Page 64 of We Met Like This
He looked down at where my fist had connected with his shoulder and smiled a full smile. My heart melted a little.
“Bye.” He took a step toward the door, but before he took another, I grabbed his hand that wasn’t holding my book and pulled him into a hug.
“Friends hug,” I said. “Right?”
“Friends hug,” he answered, holding me tight, his lips resting on my temple. It wasn’t a friendly hug between friends. But a tight desperate hug of people who had just agreed to stop touching each other but still wanted to. I wondered if he could feel my heart pounding heavy against his chest. He pulled back first, then rushed away.
CHAPTER 19
“Is his car here?” I hissed from the passenger seat, my head between my knees. The place it had been for the last several turns.
“What’s his car look like again?” Sloane asked.
“A black BMW.”
“He drives a Beamer?”
“Yes, is it here?”
“Rob’s car is not anywhere in the vicinity.”
I took a relieved breath and sat up, pushing my hair back and letting the blood return to its normal places in my body. I made Sloane drive so he wouldn’t recognize my car if he happened to be at the office on a Sunday morning. Rare, but not unheard of.
Sloane shifted her car into park and turned off the ignition. “What if they changed the locks or the alarm code?”
“It’s only been two days.” I unbuckled my seat belt. “Wait, do you think they did?”
“Probably not. It’s not like you threatened to destroy the place… did you?”
“No!”
“Just checking. I wasn’t sure how much badassery you released on Friday.”
We got out of the car and headed toward the back entrance to the office. Both my key and code worked to admit us.
“What do you even leave at work?” Sloane asked. “I’m trying to picture my desk and I don’t think there’s anything I would save in a fire.”
“For someone who’s been at her job for three years, it sounds like you haven’t committed,” I said.
“There’s only one person with a fear of commitment here and it’s not me.”
“Whatever,” I mumbled. “I signed a one-year lease with you. How’s that for commitment.”
Sloane laughed, then spun a circle as we came to the lobby and my desk. “It’s been forever since I’ve been here.” She walked to the bookcases while I beelined to my space. “Can I take some books?” she asked. “I want some books.” Before I answered, she pulled one off the shelf.
I plopped the empty box I’d brought on my desk and looked around. Was Sloane right? What did I really want or need from my life here? I had a single framed picture of my family from the last vacation we’d gone on together—a posh cabin by a lake paid for by my sister. I’d recently graduated from college, and in between swimming and paddleboarding I’d spent half that vacation recording videos of my sister for her channel and the other half poring through English major–related job opportunities in the Los Angeles area. “I thought you wanted to be an editor,” my sister had said when I found the assistant-to-a-literary-agent job. “Agents are sharks.”
I set the picture, along with the memory, in the box, thenplaced my potted heartleaf philodendron on top, as if to hold it there. The middle desk drawer had a few snacks: a couple KIND bars and a half-empty bag of Goldfish crackers. I added them to the box. The other drawers were mainly pens and stationery, envelopes and stamps. I took it all to aid in my justification for coming here.
Then I sat in my high-backed, ergonomically correct rolling chair that I would miss more than anything (and knew I could never afford to replace) and picked up the office phone. I’d tried calling Kari Cross twice from my cell phone but she hadn’t answered. I was going to send her an email, the main way we communicated, but thought I’d try here first so I could explain things in a more personal way.
She picked up on the second ring. “Working on a Sunday?” was how she answered. “That’s dedication.”
“No, I’m cleaning out my desk.”
“Cleaning out your desk? Are you moving?”
“I wanted to call and tell you how much I enjoyed the latest fifty pages you sent me. Amazing. The AI government is creepy but also I can completely understand why the community trusts it.”
