Total pages in book: 116
Estimated words: 110624 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 553(@200wpm)___ 442(@250wpm)___ 369(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 110624 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 553(@200wpm)___ 442(@250wpm)___ 369(@300wpm)
What a mind fuck.
Any sane man in my situation would have just gotten the hell out of there that first day, taken a long walk and sorted out my head…maybe moved out of the apartment even.
Instead, you know how I handled it? I went straight to my room and made her a fucking paper bird. Because, after meeting her, the only thing I could think about was that I just wanted to make her smile, take some of the darkness out of those beautiful blue eyes.
What a pansy.
It only got worse from there. I’d keep looking for excuses to be around her. I knew she had these fears, and I really did want to help her through them. But I also really wanted to get my fix, be near her, smell her vanilla scent and touch her in subtle ways every chance I got, even if it was just her hand or her back.
She made me feel alive after years of being emotionally dead. I lived for every moment spent with her and dreaded the weekends when I had to leave. I thought I could handle being close friends with her, as long as I paced myself without letting it go too far.
Which is why I came up with the brilliant idea of tutoring her and of course, our bet. Everybody won. She’d get good grades, overcome her fears, and I got my angel fix. She got what she needed, and I needed…her.
Things started to get complicated because each day I fell harder, and I craved more. The fact that I sensed that she was attracted to me too didn’t help; it only turned me on, and there was no goddamn shut off switch. I tried my best to curtail the physical need. I really did. Let’s just say, I jerked off so much that I was able to prove once and for all that the myth my grandmother told me about was false, because I never did go blind.
Aside from wanting her physically, there was this constant need to make her happy. I got off on it. I noticed Nina changing the more time we spent together. Her eyes started to transform. Light replaced the darkness, and I wondered if I had put it there. She always looked at me like no one ever had and was so attentive; she ate up every word I said. I made her laugh, and she comforted me. I wanted to be around her all of the time like a fucking bee on honey.
The way I saw it, we were two fractured souls that fit together like the last two missing pieces in a “fucked up life” puzzle. When we were together, life finally made sense; it wasn’t all work, obligation, guilt and fear. It was just amazing to be alive. She needed me to help her, but she didn’t realize I needed her so much more.
The first time I knew I was really in trouble was when she cut her finger that night trying to make me dessert. I physically felt the pain—a shooting pain—when I saw her blood. I had never experienced anyone else’s pain before. It felt like she was an extension of me. That was when I began to suspect that I might have been falling in love with her.
The moment I absolutely knew I loved her, though, was in Chicago. I was telling her things I hadn’t ever told anyone, like the story about my father and the moon. On the plane ride home, when we were holding hands and I watched her with her eyes closed, I had wished that the plane were taking us somewhere far away, where I could spend the rest of my life just being with her, making love to her and not worrying about anything else. I knew it was selfish, but I would have given anything for that.
I hadn’t even planned to take her to Chicago initially. My original idea had been a helicopter ride over Manhattan, but she kept getting A’s and putting it off. During that time, we became closer, and I wanted to share more of myself with her. Maybe it was to make up for not letting her in on the most important piece of information. Something she had every right to know, even as my friend.
Over Christmas, I had missed her so much that it was like going through withdrawal. I realized that staying in the friend zone just wasn’t working for me. I needed her. The only way I could be with her was to tell her the truth and hope that she would understand. She promised that nothing could make her leave me, but would that really still be the case once she found out about Ivy? Maybe I was kidding myself.
If she didn’t want to be with me after I told her the truth, I’d move out and walk away, because living under the same roof with her would be like strapping a bottle of vodka to an alcoholic.