Uninvolved (29 page)

He didn't,
but he did stay longer than ever before
.

Becka slept in the next day and awoke to Kyle sliding into bed with her
.
Becka panicked only long enough to realize
Nate
was already gone. He
had left sometime in the early mornin
g
.
Nate
eventually
confessed that the Kyle thing was weighing to
o
heavily on his conscious
.
Nate
planned to go home and figure out what it was he wanted
,
and then he would let Becka know.

Becka had
sex
that morning
with Kyle
, telling herself later that it was only because she was groggy and still unsatisfied from the night before
.
Kyle was fun
.
His
only fault in her eyes was that he loved her
.
If only Kyle and
Nate
's
feelings towards Becka had been reversed
,
she mused.
As they lay in her bed in
post
-
sex
bliss
,
Becka considered te
ll
ing
him they needed to slow things down.

She would have said something like
,
“
Kyle
, I have to be honest with you
.
I wasn’t sick last night when I le
ft
.
What I really did was panic after you said that you loved me
in front of everyone
.
It just feels too soon
.
”
He would probably look wounded and
,
in her mind
,
she would have continued saying
,
“
I'm not saying that I don’t care about you because I do
.
I'm just saying that I think we may be mo
ving faster than I am ready to.
”

She could picture Kyle thinking this over and being okay with it
.
Then they would go on having great sex without anyone's feeling
s
getting hurt
.
That would be the mature, honest thing to do
,
Becka thou
ght as she lay there and said nothing
.

The next day
,
when Kyle left to
go to work
,
Becka called Lilly
to unload everything that
had happened the night before.

"Oh Becka
,
honey
.
If
you don’t nip this in the bud
,
someone is going get hu
rt
,
" Lilly
said solemnly.

"But
—
" Becka began.

"Uh uh
,
honey
.
There
is no pretty way this is all going to work out
,
"
Lilly
cut her off.

"You're right
.
I know it
.
It’s
just that
—
"

"You are being selfish
,
Becka
.
That
is all this is
,
"
Lilly
cut in again.

"Ouch!" Becka complained.

"What are you going to do
,
Becka?"
Lilly
asked.

"Well I
don’t
know
.
That’s
why I called you
.
What should I do?"

"Why don’t you flip a coin?"

"I'm trying to be serious here
,
" Becka argued.

"No, hear me out
.
I'm being for real
.
I've heard
that
the second you throw that coin in the air
,
you know in your heart what side you want it to land on
,
"
Lilly
explained.

"That's fucking brilliant!" Becka exclaimed
,
going to grab a penny from her retirement fund.

"So who's heads and who's tails?"
Lilly
asked
,
laughing.

"That's not what I plan on flipping for
,
" Becka countered.

"Huh?"

"Heads break up with Kyle
.
Tails
don't break up with Kyle."

"But
what about
Nate
?"
Lilly
asked confused.

"I can't not see
Nate
,
" Becka admitted.

"That's your answer
,
missy
.
There
is no point
in
flipping that coin
.
You have got to break up with Kyle."

"What?
Like
now, the day after his birthd
ay
?
"

"Well, I guess when you put it that way it wo
uld be pretty heartless
,
" Lilly
conceded.

Chapter 12

Kyle's birthday had been over a month ago
,
and Becka was no closer to ending things with him
.
She was also seeing more of
Nate
than she ever
had, staying over at his house some
nights Kyle was w
orking
.

Nate
's way of dealing with it was to ignore the Kyle situation all together. Once
,
though, after he had more to drink than normal
,
he asked her if she was still seeing him. When Becka nodded
,
he looked so sad she almost called Kyle right then to break up with him. Instead
,
she opened
Nate
's arms and melted into them, doing anything she could to make him smile. Becka could
not
erase the image of his face
.
It
made her understand that she was hurting him.

Becka had never really considered
Nate
's feelings in the situation
.
The
more she thought about it
,
the worse she felt. Part of his issue with not wanting a girlfriend was because
Nate
's last girlfriend had cheated on him. Here Becka was
,
cheating on Kyle with
Nate
. That was what Becka finally needed to understand. Becka hadn’t said anything to
Nate
,
but she had decided to end things with Kyle his next night off.

Saturday morning
,
she woke to find Kyle had called and texted her multiple times during the night looking for her.

There was an issue with
a
delivery that night
,
so Kyle had been sent home earlier
than normal
.
He foll
owed Dave home to surprise her
.
Becka cringed as she realized
Nate
was probably going
down on her while her boyfriend
was calling
.
No wonder s
he didn’t hear it ring
,
Becka
thought.

Becka texted him that she had met up with Lucy the night before and ended up crashing at her apartment
.
Becka then texted Lucy to give her a heads up about what she had said
.
She felt a momen
tary twinge of guilt at lying but was over it when she heard
Nate
turn on the shower
.
Becka was having fun seeing how far she could push
Nate
before he would just cave and bang her
.
The shower seemed like a fun place to drive him crazy.

Much later
,
as Becka dried off
,
she wondered which
Nate
had more of
:
absurd willpower or crazy blue balls
.
After getting dressed
,
Becka glanced at her phone just before she was going to leave
.
Her first message was from Lucy and said
,
Bad news, babe. Curt and I fucking ran into Dave and KYLE at the bar last night.

"Shit, shit, shit,
shit!" Becka exclaimed
as she opened her next message
,
which was from Kyle.
You and I both know that is not true. Where are you?

Nate
had come over to see what she was freaking out about
.
She put her head in her hands and handed him her phone
.
After reading the text messages
,
he handed her back her phone
.
Becka looked up at him to
gauge
his reaction and chewed on her lip.

Not getting anything from him
,
she asked
,
"What should I do?"

Nate
laughed
,
then said
,
"Hold on
.
Are
you really asking ME for advice
on this?"

"Maybe
.
"

"This is something you are going to have to deal with
yourself
,
kid
.
"

Becka rolled her eyes when he said
“
kid
,”
even though she kind of liked it
now
.
Standing
,
Becka moved in front of him to say goodbye
.
He wrapped his arms around her thighs and kissed a patch of exposed skin on her side
.
Becka
ruffled
his hair
in return
.

"This sucks
,
" she groaned when he released her.

"Let me know what happens
,
"
Nate
said once they were to her car.

Her phone started ringing once she pulled out of his driveway
.
She answered with her Bluetooth.

"Hello
…
"

"Becka?"

"Oh
,
thank
G
od, Dave
.
What's up?"

"Where the fuck were you last night
,
Becks?
Kyle is over here freaking out."

"Is he really pissed?"

"Hell yeah
,
he's pissed
.
Where were you?"

"I don’t want to talk about it."

"Shit
,
Becks
.
Were
you with another dude?
I thought you liked Kyle."

"Can he
FUCKING
hear you?"

"Chill out
.
He can't hear me
.
I'm out back."

"Okay"

"Are you going to tell me what is going on?"

"Promise you won't be pissed
and that you won't say anything to Kyle
."

"I hate it when you say that."

"Just promise, okay?"

"Fine
.
I promise I won't be pissed."

"I've kinda been seeing someone else."

"WHAT?"

"Don’t yell at me
.
You
promised
.
Besides
I haven't even slept with him."