The Wake-Up Call

by Beth O'Leary

I remember the first time Drew popped in to see me while I was at work—she’d been hoping for a free lunch. Arjun eyed her through the kitchen door and said, That’s the flatmate you’re always bending over backwards for? I say cut her loose. She’s ordered three sides, Izzy. That is a woman who takes what she can get.

I am a careful man by nature. But Izzy makes me feel reckless.

I am a slightly different man in my mother tongue. Bolder, firmer, louder. I don’t think either English Lucas or Brazilian Lucas is the truer one, but the two languages bring out different sides to me, and right now I want to remember the version of myself who breathes through his Rs and goes after what he wants.

I’ll never be able to bring a guy back to the house I grew up in and close the kitchen door to say, So, guys? What do you think of him? Be honest!

“If we do this,” he says, voice rough, accent strong. “Then you don’t look away from me.”

So many great love stories started in the bedroom. My brother’s wife was his one-night-stand rebound girl! And now they have a horrible number of children.”

I would like to believe that I can let a person see me, and that once they have, they might think more of me, not less.

“Yes,” he says calmly. “You can. Whatever it is you want.” He turns to look at me for a split second and his eyes are as dark as the sky outside. “I’m yours.”

Within ten minutes, we’re breathless and beyond reason. We obviously won’t becomes We probably shouldn’t, and then after twenty minutes of making out in the driving seat like teenagers, without a single car passing us down this dark country road, it becomes We could just and Quero você, I want you and God, Lucas and Please and Please and Yes.

That’s what jealousy is, isn’t it? Fear of losing someone?

Really, I’m not sure I did ever want him much. He was sweet, at first, and I’ve always gone for sweet guys—they’re safe and comforting, like milk chocolate, or boots with a two-inch heel. Nothing remarkable, but no risk of breaking an ankle, either.

hmm

In the entire time I was with Tristan, we never did anything more exciting together than start a new show on Netflix.

... oh.

“Lucas,” she says, softly now. “You can relax. It’s just me.” It’s just me. Like she isn’t fucking everything.