Page 98 of Just Friends
“You like her?” he asked.
“I do.” I let out a deep breath. “Fuckin’ A, I really, really do.”
“She like you?”
“I think so,” I said, but my growing smile betrayed my modesty.
He followed up like a good detective. “Youthinkso?”
“Okay, actually, she told me earlier today that she likes me, so I know she does.”
Niko chuckled. “Great. You like her. She like you. What is problem?”
“Well, uh,” I stammered uncertainly. “I guess the problem is that we’re friends?”
He shook his head. “No. There is bigger problem.”
I hemmed and hawed, trying to avoid the truth—but in thebanya, everything flowed freely. Everything was out in the open and there was nowhere to hide.
“The problem is she wants a relationship,” I muttered at last. “And she knows I’ve never wanted to be pinned down.”
“But you like this girl.”
“Yeah.”
“So what you afraid of, man?”
“Missing out, I guess,” I said.
“Missing out on what?”
“C’mon, Niko. Girls. It’s soeasyfor us—you know that. Any city we go to, we’ve got hundreds of girls chasing after us.”
“Ya. Like those girls earlier at the pool,” he said. “Perfect tens. But you turn them down. Why, Big Rig?”
I chuckled. Now I understood why he’d brought them up earlier—and I realized this crazy kid was a lot smarter than any of us probably realized.
“Because I was upset about Piper,” I said.
“Okay, why?”
“Because she told me earlier that she likes me, but the kiss changed things. She wanted me to say something, but I didn’t know what the fuck to say. And Istilldon’t.” I balled my fist and slammed it against my thigh. “And now she’s thinking about moving back to Montana. I don’t want her to go. I’m so afraid she’ll get back with her scumbag ex, too, and then I’lldefinitelynever see her again.”
Niko raised his eyebrow, not understanding the ex reference—but the truth was coming quick and easy now, and he wasn’t going to jump in its way over some other detail.
I continued. “I don’t want her to go and I don’t want anyone else to have her becauseIwant her,man.That’swhy I turned those girls down; because they’re not Piper. I want her sobad. And I don’t mean I just wanna fuck her—obviously, yeah, I wanna do that. But I wantmorethan sex, too. I want her by my side. And I kinda want her to stay there forever, dude.” I clutched at my temples. “Am I fucking crazy or what? We’ve only kissed. And I just said I want her forever.”
Still, Niko didn’t say a word—he just sat and listened while I ranted like a lunatic.
I had to laugh at myself. “Listen to me! Holy shit.” I slugged his shoulder. “Yourbanyaopened me right up, bud. Damn.”
“Good, good,” he said, smiling. “So now you know you want her. More than sex, too.”
“Yeah. I really do,” I said, but the hope and enthusiasm had left my voice.
“Then what are you going to do?”
I knew what he expected me to say, what I wassupposedto say … but … the problem still felt so much more complex than that.
