Page 118 of Run
I shake my head to clear it. “Wait, hold up. Why is this a disaster? It sounds like Gino is—”
“Fucking perfect? Prince freaking charming? The Eric to your Ariel? Yeah, exactly.”
I open my mouth, but no words come out.
“What is wrong with me? I don’t do that. I don’t have sex on a first date. And it wasn’t even a date! I was all hot and bothered because he beat the tar out of that guy, and it was sexy as hell and then he had this whole alpha thing going on—”
“Oh, yeah, the alpha thing gets me every time. Ethan has that.”
“Exactly!” Sophie points at me. “Hey, you guys got it on pretty quick, right? How long did you make Ethan wait?”
I blow a breath out through puffed cheeks as I tilt my head this way and that. “Oh, maybe, like twelve years.”
“Oh, sweet Jesus.” Sophie grabs another decorative pillow, but this time hides her face in it.
“I mean, that’s if you’re counting from when we first met. If you count from the first kiss, it’s more like seven-ish years. But then if you count from when we reconnected, it was a few weeks. Although, it would have been sooner if Lars hadn’t walked in on us that one night.”
A moment of silence passes, and I turn to fully face Sophie. “OK, so … What’s the problem? Gino is still texting you? Text him back!”
Sophie pushes her fingers into her closed eyes behind her glasses. “God, Ari, I’m just such shit at this. Am I supposed to appear aloof? Play hard to get? Be putty in his hands? I really like him, and I don’t want to screw it up.”
“Soph, he clearly likes you for you. Just do what you feel is right.”
“Are you sure?”
“Nope.” I grimace. “I am no expert at this.”
“Oh, forget you,” Sophie mumbles, leaning this way and that as she scoots herself to the edge of the couch, pushing off into a standing position. “I’m going to talk to Meg. I bet she’s got tons of advice.”
“Love you!”
“Love you!” I hear before the door to the stairwell slams.
A short while later, the guys laughing outside near the window gets my attention, and I look out to see them chitchatting. Larry’s hands are waving around animatedly as he says something that has Ethan in stitches. I can see their breath in the air, and I decide to grab an extra sweater or two to keep at Ethan’s. I catch their eyes and hold up two fingers, signaling that I’ll be ready to go in two minutes.
Not long after, the door to the apartment opens and Ethan comes walking in. “Holy shit, it’s getting cold out there. Come warm me up, woman.” He grabs me and buries his red and chilly face in my neck.
“Sonofabitch!” I shriek, and he releases me, laughing.
“I just gotta piss, then are you ready to go?” He heads into the tiny bathroom and I hear him peeing with the door open.
“Yep.” I shove my things into a bag to bring to Ethan’s as I hear the toilet flush and the faucet turn on and off.
“Hey, what’s that?” Ethan looks at the open shoebox on my dresser as he dries his hands on his pants.
“Oh. I just came across those in my closet.”
He crosses over and runs his fingers along the envelopes that are tightly wedged inside. “Are these …” he looks over at me with an eyebrow raised.
“Yes. Those are all the letters I’ve written to my mom all these years. Silly, I know. I should just toss them. But they’re almost like a diary. I can’t seem to get myself to throw them out.”
“You shouldn’t.” A sad look settles on Ethan’s face. “I feel bad we never found her.”
“It wasn’t meant to be, I guess.” I turn to put a few more things in my bag as I hear Ethan say my name, sadly. “Red.”
“Really, it’s fine. Anyway, I’m ready to go.”
“Ari?” This time my name is a question.
