Page 41 of Our Forever Starts Tonight

But why dream of something that could never be?

As long as I continued to dream about Tristan and imagine us in these scenarios that would never come to pass, I wouldn’t get over him. Ihadto start putting him out of my mind.

It was a feat much easier said than done. All manner of spicy dreams plagued me that night, which meant I was a wreck as I walked into work the next morning. It was my hope that I could hide it behind makeup, but Lucky’s eyes narrowed the second he saw me. I managed to avoid his questions as I kept myself busy with the morning soup kitchen rush, but as soon as that slowed, Zameera sent Lucky and I on break together, something I might have liked in the past, but now just made me anxious.

“Hey,” he huffed as he trudged into the break room behind me. “You seemed exhausted when you first walked in, but you’ve been going like the energizer bunny. Is everything okay?”

Arden and my mom’s concerns skidded across my brain and made me nervous to share. I’d talked about crushes before with Lucky and it was never an issue, but Tristan seemed to be the exception.

“Nothing. I'm okay,” I replied, grabbing a bottle of water and my lunch and sitting down at the table.

Lucky frowned as he sat across from me. “What the hell is that? I’m your best friend, so I know you’re lying. What, you can’t talk to me anymore? New bestie officially replacing me?”

“What? No. I just… Didn’t wanna bore you,” I said.

“First of all, you once spent like two hours explaining the antics of a dart frog to me, ininsanedetail. Second of all,” he tossed an irritated gaze at me, “is it about Tristan and that’s why you don’t wanna tell me?”

My cheeks burned with embarrassment. “Um…”

“Aria, just tell me. What’s with all the secrets?”

It made me feel instantly guilty. He was right—he was my best friend. There had never been secrets between us before. Sure, he was being a little weird about Tristan, but that was probably just because he wasn’t there to see it all in person. Lucky had always been overprotective of me, and it likely just bothered him that he had to wait and get everything secondhand and couldn’t be there in the moment for me like Arden could.

Second guessing things with Tristan had me second guessing things with Lucky, and that wasnotwhat I wanted.

“You’re right, I’m sorry. I think all of this stuff just has my brain muddled. Go get your lunch and I'll explain.”

Lucky did just that, and I told him about how things had gone with Tristan for the past couple of days, from the argument after his presentation, to my night of heated dreams. He listened intently, taking everything in, and didn’t seem bothered or annoyed at all. It was just what I needed. Having Arden was nice, but talking to Lucky just felt comfortable and familiar and really helped lift the weight some.

“Anyway, I know that’s a lot, but it’s basically it,” I finished. “I’m just frustrated. I don’t know where these intense feelings are coming from. I’m not some protag in a rom com.”

“Are you in love with him?” Lucky asked straight up.

It felt weird to hear it put plain like that. Even weirder to consider. As much as it felt like itshouldn’tbe love, it also felt like that was what it was. I was crazy about everything about Tristan, from the way he looked to the person he was—the real person, not the fake one he showed his “friends.”

“I think I could have fallen in love with him. Probably pretty quickly too, but it can’t happen. I won’t do that to myself.”

“You mean it?” Lucky asked.

I nodded, smiling at my best friend’s concern. “I mean it.”

“Then…” He poked at the empty wrapper where his lunch used to be. “What about me?”

My heart came to a stop. “Wh-what about you?”

Something Lucky read in my reaction had him retreating quickly. He tossed all of his trash back into his lunchbox and stood up from the table. “Nothing. Never mind.”

My mouth hung slightly open as he rushed to his locker, shoved the bag inside, and then raced from the room muttering something about the bathroom.

Was he asking if I had feelings for him?

“Definitely!” Arden said when I video called her after work to talk about it. “He was trying to confirm that Tristan was a no-go and then tried to wedge himself into that spot.”

The thought that it was actually what Lucky was doing had me in a tailspin. I had enough going on trying to navigate things with Tristan, now I had to be worried that my best friend had feelings for me too? It was clear that Yunmir and Devario had crushes on me too.

What the hell was going on?

“So for the first seventeen years of my life, I couldn'tpaya guy to look at me, but now I'm beating them off with sticks?”

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