“You think we should get back together.”
The statement hung a bit while Evander tried to gather himself up enough to respond. “We could try.” Ev ran his fingers back through his hair, then took a swig of the nasty, bitter beer. The kind of shit they had at high school parties because no one had any taste or culture to speak of. “I think we were good together, when we were good.”
“Which wasn’t often enough, was it?”
Ev shrugged, trying not to take that as an outright rejection. “More than we were bad together, right?”
After a moment, Ozzy nodded. “Yeah.” He closed his eyes and massaged his nose. Then, he suddenly slapped his hand down on the table, rattling the cups and silverware. Before Evander could say anything, he raised his hands up. “I’m sorry. This just isn’t as easy as I was expecting, I guess.”
Before Ev could reassure him—it was an honest emotion, he wouldn’t get pissed about that—the waiter walked up, staring not at Ozzy, but at Evander. “Everything good here?”
Ev nodded. “Everything’s fine.” He didn’t want anyone getting the wrong impression. “Honestly. But could we get another menu?”
“Please.” Ozzy sighed and looked up at the waiter. “And some coffee. Decaf, obviously.”
A moment of hesitation, then the waiter walked off.
Ozzy stared up at the ceiling. “Fuck me, this isn’t how I was planning for this to go.”
Evander forced another breath, then another, another. “Well, you can say whatever you need to say.”
“I understand that. Theoretically. It’s not coming out.” He chewed on his thumbnail, staring at something behind Ev. Or, more likely, just trying not to make eye contact for a bit.
Finally, there was no more reasoning through it. Evander could see what the answer was, and he wasn’t going to sit there and hold onto hope, lying to himself. Sohebroke the news for the both of them. “You don’t want anything to do with me.”
Ozzy’s gaze refocused straight on Evander. “That’s not it at all. I just…friends.” Ozzy nodded swiftly. “I think we should be friends…and sometimes friends get to be more than that eventually.”
“Friends.” As Evander said it, the talons gripping his midsection uncurled, letting him take what felt like the first full breath in hours. “That’s a lot better than I was expecting.”
Ozzy smiled again. Softly, of course, but it still wasn’t that fake one from earlier. “What were you expecting?”
The waiter came back with a single sheet menu and a white, ceramic cup of coffee, then left without another word.
Ev shrugged. “I mean, you would be fully within your rights to dress me down and toss me aside for suggesting something so stupid.”
“It’s not stupid.” Ozzy looked at the little basket in the middle of the table, then grabbed a sugar packet and dumped it into his coffee. “We have history. Like you said, a lot of it was good. But it’s the whole definition of insanity thing. If we just come off a break and jump back into dating again, why would we expect that to turn out any different?”
For a million reasons. I realized I was wrong. We’re older. We’re on TV. We’ve had a really long break. Because I hope so. Because I’ve never found anyone like you. Because I had the exact same thought about insanity not too long ago. Because Bunny was super clear that she thinks we’re better together than apart. Because I agree.
Evander nodded. “That makes sense.” Friendswasa damn sight better than it could have been. Now it was on Ev to put his effort into being a good friend and make that work. He picked up his spoon and tapped it against the edge of Ozzy’s cup. “I thought you didn’t do processed sugars anymore?”
“And I’ve beensohappy and pleasant ever since I went off sugar.”
“Oh, so we’re pretending you were happy-go-lucky before?”
Ozzy flipped him off, and the world seemed to settle into something that felt…not quite right, but a little more normal. A little closer to what Evander hoped.
Sometimes friends get to be more than that. They both knew “more than that” was what Evander wanted. If being friends was the step up to that, he would do his damnedest, and no one could say shit about it to him.
He raised his beer up. “To friends.”
Ozzy acquiesced with a tiny clink. “To friends.”
Chapter thirty
Ozzy
It had been ahandful of days since they’d had their big sit down, and ever since…well, things hadn’t been perfect between Evander and Ozzy, but there was a lot less hanging animosity between the two of them. Evander seemed to constantly be testing the bounds of what was friendly versus flirtatious, which made their interactions always a little awkward, like he was nervous to step a toe over that line.
