Page 71 of The Friend Zone

I sat on the floor sorting my shipment of new plaid dog harnesses. The sizing seemed off. The extra smalls looked like smalls, and the smalls looked like mediums. I was pondering this as I looked up just as Josh walked in with Tyler directly behind him.

My breathing stopped.

Stuntman lost his ever-loving shit. He dove off the sofa and went right for Tyler’s ankles. In one fluid movement, Josh scooped him up before he attacked.

My dog yapped and snarled, and Josh stood there for a moment before he finished depositing Tyler the way he dropped off a box when I was on the phone: He made eye contact with me, set him by the door, and left.

“What are you doing here?” I breathed.

Goddamn. He looked good.

I mean, he usually looked good. But that thing that always happened when he’d come back from leave, that moment of instant, primal attraction that smacked me in the face and reminded me what had drawn me to him in the first place—that thing happened.

He wore a long-sleeve striped button-down shirt rolled up at the elbows, with pressed black pants and a tan belt and shoes. His brown hair was thick and combed, and he had a five-o’clock shadow. He wore the silver watch I got him last Christmas.

“You won’t answer my calls,” he said, slipping his hands into his pockets.

He looked wounded. Slightly slumped. I’d never seen him anything but confident and smiling.

“Why would I?” I got up and crossed my arms. “We’re over, so…”

Sadness flickered across his face.

For the first time since we’d broken up, it occurred to me that this had been hard on him.

I just thought his career was more important, and he was relieved he wasn’t going back to civilian life. From his apologetic “I reenlisted without talking to you” message, I got the impression that while the breakup was an unfortunate by-product of his decision, he understood it was the choice he’d made and was at peace with it.

He took a step toward me. “Kris, can we talk?”

“Talk. Go for it,” I said defensively. “But do it from there.”

He glanced back toward the garage. “Let me take you somewhere. A nice restaurant. Where we can sit down and discuss things.”

I scoffed. “I’m not going anywhere with you. You have two minutes. Say what you came to say and get out.”

His jaw flexed. “Kris, I’m not leaving until we talk, and it’s going to take a lot longer than two minutes for me to say what I came to say. So unless you plan on having him throw me out”—he nodded to the garage—“then let’s go somewhere private.”

The set of his mouth told me he meant it. He wasn’t leaving until I let him talk. I thought of Josh, of him walking in and out of the house while Tyler and I had what was probably going to be a really shitty conversation.

I rolled my eyes. “Fine.” I grabbed my purse off the coffee table. “Let’s go.”

He looked over my outfit. I was in shorts, flip-flops, I had a sweater tied around my waist, and I wore a T-shirt that read THE MORE I MEET PEOPLE, THE MORE I LIKE MY DOG.

Tyler liked expensive restaurants. The food on deployment was terrible, so when he came home, he wanted to treat himself. We’d probably end up at some fancy fusion place or something. I’d be epically underdressed, and I didn’t give a shit.

“You’re not going to get changed?” he asked.

“Nope.” I marched past him to the front door. “You’ll just have to make my excuses to the maître d’.” I stomped outside.

He ran around me to the passenger side of his SUV and held my door open. I got in grouchily and stared into the garage as Tyler slipped into the driver’s seat.

Josh stood over a staircase holding a nail gun with Stuntman leashed by his feet. Josh looked at me for a flicker of a second before he turned back to his project, his jaw tight. I wondered what he thought of all this.

Stuntman barked and strained against his leash as we pulled out of the driveway, and I couldn’t shake the super weird feeling I was leaving my family behind.

Tyler’s sandalwood cologne was more concentrated in the closed SUV. It blasted my face through the AC, familiar and new at the same time, stirring feelings of nostalgia in my heart.

“I missed you,” he said. He reached for my hand, but I yanked it away.