Page 67 of Roughing It

Flor gently pets my hair. “Babe, it doesn’t have to be this way. You don’t have to just cut him out.”

I lift my head up and stare at her. “What am I supposed to do? He lives in the mountains, and I’m…” I don’t even really know how to finish that sentence. I’m a glorified secretary who just quit her job, has no parental support, no savings, who may end up living off the good graces of her rich best friend if the firm decides to blackball me from the market.

Flor cups my cheek with her good hand. “You’re gorgeous and funny and amazing. And you never do anything for yourself.”

I close my eyes and breathe out slowly. She’s not wrong—at least, not about that last part. I worked to pay the bills, I went on vacations when it suited Flor, and the only thing I really consider my own is my book collection and the half-done manuscripts on my computer I know I’ll never finish.

I remember having big dreams once, when I was younger and things still felt hopeful and attainable. I thought I’d follow one of my dreams and someone might find me worth loving. But so far, I’m heading toward my midlife crisis with nothing to show for it.

“I can’t just turn up on his doorstep and ask him to help me figure out a way to make it work,” I finally say.

“Why not?” Sage props up on his elbow. “That’s what I did.”

I scoff. “Yeah, but you two are different.”

“We really aren’t,” he counters. “We had a single, wild holiday, then I showed up at her place with coffee—”

“Half-eaten McDonald’s,” she corrects primly, and in spite of myself, I smile because Sage goes all soft.

“Right. McDonald’s.” They share a moment, both looking two seconds away from kissing over me. “I showed up with McDonald’s because I knew that none of the other shit I was worried about mattered more than how I felt about her. So I knocked on her door and laid all my cards on the table.”

“The answer was easy,” Flor says. She pets my hair again. “I wish I’d been there so I could have seen the way he looked at you. But I know firsthand that you don’t have a fling with someone like that and not mean it. You and I both know the difference, Eden. We both know what it feels like when it’s just sex.”

She’s not wrong. I spent a year and a half having mediocre sex with a man who couldn’t do more than nick my pride, and two nights with Maddox has my heart in pieces. But I’m also not brave, and I’m definitely jaded enough to know there’s a chance I could drive back up there and offer my heart, only to have him laugh in my face. Or worse, reject me with pity softening his handsome face.

With John, it was easy to disappear and lick my wounds. If Maddox put me through that…

“Give it some time,” Flor says and snuggles back into her blankets, sounding exhausted. “You said yourself it’s not like he’s some playboy with women in and out of his bed.”

She’s not wrong, but I still can’t help but fear that if I sit on this too long, the moment I decide, it’ll be too late.

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