Page 50 of Hard to Forgive

Unfortunately, whoever made up that saying had clearly never been near a bullet. They were terrifying.

Telling Jonas how I felt and facing that rejection was terrifying.

And we were at the part of the work where we could do things independently, so I didn’t even have the built in excuse of inviting him to come over for a work session, which might have made this whole thing easier. I just had to do it. It was as simple as that.

When I told Isabel that I was going to do it, she spent the entire lunch break trying to hype me up for the big moment. Then I returned back to our shared desk, and Jonas was so deep into his part of the project that I couldn’t bring myself to interrupt. Besides, shouldn’t this be a private conversation?

Yeah. It should definitely be a conversation had in private. Mainly, because if it went the way I wanted it to, I knew I’d want to kiss his face off, and while Yvette was a pretty lenient boss about most things, I think she might frown on unprofessional displays of affection on the clock. I really think she’d frownon everything else I’d want to do to Jonas if he returned my feelings. So, public confession? Bad idea.

That meant I was going to have to figure out another time and place.

The time and place turned out to be his apartment. I’d been going to grab take out for dinner, when I decided to order enough for two. I showed up at his apartment, completely uninvited and unannounced. I figured if nothing else, the food would be a good peace offering and would hopefully go a long way in making things not awkward if the way I felt was entirely one-sided.

“What are you doing here?” Jonas asked when he opened the door.

I held up the bag of food like a peace offering. “I was in the neighborhood.” He raised an eyebrow at me. “Okay, I wasn’t in the neighborhood to visit you, but then I realized I was in the neighborhood, and now, here I am.”

“Because that clears everything up,” he muttered, but he stepped aside to let me in. “Is there a reason you’re bringing me food?”

“You’ve been—” I sighed, trying to think of how to word this in a way that wasn’t going to offend him. “You’ve been weird the past few days. Ever since we talked.”

It was his turn to sigh. “I didn’t really know how to talk to you after that.”

I was actually a little surprised by the depth of his honesty. I’d expected it to be harder to get him to even admit that he’d been holding me at arm’s length. I didn’t even know what to say, now that I didn’t have to spend the first part of this prying that out of him. It threw off the entire mental script I’d spent too long drafting while getting to this place right here.

But I had to press on.

“I may have had other motives in coming over,” I admitted. That was a good place to start.

“Sex?”

Okay, that was a bad place to start.

“No,” I corrected as I sat down on the couch and started pulling boxes of food out. I’d gotten Firelli’s, simply because it was close to his place. “I didn’t actually know what you liked from Firelli’s, so you can pick first. Chicken Alfredo or spaghetti and meatballs.”

He eyed both boxes and then took the Alfredo. “Thanks.” He grinned. “But what would you have done if I was allergic to garlic?”

“Already have killed you. Do youknowhow much garlic Pie in the Sky uses in their crust?” And I’d seen him down a lot of pizza. I doubted he had any deadly garlic allergies, but it did remind me of how little I actually knew about him. “But I wouldn’t mind knowing the things you’re allergic to and your favorite thing from Firelli’s.”

He put the Styrofoam container back on the table. “Huh?”

“I want to get to know you better,” I started. “I—” God, I felt like an awkward teenager. No, because in high school, I’d been smooth. I wondered if this would’ve been easier if I’d still been blind to how badly my smooth ways had fucked him over. He was looking at me expectantly. I didn’t have a choice but to go on. “I like you.”

He stared at me like I was speaking a foreign language. In the million and one different ways I’d imagined this playing out, that hadn’t been one of them.

“Jonas?”

“I’m sorry, youlikeme?”

The emphasis on the word ‘like’ made me flinch, but I nodded anyway. “I mean, I get it if it’s not reciprocated, but there you are. Figured I kind of owed it to you to come clean.”

He snorted. “Owed it to me?”

“No, not like—Fuck. I’m bad at this, okay?” I took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. I wasn’t coming undone during this confession. I was a logical person. I could put this into logical terms. “I mean, I wanted you to know. You were really open with me the other night, and I want to be just as open with you. I want to get to know you better, and I want to see if this thing between us could be something real.”

He stayed quiet for a few more minutes before he picked up his food and started eating. The entire time, I watched him, trying to figure out what was going on in his head. I watched as he took and chewed three bites before taking a drink from the plastic water bottle he had sitting next to his laptop. I felt like I was going to explode out of my skin, just waiting for him to say something.

Instead, he deliberately put the food down, took my hand, and brought it to his lips, kissing my knuckles. “Okay,” he said evenly.

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