Maybe he will never want me in return. Maybe I’m a fool. But I also know that somehow, I’ve also been in a crystal box of my own creation for a while. And nothing has ever lured me out of my box but HIM.

I’m in love with Tahoe, and Trent will never be him.

I get to my feet and go text Trent, pushing up our meeting and asking him to come over to my place tonight.

“I have to get home,” I tell Rachel.

I kiss her on the cheek, tell her to kiss the baby for me when they bring him back from the nursery, then I say goodbye to Saint, Emmett, Wynn, Rachel’s mom, and Tahoe.

I say, softly so that only he hears, “I have to go, thank you for Texas.” And when he smiles, I kiss his dimple and leave.

WHEN GOOD IS NOT ENOUGH

Back in my apartment, I fall into my couch and lay my head on the back as I wait for Trent to arrive. I’m nervous, both excited about my realization and pained about it too.

He arrives with a hopeful look on his face.

“Hey,” he says.

“Hey.”

I lead him into my living room.

“So,” he says, clasping his hands together and raising his brows as he takes the couch opposite mine.

I bite my lips for a moment, dreading what I have to say. In all of my life, I’ve never been the one to leave someone. I may be snarky or bitchy or grumpy or a thousand things, but I’ve never been the one to say I’m moving on. After being hurt so badly myself, it gives me no pleasure to hurt anyone else. But this includes myself too.

I don’t know what’s happening with Tahoe. Actually nothing is happening with Tahoe, but I have feelings for him that I can no longer deny.

I have been trying to find pieces in Trent to love. And there are so many sweet things about him. But what I deeply fear is that I’m not just looking for pieces of him to like. I’m looking for Tahoe in him.

I search for the words, finding it harder than I thought. I want to tell him that Tahoe likes me with or without makeup. That he nudges me back when I nudge him. In fact, he nudges me first. I want to tell him that I always dream that I’m sleeping naked, facedown, and there’s a man above me, and he’s licking my spine. That I wake up with a start and when I turn around, blue eyes are staring back at me.

None of these things will matter to Trent.

I hug my knees to my chest and smile sadly at him. “I wanted to change me by giving myself a chance with you. But that wasn’t the recipe. I should have focused on accepting me. I don’t need to change who I am for you to love me. I shouldn’t,” I say.

“Not everything, Gina, but making an effort for your partner—”

“I’ve fallen in love with someone,” I interrupt. “It’s hopeless and I don’t think he’ll ever be able to respond, but I can’t keep on lying to myself about it, and you don’t deserve me lying to you.”

“Who is he?” he asks, leaning back. He almost looks calm about it, disbelieving, as if I couldn’t possibly have found someone better than him.

I smile. “Someone who likes my ponytail.”

There’s not much more to say, I guess. In the end, he hugs me and kisses my cheek, and I do the same, and at least our smiles feel genuine when we say goodbye.

HALLOWEEN

I’m not ready to tell my friends that I broke up with Trent.

Rachel is so busy with Kyle. Wynn may start pressuring me to go after Tahoe. I know her. She always believes that there’s hope in everything. But I just don’t know that there is. One kiss doesn’t change anything. Tahoe kissed me and it was epic and red-hot sparks fired up as if everything inside me went haywire. That doesn’t mean he wants more—that doesn’t mean he can give me more. I now know why he’s not interested in that sort of commitment, but that also doesn’t change the fact that every time I look at him I think, you are so loved by me, you lovely, wounded beast.

He’s been calling these past weeks since Trent and I broke up. It’s almost as if he can sense I’m available. He can’t stay away—neither can I. We talk constantly, he takes me out for coffee, or I stop by his office, and on many of those occasions, he looks at me with his blue eyes that pierce the space between us and say both a thousand things and nothing at all.

I don’t know what’s going on, but I don’t want to push for more too aggressively. I sense he needs time to adjust to whatever ways our relationship is changing, and if that’s what he needs, I am willing to wait it out.

On his birthday, I really wanted to knock on his door with nothing on beneath my trench coat, and just stand there, and let him see me, let him want to take me.

Instead, I hear he spends it out of town. No partying for Tahoe Roth this year. Which his social media seems to find odd.

No bash this year @Tahoe Roth? People keep tweeting.

I tweet him: Happy Birthday @tahoeroth

He tweets back: Won’t sleep until I figure out what you got me this year ;)

I reread the tweet a thousand times, feeling different things each time. Amusement, excitement, outrage, arousal. I threw myself at him last year and what…he expects me to do that again this year?

Does he want me to do it again this year?

I decide he’s just teasing me—as usual—and try to calm down my hormones.

To stay busy and keep saving up for my future apartment, I send a mass email to my friends the following week, telling them I’m free for any work they may have, including odd jobs.

My phone rings almost instantly.

Tahoe Roth.

Quelling the kick I get in my heart, I answer.

“Don’t do that, Regina,” he chides. “Odd jobs. Do you know how many things popped into my mind to ask you for?”