Page 37 of Waste Some Time
She looked down and wished she never had.
Sorry. I can’t do this.
Sydney’s heart sank as a bowl of bread pudding appeared in front of her.
“You okay?” Stephen had a look of knowing concern as his eyes tried to ask the larger question without letting on to the rest of the room.
“Yeah, fine.” Sydney placed her phone face down on the table and forced a smile, pretending like her world wasn’t being broken by a woman she’d known for only a week. “This smells delicious.”
15
KATIE
Benjamin hobbledover the red snowflake fleece blanket covering Katie’s legs and settled into a comfortable spot on her lap. On the other end of the couch, Rachel sat on the far cushion and lifted Katie’s feet to sit beneath them.
“Okay. Tell me this again,” Rachel said, taking a sip of her apple and cinnamon tea. “Slowly. Like I haven’t heard it before. And make it make sense this time.”
Katie had already explained what had happened earlier that evening. She’d rehashed the whole slow-motion realization she’d had about how a relationship between them could never work.
“I like her too much,” Katie said. “And I like her family too much. I can’t lose them or make things awkward with them for her.”
“Uh-huh. You said that.” Rachel frowned at her from across the couch. “Now tell me how that’s supposed to make sense.”
“If I tell her how I feel, it would just mess everything up. She doesn’t want to jump into a relationship, so I need to step back. At least until it doesn’t hurt so much to see her. I love everyone in that house too much to mess things up for any of us.”
“Okay, but why would being with her mess anything up?”
Katie scratched Benjamin’s head and avoided Rachel’s stare. “Because when we inevitably don’t work, I’ll have to stop hanging out around there. It’ll be like losing my second family.”
She was a little annoyed having to rehash this with Rachel, but the good thing about all the repetition was that she was beginning to fully buy her own logic.
Her head already believed.
But now she was getting her heart on board.
Rachel sighed, then blew across her mug to cool it off more. “You’re being dramatic. You know that, right?”
“I’m not being dramatic. I’m being logical.”
The one thing Katie knew for sure that Sydney understood was logic, but Sydney hadn’t understood that text. She’d messaged Katie asking what was wrong and what happened and a million other whats.
As an explanation, Katie didn’t respond.
Shitty move, she knew. But she really couldn’t do more justice to her decision than those five little words.
Sorry. I can’t do this.
There wasn’t any more to it, was there?
“Then tell me why you’re bailing on the thing that was making you happy. You’ve been happier this past week than I’ve seen you in years.”
“Because it wouldn’t last,” Katie said. “It can’t.”
“Who says?”
“She did.” Katie looked up from Benjamin to aim a pleading look at her cousin. “I can’t tie myself to someone who isn’t ready to love me back. Not fully. I need someone who’s going to be all in.”
“No one is going to fit all of your checkboxes, Katie.”
