Page 58 of What We Brave
The waitress arrives with Jamila's pancakes. The interruption gives me a moment to gather myself.
"Okay," Jamila says, cutting into her stack. "So teach me. What actually happened with Reid? And why are you shaking during tree pose like you've seen a ghost?"
I laugh, but it comes out strangled. "Because I kissed Blake last night."
Her fork freezes halfway to her mouth. "Blake. Reid's roommate Blake?"
"That's the one."
"Holy shit, Laine."
"Exactly."
"Start from the beginning. The real beginning."
So I do.
"That asshole!"
Turns out, friends have opinions. Strong ones.
"Yeah, it wasn't the nicest thing he could have done."
Jamila's eyes widen. "Not the nicest th— Laine! He was trying to destroy you. Call it what it is lady!"
"He did," I admit. The words feel heavy leaving my mouth. "Do some damage, I mean. I started second-guessing everything. Monitoring myself constantly—what I said, how I moved, whether I was being 'too much' in Reid's space. I stopped feeling like myself."
"And then you kissed him." Jamila's voice is carefully neutral. "The guy who made you feel worthless for months."
"When you say it like that, it sounds insane."
"Because itisinsane, Laine." She sets down her fork. "Help me understand. Because right now I'm looking at my friend who just told me a man systematically tried to destroy her relationship and her sense of self, and that same friend kissed him last night. The math is not mathing."
I wrap my hands tighter around my coffee mug. The ceramic is barely warm now.
"There was something there. At the beginning." The confession feels like pulling splinters from under my skin. "Before he turned cruel. This... spark. Chemistry. Whatever you want to call it."
"With Blake."
"With Blake." I close my eyes. "The first time we met, he was covered in sawdust and barely said two words to me. But when he looked at me—" I shake my head. "I told myself I was imagining it. Reid was right there, and I was falling for Reid, and Blake was his best friend. Hisbrother. So I ignored it. But there were other moments when I saw it too. I felt it."
"And then he started being awful."
"And then he started being awful," I agree. "Which made it easy to forget that spark ever existed. It's hard to feel attracted to someone who's actively trying to make you feel like garbage."
Jamila nods slowly. "So what changed?"
"He confessed. The night before he left for Afghanistan." I stare at the scratched tabletop, tracing a groove with my fingernail. "Showed up at my apartment with a bloody face—Reid had beaten the heck out of him—and told me he'd been in love with me since the beginning. That all the cruelty was him trying to make us both hate him so he could leave."
Her mouth drops open. "That's... fucked up. And kind of stupid. Men are so dumb. Thank god I'm into women."
"It is f-fucked up." I finally look up at her. "And I didn't know what to do with it. I was so angry. Still am, honestly. But also—" I struggle to find the words. "He was gone for three months. In a war zone. And I couldn't stop thinking about what he said."
"So last night...?"
"Last night we were at the homeless camp. Both volunteering. And he was different. Open. Real." I still remember the feel of him, how solid he was under my weight as we sat by the heat lamp. "He told me things. About his service, about a soldier who died in his arms. Personal things. And I just?—"
One eyebrow wings up. "Lost your mind?"
