say and walk up to him. My hand pulls at his arm until he turns to look at me again. “Because you can’t tell me all this time I’ve been in love with you and you’ve been in love with me, and that we wasted all these years with other people.”
He winces, his head stretching back as if he’s trying to get a better look at me.
