Page 35 of Matched (LSU #5)

“ I have a hypothetical situation, and I could use your advice.”

Ander held up his hand. “Before you tell me what this is all about, is it gonna require the assistance of Sid?”

“Sid,” I muttered, but when Ander continued to look at me expectantly, I sighed in defeat. “Okay. If you really think it’ll help.”

“Sid’s a great therapist.” My housemate made for the stairs, and I followed him up on autopilot, not even realising we were heading for JJ’s bedroom until he was knocking on the door.

“JJ—”

“JJ has custody this week. He’s good for advice, too.” Ander glanced back at me as he pushed the door open. “Mate. We’ve got your back. Don’t look so stressed.”

“Make yourself at home,” JJ said drily when Ander flopped onto his bed. He was leaning back in his desk chair with his feet kicked up on the desk, a music video playing on his open laptop. The sound was muted, and when I took a closer look, I realised the video was playing at half speed.

“Dance moves,” JJ explained when he caught me staring. “Now, do either of you want to tell me why you’ve invaded my room?”

Ander rolled over onto his back, his head hanging off the edge of the bed.

Looking at JJ from his upside-down position, he lifted his hands in the air.

“Charlie needs our advice on a hypothetical situation.” He did air quotes with his fingers when he said the final two words.

“I thought we could use Sid for moral support.”

They both glanced over at where the giant snail was gliding along the bottom of its enclosure, completely ignoring the humans in the room.

“See? He’s listening,” Ander said, and JJ nodded in agreement. My housemates were weird.

“Okay.” JJ lowered his feet from the desk to the floor, pausing the music video. “Let’s hear it.”

“Yeah. Uh.” Crossing to the wall, I leaned back against it, shoving my hands in the pockets of my shorts.

“Hypothetically, if you’d been seeing someone and you’d agreed to keep it casual and end it when he—they were moving away at the end of the semester, what would you do if you caught feelings?

Would you keep to the agreement or, I dunno, do something else? ”

Ander rolled back over. “We all saw that kiss, so let’s not pretend this is hypothetical.”

“When you say you caught feelings, how deep are we talking?”

Exhaling heavily, I turned to JJ. “Deep. Deeper than I realised—or maybe I did realise, but I was denying it to myself.”

“We’ve all been there,” Ander reassured me.

“Our minds play tricks on us, and we end up doing things like getting a boner from kissing our best friends, not even realising said best friend caused that reaction in us.” JJ and I exchanged glances, and he grinned.

“Okay, that one was probably just me. But it’s true.

Our brains can convince us of all kinds of shit, no matter how irrational or untrue it actually is. ”

“He’s right,” JJ said. “Speaking from my personal experience, if we can apply any of it to your situation, trying to stay away from someone when you want to be together just ends up hurting you both. I wouldn’t recommend it.

Even if Killian was moving to—where’s Nate going?

—we’d make it work. We love each other, and neither of us would give that up for anything. ”

“Plymouth. And yeah. I know. It’s just that we agreed it would be a casual thing between us that would end when he moved away. Then I caught feelings, and—” I swallowed around the lump in my throat. “I don’t want to let him go.”

Ander swung himself upright. “Then you don’t let him go.”

“It’s not that simple.”

“It can be. Talk to him.”

Me:

How’s it going over there?

Nate:

Okay. Want to talk properly?

Instead of replying, I hit the Video Call button.

Nate’s face filled the screen, tired but happy to see me. “Hi.”

“Hi. How’s the hotel?”

“Quiet now everyone’s gone. I’m meeting my lecturer and touring my accommodation tomorrow morning, so I was meant to be having an early night. I can’t sleep, though.”

“Me neither.” I rolled onto my side, propping my phone up on my pillow next to me. “Can we talk when you get back?”

He nodded instantly. “I wanted to ask you the same thing. I’ll probably be back late tomorrow, but we can sort it out for Tuesday. Are you working?”

“Nope. I’ve got lectures until three, but I’m free after that, or we can even meet up at lunchtime.”

“We’ll sort it out when I get back.” He smiled at me. Would it ever stop giving me fucking butterflies? “Are you in bed already?”

“Not yet. Just been lying down watching videos on my phone.”

“Speaking of videos, Travis’ girlfriend took a video of the end of the match, and she caught our pitch celebrations. Want me to send it to you?”

“Video evidence of our kiss? Yeah, okay. Send it over. It’s a poor substitute for the real thing, but it’ll do for now.”

Nate’s smile disappeared. “I miss you, Charlie B.”

“I miss you, too. It’s not like…I know we don’t see each other every single day now, but when you’re here, I know we can see each other whenever, even if it’s just a quick passing thing while I’m working or—” I cut myself off when I noticed his downcast expression, suddenly realising what I was saying.

“Fuck. Sorry. I don’t…I’m not trying to complain or make you feel bad. When you’ve moved to Plymouth?—”

“Hey. I know,” he said softly. “We’ll talk about it when I get back, okay? I’d already planned to.”

“Okay.”

All I could do now was wait and hope we could work something out. I wasn’t ready to give up on Nate Glover.