Well, Actually

by Mazey Eddings

“Everything’s okay,” she says, making me hold her gaze as she gives me another shake. “Satirically interviewing low-level celebrities over hot dogs wasn’t your dream career … so what? You’re at least in the field you want to work in, even if it’s a different beat.” I go to argue, but she cuts me off. “You don’t have to have it all settled and perfect. Life marches forward regardless of your plans, babe.

I need this to remind myself too lol

Dark, wavy hair. Piercing gray eyes and offensively thick lashes framed by tortoiseshell glasses. A jawline that could tempt a nun to sin and a rumbly voice you can’t help but imagine between your thighs. Gorgeous and he damn well knows it. Rylie fucking Cooper.

I will not find goddamn … merriment from his content.

Lol!

“I’m sorry if this is way too forward,” Cooper said, that glimmer of humor still in his smile, “but would you like to get a mall massage with me?” I gaped at him. “A … a massage?” He gave me a loose shrug, smile growing. “I couldn’t help but notice that your shoulders looked very tense during the lecture.”

Lol!

“Don’t think any cameras are rolling yet, Cooper. You can cut the simp act.” He laughs—a big, bold sound that vibrates through me, and my fingers grip the edge of my chair like I’ll float away without something to hang on to.

“I’d certainly call him daddy.” Cooper and I speak in unison. My jaw crashes open as my eyes lock with his, our dumb, harmonized joke sitting between us.

Lol

I’m not going to willingly lead the way into your creepy attic.” Cooper pouts. “But how else will I get an ideal view of your ass?” My eyebrows lift, warmth splashing my cheeks as I let out a goddamn giggle of surprise. I wipe my features into a grimace. “Well, I can at least respect your honesty. I do have a great ass.” “Always been one of my favorite things about you.” Cooper agrees with a gentlemanly nod.

“Peppermint, right?” My attention snaps to where he stands by the kettle, an unwrapped box of peppermint tea held in his hand. My brows pinch, eyes bouncing between the box and his cautious look. “How did you…” “Come on, Eva.” He lets out a rough breath of a laugh. “You drank a giant thermos of it every class. The smell of peppermint and you became practically Pavlovian for me.” His smile is timid but automatic, and I have to look away, a painful rasp of emotion scoring down my throat.

“I knew you’d like that,” Cooper says, absolutely glowing. I hold up my hand to silence him, but he’s so hyped up he reaches across the table and gives me a high five.

Lol!

“Maybe I don’t know everything about you, Eva,” Cooper says, leaning forward. “But I know some things, and all those things make me want to know more. If you’ll let me.”

I’m almost out of the hall when his voice reaches me, both earnest and amused as he calls, “Too late. Miss you already.”

I’ve been aware of liking people, not genders, since I was old enough to register a crush,

“I’m bi,” he says at last, forming the words clearly and steadily as he hunches closer to the microphone.

“Why do you put up with me?” I ask suddenly. I want to snatch back the vulnerable question, force the words back down my throat and slap my hand over my mouth for good measure. Cooper swallows, and I trace the bob of his Adam’s apple. He adjusts his glasses, drags a hand down his jaw. “Because I like you, Eva.”

Each word is tapped into the blank page of my skin, inking deeper and deeper until I feel covered in his confession. “I like when you tease me,” I whisper, my admission feeling both too intimate and too inadequate. Cooper’s grin is radiant, so warm I can feel it in my chest. “Well, that’s good, because I can’t seem to help myself when it comes to you.”

I remember all the details. That’s the problem. I remember the night before too.

“But I guess I wanted to feel loved at that moment, and I … I blurted out that I loved him.”

I deserve softness, goddammit. I deserve tender moments and gentle caresses and whispered sweet nothings. I deserve someone, somewhere, wanting to like me for me and not the hardened veneer I gloss my vulnerability with.

wasn’t because I didn’t want you, I just didn’t think I was allowed to have you.” There’s a long, weighted silence, and I realize I’m holding my breath. “And sometimes, I wonder,” he whispers, still not looking at me, “if you would change anything. If you would take back meeting me. I know it’s selfish, but I don’t think I could ever take back meeting you.”

A look I can’t read flits across his face, his jaw tightening and a muscle ticking in his cheek. “If I hadn’t screwed up that night like I did, do you think—” He clears his throat. “Do you think we might have ended up together?”

Rylie’s smile is so bright it makes my eyes water. Tears slip down my cheeks, and he lets out a soft chuckle as he brushes them away with his thumbs. “Kitten, I’d rather spend every day getting in a pointless argument with you for sport than be bored and complacent with anyone else.”

“Eva, I’m an idiot with an alarmingly extensive ironic crewneck collection and a denim comforter. There is literally nothing you could say that would drop you down to my league. I want you contrarian and difficult and keeping me on my toes. I want your sour moods just as much as I want your sunny ones. I’m not asking you to change. You can call me any name you want, as long as I can call you mine.”

I can’t stop noticing things about him, cataloging every minute detail—how the hair on his legs is a shade lighter than the chestnut waves on his head, the cluster of six freckles near the crook of his left elbow, the tiny white scar on his chin that disappears with the stretch of his dazzling grin. I feel like I could spend a lifetime looking at him and still not discover every wonderful facet.

I laugh, then release a weary sigh. “I suppose I can pencil it in.” I feel Rylie’s heart skip against my cheek, and he hugs me tightly. “I appreciate the sacrifice.” Anything for you, I whisper imperceptibly against his skin, not quite brave enough to let him know how deeply I mean it.

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