Page 41 of Enemies with my Bestie’s Brother
After getting out of the shower and putting on something I clean, I explore the apartment to find Penny. I do eventually find her in the baby’s nursery, showing him how to stack cups and tap them against each other to make noise. As I enter the room, Baby J looks up at me first, followed by Penny when she notices that his attention has drifted. Penny smiles at me before scooping baby Baby J in her arms and getting to her feet.
“Hey, Whit! What’s up?” She hoists the baby onto her hip and walks over to me.
“Hey, I was actually wondering if I could talk to you about something important,” I wring my hands nervously as I broach the subject.
“Whitney, you never need to ask if you can talk to me, especially when it’s about something important. Let’s get somewhere more comfortable. Maybe the living room?”
I follow her out to the living room and plop down on the couch with her. We get comfortable against the soft, blue-toned couch as Baby J wriggles out of Penny’s grasp to play with a lone rattle on the floor.
“So, what is it that you want to talk about?”
“I’ve made up my mind about whether or not I want to move to San Francisco. I need to go back to Keene to tie up loose ends, and then I can start the process of moving my business here.”
I watch her face as I wait for this information to sink in. At first, her face is blank as she processes what I just said, but it’s quickly followed by a beaming smile as she realizes what I’ve just told her.
“Whitney. Are you saying that you’re actually going to move here? To San Francisco?”
She bounces forward on the couch, her huge brown eyes getting closer to my face at an alarming speed. I nod, and she throws her arms around me, squealing as she squeezes the life out of me. I squeak and she releases her death grip.
“Oh my god this is so amazing, I can’t believe you’re actually going to move here! Actually, I can believe it, because I knew my plan would work. When do you think you’ll be starting the process? How long do you think it will take? Are you going to wait until you’re done with Grayson’s apartment? Are you going to need help with apartment hunting?”
My heart drops to my stomach at the mention of Grayson, the guilt hitting me tenfold. She still doesn’t know the truth about the nature of my relationship with her favorite brother. I think it wouldn’t even hurt as much for her if I’d gotten with Landon or Preston, but she and Grayson have always been the closest, so I know that she will struggle a lot with finding out she was left in the dark. She’ll be hurt once she finds out that I’ve been lying to her for so long.
Why oh why didn’t I just come out and tell her sooner? I’m such an idiot and a horrible friend.
“Um, I don’t know, I haven’t really thought that far into things.”
My voice falters from the quick change in my emotion. Luckily for me, Penny mistakes it for hesitance about the move.
“Oh, no, that’s totally okay, don’t worry about answering any of those questions. I promise I didn’t mean to overwhelm you. I mean, you just made the decision to move here. Of course you don’t have every single little aspect planned out. If you need any help figuring something out or finding a place to live, you know I’m your girl. I’m just so absolutely ecstatic that my best friend is going to be in the same city that I am!” She claps, as if her excitement has to physically manifest itself. “Let’s celebrate with a cup of tea!”
“A cup of tea? Not a glass of wine?”
My brow furrows with confusion. Penny rolls her eyes, as if it should be obvious why she suggested it.
“Whitney, it’s ten in the morning. It would be pretty irresponsible of me, as a mom, to be drinking at this time, especially when I have the day with the baby ahead of me.”
My face heats up as she points out the obvious. Sometimes I wonder if I would really make a good mother when these things aren’t even close to obvious to me. She gives me a reassuring smile.
“Don’t worry, if I didn’t have a baby, I wouldn’t have thought about it either. You don’t need to feel guilty or embarrassed.”
“Okay, a cup of tea it is then.”
Laterthatevening,Graysonand I are cuddling after a steamy session in his bed.
“So, Penny told me that you’re moving here,” he says, massaging a strand of my blonde hair between his fingers.
His deep blue eyes penetrate mine with questioning.
“Yeah, I’m still thinking through all of the logistics of moving my business and really settling in here. But, ultimately, I think that moving here is the best choice for me. The more that I think about having to go back to Keene permanently, I feel sad, like I’m making a mistake. I’m still not sure if San Francisco is ultimately where I want to live, or if I want to branch out and try my luck somewhere else. But, San Francisco would be the easiest move, since my best friend and my boyfriend are here.”
I glance at his expression when I call him my boyfriend, to gauge his reaction. He either doesn’t realize that I said it, or the term affects him so little that it doesn’t matter. He caresses my forehead before responding.
“Whitney, no matter where you want to live, I promise that we can manage to make it work. There is nothing that I’m willing to do more than have a successful relationship with you.”
“You would move somewhere with me?” I ask, surprised. “What about your business with Landon? Didn’t you move here so that you could work on it with him in the first place?”
He shrugs in response and turns to face me completely.
