It’s never been important that someone liked me.
But it’s important, suddenly and shockingly, that Delia likes me.
That she approves of me. That she thinks I’m a good person. It’s important—maybe more important than anything has ever been—that she wants to be around me. To be my friend. To maybe even be more.
Claire, the girl who dumped me and spurred a week-long spending spree in Paris, is the closest I’ve ever come to having a girlfriend, and we sure as hell never put that label on it. We just met after classes for coffee, went to my room at the frat house for sex, maybe caught a movie or a party together on the weekends. It wasn’t…important. It didn’t mean anything to me and clearly meant even less to her—my being upset had more to do with the unexpected and unfamiliar shock of being the dumpee rather than the dumper than any real emotional pain.
This whole thing with Delia is on a whole other planet. Shit, another freaking universe.
Her opinion of me counts for…god, everything.
How it happened, when it happened, I can’t even pinpoint. Buying out Dell was impulsive. Maybe in the back of my subconscious itwasanother prank to play on her. Or maybe it was the opposite—maybe, in my subconscious, I’d known for years that I had to make things right with her. Maybe the guilt over my awful mistreatment of her had been niggling at me for years. Maybe buying out Dell and taking the position as co-owner of the company was my way of trying to make restitution, an in to start making things right.
It hadn’t been conscious, I know that much. Things had just developed. At first, I just wanted to prove to her that I wasn’t useless. Then, I wanted to change her opinion of me. Just a little. Get her from not actively hating me to where she could be in a room with me and not verbally eviscerate me.
And then, somewhere along the way, I realized I care about her, and I care deeply about her opinion of me—not only do I want her to see me as competent, not only do I want her to not hate me…
I want her to forgive me.
I want her tocare.
The lust—our physical chemistry? It’s gravy. The moment I laid eyes on her for the first time in ten years, it was obvious she’d blossomed into a truly breathtaking beauty.
I’m already sick of this phrase, but—for the first time, I care more about the personal, emotional, and psychological elements of our relationship than I do the physical. I know that stuff will happen, and from the two instances of intimacy we’ve shared, I also know that they will be earth-shaking and heart-stopping and be-all, end-all incredible. I’m eager and impatient and wild for her.
But…I can wait.
This note is bringing up inside me the stark, sharp reality that with Delia McKenna, I want the emotional foundation of a real relationship more—farmore—than I want sex.
I barely recognize myself.
But, to echo what she said to me in the note—Ilikethis Thai Bristow.
The arrogant, selfish prick is dead—
Long live the decent guy.
* * *
It’s a long,shitty, miserable weekend.
Delia is in meetings and lectures all day and having working lunches and dinners with other top executives in the construction and building industry. She texts me a handful of times, quick and clearly distracted. I don’t push it, and don’t worry about it.
I spend Friday at the new development site with our architects and planners and Cal, laying out how the subdivision will work best in conjunction with the landscape. Saturday I spend at the office, trying to get ahead on what I’d need to do Monday, in hopes I can convince Delia to take at least the morning off with me.
Sunday, I get a text from her while I’m out for a run—it’s an image, and I didn’t bring my phone on the run, just my cellular-connected watch. So the image has to wait till I get home.
When I arrive back at my condo, sweating like a pig and gasping for air, I beeline for my phone and bring up the thread with her.
It’s a selfie—she’s in a foyer outside a conference room, earbuds in, hair in a loose ponytail, minimal makeup; she’s snapped it from high up at a downward angle, so I can see her whole outfit. Long, loose, flowy white skirt with a sapphire blue sleeveless top, in a shade that almost exactly matches her eyes. She’s smiling as if at me, with affection.
That smile is for me? The squeeze on my heart is almost painful.
I take a selfie in return, me in my shorts, sweaty, earbuds still in, backward ball cap keeping my hair out of my face.
Me:Out for a run, so I can keep up with you.
Me:also, you are so F ing beautiful. I can’t even.
