Page 88 of Holiday Friend Zones
There’s something in his tone—lighter, almost boyish.It sends me back to summers in my backyard, when the world bent to his imagination.When we made kingdoms out of sticks and hope.He hid his bruises well then, cloaked his heartbreak in sarcasm and laughter.
However, his father is far away, and Roman looks at me like I’m worth something.Like I’m worth everything.
And it’s that look that makes me want to kiss him and never stop.
“I wouldn’t dare,” I whisper, almost too soft to hear.
His smile in response feels like the whole room shifts toward him.Bright, genuine, and warm enough to thaw every frozen place in me.
We finish closing in silence, but I can’t stop thinking about his mouth.The idea lingers, haunting me long after he’s gone.
Later, lying in bed, I whisper into the dark, “I think I might die if I don’t kiss him soon.”
The words sound ridiculous, like something a teenager would scribble in the margins of her diary, but they burn all the same.My chest aches because of it.The truth is, I don’t just want him.
I’m furious with him.
Furious that he can look at me like that, touch me like that, and then retreat as if nothing happened.
Furious that he gets to walk away while I’m left replaying every second, every almost.
And yet, beneath the anger, the ache is even worse.I know what it’s like to want and to lose, to have love ripped away overnight.Wanting Roman terrifies me almost as much as not wanting him at all.Because if I let myself fall, if I allow myself to have him, I don’t know what will be left of me if he ever leaves.
ChapterFour
WILLOW
Achieving my goal is easier said than done.
I have to leap over about a million hurdles, starting with the “Roman still sees me as the awkward kid he defended on the playground” factor.Then there’s the horrifying “what if he looks at me like a wounded animal and I have to crawl into a hole and die of shame” scenario.
And, of course, the ever-present “all of our friends live here, and if I screw this up, I’ll make things so awkward we’ll have to divide up the town like divorced parents at Christmas” paradigm.
If I’m being honest, this entire plan has a very-large, non-zero chance of blowing up spectacularly in my face.
I waffled about it for hours.Days, maybe.Is it worth risking the fragile balance of our friend group on the slim chance that Roman might actually like me back?The logical answer—mine and every reasonable human’s—should be a hard no.
But then I remember.
When I was feeling lonely and down in the city, who called me in the middle of the day just to make me laugh?Who sent rambling emails or texts about whatever obsession he’d picked up that month—woodworking, survival shows, fantasy football, once even sourdough bread—because he knew I needed a distraction?
Who held me together when we lost my mom?
When my ex-boyfriend decided I was “too much”—too determined, too passionate, too loud when I cared about something, too relentless when I wanted more from life—and told me, with a straight face, that I’d “burn myself out chasing impossible dreams.”As if my ambition was a flaw he was tired of managing.As if my grief made me inconvenient.
He didn’t even have the guts to break up with me like a decent human.Just stopped answering calls, vanished out of my apartment like I was a phase he’d outgrown.Months of my life dismissed like an overdue subscription.
Who stormed in when I was staring at the pile of his things in my living room, too numb to move, too humiliated to cry?Who scooped up every last hoodie, every textbook, every goddamn coffee mug he left behind and launched them onto the lawn without a second thought, shouting curses so loud the neighbors peeked out their windows?
It was Roman.
Roman, who stood in my kitchen afterward, chest rising and falling, daring me to tell him he’d gone too far.Roman, who stayed until the adrenaline drained from me and I collapsed, sobbing into his shirt.He held me through the ugly, through the heartbreak that threatened to hollow me out, whispering over and over that the guy was an idiot, that I wasn’t “too much”—I was exactly enough.
Roman, who saw me at my most fragile and didn’t look away.Who pieced me back together when I was sure no one could.
Who wrapped me up when I felt frayed and breakable, when I thought a broken heart might actually kill me?Who whispered reassurance into the cracks of my silence until I could breathe again on my own?
It was always Roman.
