“No. They’re moving it up, not back.”
I frown, sliding a receipt between the pages. His eyes follow my hand movements as I say, “Why? I don’t understand why it keeps changing. It’s giving me whiplash.”
“It’s definitely annoying, but I hear that’s Lisa in a nutshell,” he says in response, still looking at my hand, and he tugs on the receipt sticking out.
“I have tons of bookmarks if you need one.”
I laugh, realizing it wasn’t my hand he was looking at. It explains the looks of distaste. “That’s not necessary.” I snap my wrist back and forth. “Not when receipts are free and already either come in the book or are in my back pocket.”
His body shakes with laughter. “They aren’t as nice looking as bookmarks. It literally looks like you’re carrying around trash.”
I roll my eyes, tapping my book with my hand. “One man’s trash is another’s treasure.”
He chuckles, cupping the back of my head to pull me in for a quick kiss. “Is that what you’ll say when people ask why you’re with me?” He waggles his brows and my tongue goes dry.
“We aren’t together . . . are we?”
His brows press down. “We’ve spent the past week together. You’ve walked around my house naked with my cum dripping out of you every night since arriving here. I’d say that’s definitely surpassed a fling or hookup.”
An uncomfortable tightness tugs at my throat. “I’m sorry I . . . you’re right about it not feeling like a fling or a hookup, but I was thinking we were more of a temporary arrangement.”
Anger flashes in his eyes and he balls a fist against his leg, looking away from me. “I should probably take you back to your apartment tonight, then. That way I don’t keep getting it into my head that it’s more than it feels like it is.”
“Hayden.” My stomach shifts and I reach for him as he jumps from the couch.
“I’ll go get dressed. You should do the same. I’d rather not be driving back too late.”
“Wait,” I call out as he’s already halfway up the stairs. “Can we talk about this some more first?”
“I think we both already said what needed to be said.”
“You don’t know that,” I exclaim.
“Are you saying you could change your mind within the next ten minutes?” he asks as he remains looking ahead.
“No,” I say regretfully, but the word feels wrong. All of this feels so fucking wrong. I don’t want to leave yet. If I had a choice, I’d never leave. This has started to feel too much like home for me. I’m more comfortable and more myself here than in my own apartment. And if we end, so do our movies. I’ve grown accustomed to those too.
“Yeah, I figured as much. Be ready to go in fifteen,” he says sharply, his steps picking back up as he heads to his room.
My stomach twists. I need to stop this, to tell him I’ve changed my mind, but I’m unable to find my voice again. There’ve been so many chances, someone could have seen us, and if we keep whatever this is going much longer, the challenge will only increase. I’ve gone back and forth thinking we could do it if he wanted to continue seeing me, but then he mentioned others knowing about us. Knowing we’re together.
I don’t know if I’m ready for us, but I know I’m not ready for that. I look back, unable to move a muscle. But I want him. I’ve never wanted something so damn much in my life, and even with him in the same room it doesn’t feel like enough. Soon I’ll be in a whole different place, an hour away. My skin tightens around me the more unsettled I grow.
I’ll get past it. I’ve gotten past harder things, haven’t I? He’s just some guy I work with, isn’t he? But haven’t I made him promise never to go anywhere? That’s while we were fucking, though. People don’t always mean everything they say during sex.
I never did before, and I’d get wrapped up in the moment, saying whatever I thought the other person wanted to hear, but I’m not so sure that’s the case with him.
I look back again and push my book off my lap, the ground shaking beneath my feet as I step on it. I slowly grab my bag from the entryway closet and collect all my things, feeling numb when I shove the last item, my book, in the bag. It looked better where it was before, my stuff on his. Once I walk out that door, all of me will disappear from here.
Everything but our movies. He said no one else would ever see them but us. Has he changed his mind now? It was only supposed to be one, and now we’re six deep in, each one more eye opening than the last.
I liked making him bleed, and he was okay with it, handing me sharp objects for me to do it more. This part of me I’ve been trying to fight against ever since my first horror film won’t be as easy to win against now. Not after getting to come out and play on several occasions. He kept saying the character liked Kathy bleeding, but it’s the way the words came out. He couldn’t really know, but I wanted him to. I was okay with the idea, wanting to hold onto it.
Maybe it’s good that I’m leaving. I can’t have him, and I can’t have those things he allows me to do in the movies we make together either. It doesn’t matter how much I want both. One is dangerous, releasing a darkness in me I didn’t think could grow as much as it has. What if it gets out of control? Then he’d be the one to leave me anyway.
What I want to hear and what he actually says are two different things. His footsteps echo around the room, and he has a black hat on, forming the bill while barely able to make eye contact with me.
“Ready?”