Can't Let Go - A Contemporary BWWM Romance (13 page)

“I
can’t believe you’re going out for coffee with Ayla Giovanni,” LaLa said as she
perched on the edge of my bed while I got ready.

“You’re
telling me,” I lamented as I swiped on some blush. “I don’t want to go.”

“I
know you don’t,” LaLa said with sympathetic eyes. Secretly, I figured she was
probably entertained by all of this.

“Antoine’s
going to think I’m up to something,” I said.

“Screw
what Antoine thinks,” she replied. “It’s not about Antoine. You’re doing your
boss a favor.”

“True,”
I agreed.

“If
Antoine and Ayla weren’t dating, and your boss asked you to get coffee with
Ayla, you’d have still done it, right?” LaLa stated.

“Yeah,”
I said.

“There
you go,” she said. “Has nothing to do with Antoine.”

I
checked my watch. “I gotta go.”

“Good
luck,” LaLa said with a wink and a laugh. “I’ll be thinking of you.”

I
rolled my eyes and bolted out the door. We were supposed to meet at some coffee
shop halfway between her place and mine. I tried to take comfort in the fact
that she was probably dreading it just as much as I was.

“Ayla,
hi,” I said as I walked in the door. I was a few minutes late, and she seemed
annoyed. Then again, when didn’t she seem annoyed?

Her
long, dark hair was pulled back into a low, ballerina bun. She was wearing
Aztec print leggings, brown, leather booties, and a button down, silky blouse.
Only she could pull off that look.

I
immediately felt frumpy next to her in my jeans and top, but I brushed it off.
She had already ordered a coffee and was sipping on it while checking her
phone.

“I’m
going to grab a drink,” I said, getting back up.

I
returned with my warm mug of Chai and took a seat across from her.

“I
think it’s cute that Julianne is trying to…” I trailed off as I saw her face. I
guess it really wasn’t cute. It was rather sad and pathetic. “She really cares
about you.”

Ayla
shrugged and sipped her coffee.

“So
your wedding is coming up,” I said in an attempt to make conversation.

“Yep,”
she said with a smile.

“How
did you meet Antoine?” I asked. I couldn’t help myself, and it seemed like a
natural question.

“Friends,”
she replied. She was clearly in a one-word answer kind of mood.
So rude.

I
wondered what mutual friends they had, but of course I couldn’t ask that.

“That’s
nice,” I said. “It’s good to have mutual friends.”

Julianne
said Ayla didn’t have any friends, I remembered. I wouldn’t have put it past
Antoine to have an online dating profile somewhere. I laughed on the
inside
as I was pretty sure that’s how they met. It was the
only thing that made sense.

“So
are you excited to get married
?” I asked.

She
glanced up at me over her mug of steamy coffee and scrunched her eyebrows.

“Yeah?”
she said in an almost offended tone. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

She
had no personality. Zero. What the hell did Antoine see in her?

“Tell
me about Antoine,” I said. “What’s he like?”

Her
demeanor instantly changed and her shoulders seemed to relax a bit while her
face softened.

“He’s
wonderful,” she said. For the first time since I’d formally met her, a genuine
smile spread across her full, supermodel lips. “He’s more than I could ever ask
for. More than I deserve, probably. He’s my whole world.”

“How
nice,” I said. On the inside, I died a little. That described him perfectly and
I knew it.

“He’s
so good to me,” she continued. “He makes me breakfast in bed on my days off. He
takes me shopping and spends hours waiting while I try on the entire store. He
always lets me pick the movies and the restaurants.”

“That’s
good,” I said. I didn’t know what else to say. That was Antoine for sure.

She
rambled on a bit more about how great Antoine was, but after a bit I tuned it
all out. I already knew all those things.

I
couldn’t get out of that little coffee house fast enough. A half hour with Ayla
Giovanni was a half hour too much. What the hell did Antoine see in her? She
was so into herself and so self-absorbed.

My
feet carried me swiftly down the sidewalk and back towards my apartment. I
picked up my phone to dial LaLa, but she didn’t answer. I wanted to vent. I
wanted to tell the whole world that Ayla Giovanni was nothing but a silly,
vapid girl and that Antoine was making a huge mistake. If he didn’t want to be
with me, fine, but why her? Why someone so shallow?

My
fingers hovered over Kevin’s name on my phone. I still needed to thank him for
the flowers. I’d sent him a text earlier, but it wasn’t the same. I bit my lip,
swallowed a gulp of air, and pressed his name on the screen.

“Hey,
Liv,” he said as he picked up in the middle of the second ring.

“Hi,”
I said with a sheepish tone.

“What’s
up?”

“I
just wanted to thank you again for the pretty flowers,” I said. That and I just
wanted an excuse to call him and hear his voice. “What are you up to?”

“Just
hanging out at home,” he said. “Long day at work.”

By
the sounds of his voice, he was lying down. I was pretty sure I could hear the
TV on in the background as well and it sounded like ESPN or something sports
related.

“Do
you want to maybe come over tonight and hang out for a bit? LaLa’s with
Demarius,” I said. I cringed. I didn’t want him to think I was insinuating
anything simply because LaLa wasn’t home. I hoped he didn’t take it that way.

“Um,
sure,” he said at length. He must have been thinking about it.

“If
there’s a game on or something, I understand,” I interjected.

“No,
no,” he said. “It’s fine. I’ll be over in a bit.”

By
the time we hung up, I was climbing the stairs to my apartment. I rushed in to
change into something more casual, then waited on the sofa for him to knock on
the door. A good twenty minutes later and he was there, in the flesh.

“Hey,”
I said with a grin as I let him in. “Thanks for hanging out with me tonight.”

“No
problem,” he said. “I’m glad you called. I was beginning to think I’d royally
screwed this up.”

I
waved my hand in front of my face and smiled. I really didn’t want to talk
about last weekend. It was over and done with. No use in rehashing it.

“Why
don’t you have a seat and make yourself comfortable?” I asked while I pointed
to the couch.

He
kicked off his shoes while I ran to the kitchen and retrieved an icy cold beer
for him like the good little prospective girlfriend I was.

“Oh,
wow,” he said. “Thank you.”

“I
hope you like pale ale,” I said. “It’s all we have right now.”

“Beer
is beer,” he said. “This is perfect.”

I
sat down next to him and kicked my legs over his lap before handing him the
remote.

“I’m
pretty sure you were watching basketball when I called you earlier,” I said
with a wink.

His
face lit up. He was probably shocked that I was being so cool about everything.
I could tell.

He
flipped on the T.V. and instantly tuned it to some college game. If he
absolutely had to watch the game, I was glad he was going to be watching it
with me.

I
grabbed one of LaLa’s many gossip magazines from the coffee table, repositioned
the sofa cushion behind me, and got comfortable. If I didn’t know any better,
we were settling into a relaxing Monday evening like some boring old couple. It
felt good to have that with someone. I hadn’t had that for almost a year.

The
moment a commercial came across the screen, I decided to make small talk with
Kevin. I couldn’t just sit there in silence all night.

“So,
long day today?” I asked.

“Yeah,”
he said as he turned towards me. At least he was engaging.

“Wanna
talk about it?” I asked with raised eyebrows. “
I
’m
all ears
.”

“Nah,
it’s okay,” he replied. He took a swig of his beer, and I saw that it was
getting a little low.

“Want
another beer?” I asked, leaning forward to climb off the couch.

“You
stay there,” he said. “I’ll get it. You don’t have to wait on me.”

“Okay,”
I said with a grin. Things were definitely getting more comfortable between us,
and I loved that.

He
returned with his fresh bottle of beer and sat back down, moving my legs back
onto his lap.

“So
guess what I did today?” I said. “You’ll never believe this.”

“What’s
that?” he asked. The game was starting to come back on. Damn it.

“Had
coffee with Ayla Giovanni,” I said as I casually flipped the pages of my magazine.

I
glanced over at Kevin who looked like he was about to spit his beer out of his
mouth.

“How?
What?” he said, perplexed. “How did that come about?”

“Julianne
approached me at work today,” I sighed. “She doesn’t think Ayla has enough
friends. Or maybe she doesn’t have any at all. I don’t know. She thought I’d be
a good friend for Ayla to have, and she asked me to meet Ayla for coffee after
work. How could I say no to my boss?”

“So,
how’d it go?” he asked. His face was intense and he was totally tuned into me
despite the game clearly playing on the T.V. screen just mere feet away.

“Honestly?”
I said as I sat up a little. “I think she’s shallow and vapid. She’s impossible
to have a conversation with. She only talks about herself. She didn’t once ask
anything about me, and I don’t know what anyone sees in her. There’s just,
like, nothing there.”

Kevin’s
face twisted uncomfortably as he took another swig of beer.

“That’s
not exactly fair to say,” he said. “You spent, what, an hour with her?”

“Half
hour,” I corrected him.

“Okay,
so you spent a half hour with someone you don’t know, and you’re calling her a
bunch of pretty harsh names,” he said. “Just seems a little extreme.”

He
turned back towards the game and turned the volume up a tiny bit. He didn’t
want to have this discussion, I could tell. But I didn’t care. I wanted to know
why he was sticking up for her.

“I
think she has the personality of a wet blanket,” I said. “There’s nothing
special about her beyond that pretty face of hers.”

He
turned back towards me and cocked his head to the side as if to say, “Come on.”

“I
don’t know what Antoine sees in her,” I added.

“Who’s
Antoine?” he asked. “Oh, wait, her fiancé. Why do you care what he sees in her?
You don’t know the guy.”

I
bit my lip. It was almost on the tip of my tongue, but I couldn’t tell him. I
hadn’t told him when I had the chance, so I couldn’t say it now. He was better
off not knowing anyway.

“Oh!”
he yelled out as he stood up. My legs flew off his lap like two limp noodles.
There must have been an exciting play in the game.

I
sat up a bit and crossed my legs. I didn’t feel like being
all
cutesy
with him after that. I couldn’t believe he was standing up for
Ayla when she was clearly the most self-absorbed person in the entire world.

I
finished one magazine and picked up another. I glanced over the glossy pages of
well-coiffed celebrities, read an article about how some reality star lost
thirty-five pounds in two months, and reviewed a spread on nail polish trends.
At least a half hour went by, and Kevin hadn’t said more than a couple words to
me.

“Care
if I have another beer?” he asked.

“Go
for it,” I said, not looking up from my read.

He
returned from the kitchen once again and downed his third beer. I was a little
surprised since he was a cop and had driven there. It was almost nine o’clock,
and I figured he’d be trying to jet out soon.

The
moment his game ended, his demeanor completely changed.

“So,”
he said, playfully slapping my knee.

I
looked up, and he had the biggest, cheesiest grin plastered across his face.

“Your
team won?” I asked.

He
nodded with the enthusiasm of a kid at Christmas.

“That
and I’m a little buzzed,” he said. He tossed his head back and sunk deep into
the couch. It was probably the most relaxed I’d ever seen him.

“You
can crash here tonight if you want,” I said. “I’m probably going to go to bed
soon. Gotta work tomorrow.”