Page 29 of I Need You

“My parents. The church.”

Whose parents don’t want their kid going to college?

“If you want to go to college, screw your parents and screw that crazy church–enroll anyway,” I say, getting a little worked up.

This earns me another eye roll.

I’m frustrated because even in the short moments I’ve had with Aubrey, I’ve seen how smart she is. She is so much smarter than I am. She deserves anything and everything she wants and I intend to help make sure she gets it.

“That’s easy for you to say. Let me guess, you don’t have to even work. All you have to do is go to school?” she says, straightening her back and pursing her lips.

“And I have football,” I say without even thinking.

It’s not technically true at the moment, but it's a habit for me to use football as a defense. Aubrey isn’t the first person to throw my privilege in my face.

“Well–” I correct myself, “I guess I’m on a break from that right now too.”

“Why? Why are you on a break from school and football?”

If I wasn’t so desperate for her to keep talking to me, I’d brush her off. I choose to lie instead.

“I got injured.”

She turns her head back to me, looking me up and down, like she’s looking for evidence of the injury.

“Was it a head injury? Is that why you keep popping up and talking to me like we’re friends?”

“No.” I let out a laugh. “I like you Aubrey, and I think two Fridays spent together in a row, makes us friends.”

Aubrey can’t hide her emotions from showing up all over her face, and right now I can see a mix of surprise, concern, and annoyance. The annoyance, the way she narrows those big beautiful eyes at me, has my dick twitching. I almost tell it out loud, to calm the fuck down. I do some more subtle adjusting instead.

Aubrey’s eyes go wide and I notice her gaze is now on my junk.

Okay, maybe not so subtle an adjustment.

I smirk at her, “Like what you see, baby?”.

It’s out of my mouth before I can stop myself.

Shit.

I don’t know how to do this. I don’t know how to be charming in a way that isn’t sexual. I don’t know how to show a girl I’m interested in more than sex because I’ve never been interested in anything more. Not until now.

Aubrey lets out a sound that’s somewhere between a gasp and a squeak. Her eyes are wide open and her mouth has fallen completely open.

“Aubrey, shit. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that. That’s totally something the old Emmett would have said, and I’m trying really hard not to be that guy anymore.”

She slowly lets the shock release from her face, closing her mouth and pursing her lips. She narrows her eyes at me once more.

“What do you mean by that? ‘The old Emmett’.”

“Look, I wasn’t just making a joke. I want to be your friend. I do like you. So I won’t lie to you. I haven’t exactly treated girls–women–the way they deserve in the past. I don’t want that reputation anymore, I want—”

What do I want? Do I want a girlfriend? I’ve never had a girlfriend. I’ve always had girls around, sure. Girls around for hooking up and then I would send them packing until the next time I got a hard on I didn’t want to take care of myself. Some of those girls tried for more, told me they wanted more, but it was never something I let happen.

I wasn’t a complete asshole, though. I was always honest, told them upfront what we were doing was about sex, nothing more. No cuddling, no hand holding, no flowers.

“What does this Emmett want?” Aubrey asks, as she moves her hand up and down in front of my body.

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