Page 24 of Fun Together (Make Romance #1)

Eli

I am frustrated, but probably not for the reason she thinks.

It’s not because of things not working with Dani.

Or because of anything Faye said. I’m frustrated at Cameron for being an idiot and at myself for introducing Faye to Chris, knowing that he would never make the first move with her.

Since everyone left, Faye has tried to act like she’s okay, but I can tell she’s in her head about it.

Even though she says it was fine and that she’s not actually into them, I guarantee she’s running through everything she said tonight, wondering what she could have done differently.

I’m frustrated at the battle I’ve had with myself for the last three hours because the handle I have on this crush is slipping by the minute. I guess I should be happy she changed, because those pants she had on tonight were designed in a lab to torture me.

But honestly, what she changed into doesn’t help matters. Now, she’s in her glasses and wearing these spandex shorts and huge T-shirt that just makes me want to curl up on the couch with her, instead of putting together this dresser.

Maybe if I talk to her about tonight, it’ll help distract me from my own thoughts.

“Faye,” I say.

“Yeah?” She's concentrating on screwing in a piece, and she’s making this face that is so cute it’s killing me.

“They’re idiots.”

“Yeah, I know,” she says.

“I’d say you dodged a bullet with both of them. And look on the bright side, you’ve gotten a couple of dates out of the way. Gotta kiss some bad frogs or whatever the expression is.”

She just hums in answer.

But I can’t stop talking. “Can you imagine what either of them would be like in bed?”

She stops what she’s doing but doesn’t look at me. “Eli?”

“Hmm?”

“I don’t really want to talk about their potential sexual prowess with you.” She sits back and looks around. “Do you see another piece like this one?” She holds up what I think is the front of a drawer.

I sift through the other pieces. “No, don’t see it.”

She tosses the drawer piece aside. “If you want to continue this slow torture, go for it.” She stands up and heads into the kitchen. “You still want cookies?”

I’m thrown by the change in subject. “Uh, yeah?”

“You like peanut butter cookies?”

“Uh, yeah?”

“Want to make cookies instead? Because if I have to play Tetris with this engineered wood for two more seconds, I’m going to explode.”

I laugh and get up to join her in the kitchen. “Fine by me.”

She takes out the peanut butter, eggs, and sugar and sets them on the counter.

“Is this all we need?” I ask.

“Yep, I used to make these all the time when I was little.”

“Did you like to bake a lot?”

She takes out measuring cups. “Not really.”

“Where did you grow up again?” I ask casually, subtly bringing up our old guessing game.

She gives me a sly smile. “Nuh-uh. Still not telling you.”

“Why won’t you tell me?”

She measures out the peanut butter and sugar into the bowl. “Now it’s just fun to not tell you.”

“You’ll tell me someday.”

She shakes her head as she slides the bowl down the counter to where I’m standing. “Can I tell you to crack two eggs in there, instead?”

“Yes, chef.”

I add the eggs, and she hands me a spoon. “Just mix it all together until the dough forms,” she says.

Her kitchen is so tiny that we keep brushing against each other with every move the other makes.

She reaches across to take a dish towel from a hook next to the sink, grazing against my arm.

I move behind her to throw away the eggshells, and we’re pressed against each other momentarily.

It’s a dance we’re doing, and it kind of reminds me of the swans circling each other at the pond.

She rolls the dough into little balls to place on the cookie sheet. “Do you think I’m mysterious?”

The question is so out of nowhere, I almost don’t think I’ve heard her right. “What do you mean?”

“Rett says I’m bad at letting people know me. Just wondering if that’s why—” She pauses and shrugs. “Maybe that’s why Cameron and Chris weren’t interested. Maybe I didn’t try hard enough.”

I was right—she has been overanalyzing the night.

I take a bite of peanut butter to buy some time while I think of the best thing to say.

Faye is an odd combination of open and closed.

There’s nothing intimidating about her, but you get the sense that she’s never fully herself.

She knows what to say to make you feel heard, but ask her anything personal, and she’ll deftly steer the conversation back to you.

“I’d say you’re intriguing.” I join her in shaping the cookies.

“And I’d say Cameron and Chris are lazy. ”

“So, you don’t think I’m hard to know?”

“I didn’t say that.” I playfully shove her with my hip. “You’re worth trying to get to know, though.”

She gives me a curious look before focusing on spooning more cookies onto the sheet. She places them in the oven while I set a timer on my phone. We take a seat on the stools she’s placed by her kitchen counter—another tight space, where our knees bump against each other.

I decide to test something and don’t move my knee away from hers to see what she does. She doesn’t move hers away either, keeping it pressed against mine.

She folds a dish towel. Unfolds it. Folds it again. “I thought Andrew really knew me. But then when he asked me—” A few seconds tick away. But I don’t say anything, even though I’m wondering what he asked her. Even though, I think I might know what he asked her. “He didn’t know me at all.”

She shakes her head as if to clear it out. “I’m sorry for even talking about this with you. He’s a great person. You don’t have to say anything.”

“You can talk about anything with me.”

“I know.” She raises her eyes to fully look at me with a direct stare you rarely get from her. I don’t want her to look away. I want to swim in those blue eyes forever.

I know.

Those two words make me feel . . . warm. More than a physical attraction kind of warm. Like, I want her to tell me everything, and maybe I could tell her everything, too.

She looks back down at her hands, still fiddling with the towel. “How are things going at work?”

“It’s going okay. I’m still figuring things out.”

“What were you doing before? In New York?”

“I was doing something similar, but it was a smaller company. More of a mom-and-pop kind of place that sold electrical parts.”

The oven beeps, letting us know the cookies are done. Faye gets up to take them out and I watch the swish of her legs as she walks to the oven.

She places them on a plate to cool. “Do you like working in recruiting?”

“Does anyone like working in recruiting?”

She laughs. “I overheard Melissa talking about how you were fitting in well so far.”

“That’s good to know. My last job was . . . the opposite.”

“What happened?” she asks, taking a cookie from the plate, and handing one to me.

“Well, I kind of got fired.” It’s not my favorite topic of conversation, but since we’re talking about it, I might as well be honest. Not that I’m nervous to tell her, but it’s embarrassing because I knew better.

“I’m so sorry. Companies pull that shit all the time.”

“It wasn’t layoffs or anything. It was something I did.”

“You don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to.”

It was one of the worst days of my life. I’ve never felt the kind of shame I did that day. Turns out, companies do notice when you show up late to work almost every day but lie about it on your timecard. It was so stupid. I was so stupid.

It’s not that I think Faye will judge me, and she obviously understands not wanting to talk about something difficult, but tonight just doesn’t feel like the time to talk about my failures. “It’s a long story, and I’m getting kind of tired.”

“Yeah, same.” She nods and fights a yawn.

I stand up. “Okay if I sleep on your couch for a bit? Don’t want to drive yet.”

“Of yeah, that’s fine.”

She goes into the bathroom, and I hear her brushing her teeth. She comes back out a few minutes later, tugging on the hem of her shirt as if she’s nervous.

“Remember that night we talked on the phone about how sleeping alone sucks?”

I nod, unsure, but stupidly hopeful about where she’s going with this. “Yeah, I do.”

She swings her body around to gesture toward her bedroom. “You could sleep in here with me. If you wanted to.”

My heart starts to pound. Sleep in the bed with her. Sleep in Faye’s bed. In bed with Faye.

I need to calm down. She only wants someone next to her. It’s not like she’s champing at the bit to touch me like I am her. It’s just sleeping. No big deal.

She must take my silence as need to explain herself. “It’s just . . . we’re friends, and?—”

“I’ll stay over.” I’ll do anything you ask , I think but don’t say.

It’s just sleeping.

I follow her into the bedroom.

“I feel pathetic,” she speaks into the darkness.

“For asking me to stay with you?”

“I guess?” She plays with the edge of the sheet she’s tucked under her arms. “You just get used to sleeping with another person next to you. I’ve gotten used being alone, for the most part. I don’t mind my own company. Except at night, it’s like?—”

“Like you’re literally the only person on the entire planet.”

We’re both lying on our backs facing the ceiling, but I feel her move so she’s now on her side facing me. “Exactly,” she sighs.

Why does she have to smell so good? Every time she moves, I get a whiff of her warm vanilla fruity-sweet scent. Does her skin taste as good as it smells?

“You’re a good friend,” she says.

I’m a terrible friend. To her. To Andrew. If either of them knew what I was thinking right now, I’d be sent into horny exile.

She closes her eyes, and I close mine. The air conditioner hums, but I’m hot with confusion and frustration. Her breathing has slowed, and I assume she’s fallen asleep.

Until I hear her whisper, “Can I ask you for one more favor?”

I’m half terrified to hear what she could ask me right now. “Sure.”

“Would you . . .” She covers her face with her hands.

The anticipation is fucking killing me. Does she want me to go to the couch? To get her another blanket? To leave her apartment and never see her again? I have never felt this antsy and nervous around a woman. My thoughts don’t normally race like this because I don’t give them time enough to.

“Do you want to cuddle?”

I release a breath that turns into a laugh. “I always want to cuddle,” I joke, trying not to sound like I might spontaneously combust. If this is how I feel about cuddling her, imagine how it’d be to do other things?

Stop thinking about other things.

She rolls around so she’s facing her window now and I rest my arm across her waist, careful not to grip her any tighter than she might want. “Is this okay?” I ask.

“Yes,” she sighs, snuggling in close to me.

We both fall asleep almost immediately.