Page 65 of Beautiful Desire
Fletcher: Soooo, celebrate tonight? *wink emoji*
I send him a smirk and a tongue emoji before locking my screen and setting the phone in my lap, just as Charley drops down beside me on the sand. It’s a warm, sunny, cloudless day, so we decided to spend a couple of hours at the beach this afternoon and take advantage of it.
“What’s got you smiling like that?” she asks, handing me a cup of chocolate and vanilla swirl ice cream.
“Fletcher had the presentation for his capstone project today,” I explain, taking a bite. “He just texted me that he thinks it went well.”
“Hell yeah, go Fletcher! Does that mean he’s finished, then?”
“Not yet.” I shake my head. “There’s still a couple more weeks.”
“That’s good,” she mumbles, but her focus is on the phone in her hand, and I know her mind is a million miles away.
“Everything okay?” I ask softly.
“Yeah, sorry.” Blowing out a breath, she shoves the phone into the pocket on her zip-up and glances at me, eyes hidden behind a pair of dark sunglasses. “Every time my phone goes off, I think it’s my mom with more awful news.”
Charley’s dad had a pretty massive heart attack a couple of nights ago. He’s still in the hospital, which is where she was before we came here. While he seems to be doing a little bit better as of today, it’s been rocky.
“Girl, you do not have to apologize. If you want to go back to the hospital, I can come with you.”
Shaking her head, Charley watches the kids playing a game of football near the water in front of us. “It’s okay, but thank you. He’s resting right now anyway.” Turning her head toward me, she asks, “What happens once Fletcher does finish?”
“Char, we don’t have to talk about this?—”
“No,” she cuts me off. “I could use the distraction, so please, give me all the steamy, juicy stepbrother tea.”
“You know I’m here to talk it out with you when you’re ready, or be a shoulder to cry on, right? What you went through is traumatic, Char, and I don’t want you to ever feel like you need keep it bottled up because you’re worried it’ll be too dark for me.”
A small smile spreads as Charley nods, the tip of her nose red. “I know, and I love you for it, but right now,thisis what I need.”
My heart hurts for my best friend, but I agree that getting her mind off things for a few hours will be good for her. So, even though it seems so trivial to talk about this, I heave a sigh and say, “Okay, fine. Once Fletcher finishes the program, he’ll be going back to Charleston, and that’ll be the end of it.”
“So, you guys will just…end?”
“Well, yeah.” I nod. “Him being here was temporary.”
Charley’s face scrunches up, and I can see the furrow to her brow under the sunglasses. “How do you feel about that?”
“Fine,” I mutter, ignoring the gnawing ache in my chest that only seems to appear when I let myself think about this. “There will be no point in us continuing to hook up after that. We live hours away, and once he’s back home, there will be plenty of women for him.”
“He said that?”
I shake my head. “No, not exactly.”
“So then, whatdidhe say?”
“Nothing. We haven’t talked about it.”In fact, I’m actively avoiding anything even remotely close to talking about it.
Clicking her tongue to her teeth, Charley sounds like a disappointed mom as she murmurs, “Georgia…”
“What?” Glancing over at her, I chuckle. “There’s nothing to talk about.”
“Yes, there is.” Turning her body toward me, she sits criss-cross, and says, “Georgia, you’ve been seeing each other for months. Thereabsolutelyneeds to be a conversation about this.”
“First of all, we are not ‘seeing’ each other,” I point out. “We have been roommates for the past few months, who also happen to enjoy having sex with each other. But also, this was never meant to go anywhere or be anything other than what it is. So what,exactly, is there to talk about? To confirm what we already know? No, thanks.”
“But you want it to go somewhere?” she asks, the question like a punch to the gut.
