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When I stepped out of the car, my mouth dropped open, and I snapped my head to Robert, squealing, “Thisis your place?”
He smiled a thin smile at me and nodded as he led me down the cobblestone pathway to his mansion. It really was a mansion, an enormous home with two balconies, a porch that spanned the front of it, and white bricks and red shutters. It was idealistic, a home out of the movies.
When we stepped in, a small alarm beeped, and he typed a set of numbers into the home screen. Walking in, I was confronted by the endless hardwood floors, shiny and waxy. “This is gorgeous,” I breathed.
How did Robert make this much money? What did he do?
“Thanks,” he said glibly, gesturing for me to follow him. I walked into a kitchen with a giant butcher block island in themiddle of the room and dark brown shelves with bowls and cups across them. It was homey and expensive looking, all at once, somehow.
“Can I make you some tea? That’s what I do when I’m stressed.”
Taken a little aback by his telling me what he did for stress, I said, “Um, sure,” and scooted into a chair at the island.
“What kind?”
“I don’t really drink tea, I don’t know.”
“I’ll make you chamomile. It’s a safe choice,” he said, with a boyish smile. I’d seen him smile twice already now. It was more than I’d seen him smile the entire time I’d known him. “Thanks for letting me drive you.”
I shrugged. “Are you going to tell Jeremy?”
He turned toward the kettle and said quietly, “Probably not.”
He sounded regretful, and I thought, not for the first time, about our kiss. It was so passionate, but it seemed like so long ago. And it seemed like he regretted it.
But then why was he here with me?
A moment of silence passed between us; it coursed through like it was alive.
The kiss swirled in my mind, his hands in my hair, on my face, the pressure of his lips… “Does Jeremy know?” I asked, from the counter, fidgeting with my hair. I wasn’t sure if he knew what I meant, what I was asking.Does Jeremy know that you kissed me? That I kissed you back?
“No,” he said, pouring hot water from the kettle into a mug and pulling down a metal box of tea bags.
“Are you going to tell him?” I pressed.
“No,” he said simply, opening the box and pulling out a tea bag.
I chewed on my lip as I watched him steep my tea. I could tell this line of questioning was upsetting him. “Robert—”
“I won’t talk to Jeremy about you anymore if that really bothers you,” he blurted out, closing the tin and replacing it on the shelf it came from.
I sighed, partially from relief and partially because I felt like we were never going to talk about the kiss. “It does.”
“Why?”
“The last time you and Jeremy talked, it didn’t…end well for me.”
“Ah. The breakup.” The way he said it was almost sarcastic, and it seemed to stab at my ribs.
I winced. “Yes, thebreakup.”
“Look, I just, I need you to know that it wasn’t about you.”
“Really? Because it sounds like you thought I was using him to get ahead.”
“Okay, it was a little about you,” he chuckled a little, and I smiled despite myself. “But it was mostly about him. I thought he was throwing away his life. You have to understand. You were making a choice. He was making a mistake.”
“How?”