Searching for Neverland (16 page)

“I know,” I said quietly, not wanting to say it too loudly. It was a little embarrassing that I was playing into Alex’s FWB agenda, but I was too weak around him. “He actually told me last night that he’s not looking for anything serious.”

I figured I needed to come clean with Josh about that, even if it did make me look like an idiot. It wasn’t like I could mask it anymore. Alex was obviously seeing other people.

Josh nodded but didn’t say anything.

“He told me he wasn’t ready to date me, but in five years, if he saw me, he was going to put a ring on my finger.”

Josh laughed out loud. “Sorry,” he said, when he saw how his reaction had affected me. “He actually said that to you?”

“Yeah, he did,” I said holding out hope that Alex was being sincere.

Maybe he really just wanted to be single for a while before settling down. Maybe I could be okay with that. Maybe after spending some time with me, he would realize that I was really the girl he wanted, and he would want to commit to me. Maybe. Hopefully.

“Tay, do you really believe that?” Josh asked, pulling me out of my fantasy.

I didn’t answer him.

“Don’t you think that it’s a little ironic that a twenty-nine year-old guy can’t seem to commit to anyone?”

I looked pointedly at him.  “You’re thirty-one, and you can’t commit,” I said and felt like I was slapping him in the face.

“I have a girlfriend,” Josh said coldly.

Who’s completely wrong for you.

“She’s not ‘the one’, and you know it,” I said, knowing I was risking crossing the line that got me in trouble with him the last time we’d talked about Kimmy.

“Yeah, well, sometimes we’re with the one we’re with, because ‘the one’ is not available,” he said, looking directly at me.

And I knew that was when I needed to bring up the kiss.

“What is that supposed to mean?” I asked, as my heart started to pound, and I wondered what he was going to say.

He opened his mouth, but then changed his mind and closed it. He looked out the window for a few seconds, but he wasn’t looking at anything outside. The two of us and his room were reflected back in the gl
ass, and in that reflection
I could see his eyes were on me. I caught his gaze. He looked sad all of a sudden.

“J, what’s going on?” I asked, watching his reflection. He turned back to look at the real me.

“Nothing, I don’t know what I’m saying. I obviously haven’t met the right girl yet,” he said, and then shrugged like it wasn’t a big deal, but I could tell it was. His eyes told a different story. I just wasn’t sure I wanted to hear it.

“You will,” I said, simply because it sounded like the right thing to say. “You’ll end up with someone great. I know it.”

He smiled. “I know.”

I smiled back at him. It was the least I could do.

“Well, I guess if Kimmy’s not the one, then she’ll do for now. Or maybe I should get a friend that I can benefit from,” he said, his tone instantly changing. “Want to ditch Ex and be my FWB? I’m probably better in bed than he is anyway.”

Yeah, I had no doubt that was true.

“Ha, ha,” I said instead as the black cloud that had settled over our conversation started to dissipate. We were back to flirting which was a comfortable place for us. “You are hilarious.” I kicked his leg with my foot.

“Oh yeah? Is that how you want to play it?” he asked, grinning at me, so I kicked him again. “You are five years old, Taylor.”

Then he reached forward and yanked my leg, pulling me down onto the bed where he proceeded to tickle me until I screamed for him to stop. He was laughing as much as I was when he collapsed opposite me on the bed. I sat up and pinched the skin above his knee, and he smiled lazily at me from where his head lay on his pillow. And just like that, our fight was over.

“Okay, I’m going to bed,” I said, pulling myself up into a sitting position, knowing I was a giant chicken.

If I truly wanted to clear the air, I needed to bring up the kiss, but I was too afraid to go there. I knew it would change everything, and I didn’t want things to change.

Josh looked over at his alarm clock. “It’s only ten o’clock. Do you want to watch TV for a little bit?”

I shrugged. “Sure, why not.” 

I’d missed hanging with him that week.

He moved his laptop to his bedside table to mak
e room for me
and patted the space next to him
. I moved to the top of his bed
so
I
could lean against the pillows that he had propped up against the headboard. 

Josh turned on a rerun of
The Office,
and we laid together watching it and laughing at all the same parts. At one of the commercials, he flipped through the channels to see what else was on and came across a late HBO showing of
The Shining
which was one of my all-time favorite horror movies. 

It was right at the point where Jack goes into room 237 and sees the beautiful woman sitting by the bathtub. When she turns around, half of her skin is missing. I screamed when she turned, and tucked into Josh’s chest, even though I knew exactly what was going to happen. 

He laughed and put his arm around me, pulling me close. For the rest of the movie, as the creepy twins on tricycles said
‘Redrum, redrum, redrum’
, when the blood poured out of the elevator, and when Jack tried to hack up his wife and son, I cowered into Josh’s chest and tried not to look. He just laughed at me the whole time.

When the movie was finall
y over, I pulled away and let my
whole body go slack as I stretched out. I hadn’t realized how stiff I’d been during the whole thing. 

“I thought you loved that movie?” he asked, looking over at me as the credits rolled.

“I do,” I insisted. “It’s just freaking scary!”

He laughed again. “I think it’s awesome.”

“It is, but now I’m terrified to go back to my room,” I whined, knowing I was adding a touch of drama, just for effect, even though I really was scared to sleep alone.

“Do you want to have a sleepover?” he asked sarcastically, but I knew he was serious.

It wasn’t the first time we’d done it. I’d fallen asleep in his bed before, and he’d slept in mine. It wasn’t sexual at all, it was just sleeping.

I looked up at him, grateful that he’d asked and nodded slowly.

He laughed again. “Okay, finish getting ready for bed and come back in here. I’ll protect you tonight.”

“Thank you,” I said, smiling at him.

I hurried back to my room, turning on every light along the way. I washed my face and brushed my teeth as quickly as I could before heading back to Josh’s room where I found him sitting up in bed reading a Stephen King novel. How on earth he could read a horror novel after watching a scary movie was beyond me, but that was Josh. He was fearless.

I noticed how cute he looked in his glasses, since he’d taken his contacts out. Not wanting to think that, I crawled into bed and turned away from him. I was tired and would fall asleep quickly now that I knew I wasn’t in danger of being murdered in my sleep. 

“Is the light bothering you?” Josh asked, referring to the lamp he was using to read.

I looked back at him. “Nope. You’re fine.”

“I know,” he said in mock arrogance, and I turned to grin at him.

He was smiling back at me.

“Hey, can I ask you something?”

“Sure,” he said, looking up from his book.

I sighed. “I hate that I have to do this, mostly because I figured I’d be dating someone by this point, but I sort of RSVP’d to my cousin’s wedding in two weeks with a date, and I don’t have a date.”

“You don’t want to take Alex?”

I sighed. “My family hates him.”

“See a pattern developing?” he asked, and I would have smacked him had it not been the truth.

“I guess, but that’s not the point. The point is, I’m dateless, so I need a huge favor from you.”

“You want me to be your date?”

I nodded. “If you can get away. I’ll pay for your plane ticket and your hotel room. You won’t have to pay for anything, but you’d really be doing me a favor.”

“Yeah, absolutely,” he answered without hesitation, and my heart melted just a little.

“Thank you, Josh,” I said, hugging him around his middle.

“Anything for you, Swift,” he said sweetly.

I breathed out a huge sigh of relief, feeling like a weight had been lifted from my chest. The wedding thing had been bugging me for a while.

“Goodnight Tay,” Josh whispered, as I rolled back over
on
to my side.

“Night Josh.”

I closed my eyes and drifted off into what I hoped would be a dreamless sleep. The last thing I needed was to imagine myself being chased through a maze by a
n axe-wielding Jack Nicholson.

Chapter 8

Josh walked into my room when he got home from the gym on Sunday and flopped down on my bed next to where my research for a paper was laying.

“Hey,” he said, as he turned on his side to look up at me.

“Hi,” I said, not taking my eyes off of my laptop. I only had a few pages left to go.

“How was your date with Mr. Abercrombie last night?”

I shrugged. “It was fine, but there wasn’t a lot of chemistry.”

“That sucks,” he said, but I wasn’t sure I believed him.

He hadn’t been very excited to hear that I had a date with Nathan in the first place, so it made sense. For some reason he hadn’t liked him from the get-go.

“So did you just have a burning desire to ask me about my date, or did you want something else?” I asked, knowing I sounded snippy, but I was on a deadline.

“I wanted to see if you wanted to grab drinks and dinner tonight. Kimmy’s going out with friends, so I’m flying solo. Want to be my date? Please say yes, because if you don’t, I will be faced with a very lonely night.”

“Aww, you poor, unloved guy,” I teased.

“I know,” he said, chuckling as he looked up at me. “No, really, I was hoping we could do something. I’ve missed you.”

He sounded slightly down again, but that time, I didn’t think he was kidding.

“Okay, fine. Just let me finish this paper, and I’m all yours.

“I wish,” he said, as he hauled himself off my bed and turned back to grin at me.

I just shook my head at him, wondering if he was joking.

“J, can I ask you something,” I called after him, sensing a golden opportunity. I needed to finally bite the bullet.

“What’s up?” he asked, pausing in my doorway.

“Can you, um, can you come back over here?”

He walked back over to my bed, and I found myself watching him more closely than I ever had before. He settled back down next to me with his head against my pillows and looked over at me.

“Do you like me?” I blurted out, knowing there was no other way to do it.

He looked confused for a second. “Define ‘like’,” he finally said.

I gave him an exasperated look. He knew what I meant. Was he just buying time?

“I mean, do you like me as in
like
me, as in you want me to be your girlfriend.” I eyed him carefully, waiting to see his expression.

He laughed a short, semi-humorless laugh. “What on earth made you ask me that?” he asked, and I suddenly felt very stupid. It was time to lay all my cards on the table.

“Well,” I began, “you told me you loved me, and you kissed me.”

His eyes went wide as saucers. “I did? When?”

And then I got really confused. Did he really not remember? Or was he lying?

I kept my expression serious. “The night you were really drunk, after we got home from Champps – the night you asked me to be your partner.”

There was no way he could deny that. He’d outright admitted that he remembered that part of the night the week before.

But he still looked utterly baffled. “I remember asking you that, but I thought I passed out right after.”

“You did, but not before you told me you loved me and you kissed me.”

“I kissed you? For real?” he asked, seemingly trying to wrap his head around the idea.

I had a really hard time believing that he didn’t remember, but he seemed so genuine.

“Yeah, you did.”

“Shit, Tay. I’m sorry,” he said, as he raked his hand back through his hair. I could tell he was visibly disturbed by what he was processing. “I had no idea. I must have been really, really drunk to do something like that.”

“Yeah, you were.”

He looked guilty as he raked his hand back through his hair again, leaving it sticking up at odd angles. “Shit. I’m really sorry. I honestly didn’t mean to do that.”