All Yours: A Second Chance Romance

  ALL YOURS

  By Ellie Bradshaw

  This is a work of fiction. All characters and events reside solely in author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual people, alive or dead, is purely coincidental.

  © 2020, Ellie Bradshaw. No portion of this work may be reproduced in any way without prior written consent from the author with the exception for a fair use excerpt for review and editorial purposes.

  Table of Contents

  A Long, Cold Shower

  A Natural Biological Reaction

  Release This Restricting Notion

  There Were Several Buts

  That Kind Of Bar

  Too Pretty For This Kind Of Thing

  Laying It On A Little Thick

  You're Not Going To Like It

  A Maiden, Obviously Lost

  Everybody But You Two

  There's A Word For That

  Better Than They Know Themselves

  Machiavelli Couldn't Be Prouder

  My Plus Ones

  To Tell You So Many Things

  Practically Naked

  Say It Again

  Not Going Anywhere

  Checking In For An Update

  The Black Sheep

  Finding Their Naughty Words

  Love Is Just A Word

  Epilogue: That Roommate Situation

  Bonus Chapter

  Also by Ellie Bradshaw

  A Long, Cold Shower

  Aimee

  It’s raining. Of course it’s raining. Now. It wasn’t when I walked to class. Then, it was sunny, with just a hint of overcast on the horizon. The kind of clouds that don’t make me think of torrential downpour.

  This is what I get for busting the curve on the Principles of Finance test. Again.

  Part of me wants to smirk. But that part of me is warm and dry and still packing up her class things in an Adams Hall classroom. Not out here under the Niagara Falls of October rainstorms.

  In my mind’s ear I hear my father telling me that I should always check the weather forecast before stepping outside. Advice that goes along with “it’s more important to be happy than to be rich” and “smile as much as possible.” Dad was a good guy—a great guy—but also somewhat tedious.

  Maybe all dads are.

  I can’t really argue with his wisdom at this moment, though. My hair is plastered to the back of my neck and the sides of my face. My dress, which had seemed so perky and cute back when it was sunny, now looks as if an insane house painter sprayed it onto me in a hurry. It’s stuck equally to my breasts and belly and back and legs, and the short walk to my apartment now seems like twenty minutes of watery hell. At least I made a smart move last year and invested in a waterproof backpack. I think my laptop would enjoy this weather even less than my hair does.

  Oh well. At least I can look forward to work later. Nothing like an eight hour shift of serving watered-down beer to snotty frat boys and bikers with wandering hands to top off an amazing day. I’ll bet Dad wasn’t thinking about that when he voiced his dismissal of wealth.

  Sarcasm is the language of the uncreative mind, his voice says. Sometimes I wish my mind had a mute button.

  I don’t notice the car pulling up next to me at the curb until it honks at me. I turn slightly, continuing to walk because I don’t want to lose momentum. The rain is coming down hard enough that I’m not quite able to make out what kind of car it is, just that it’s long and black. The passenger window rolls down just enough for the driver’s voice to make it out, but not far enough down to flood the interior of the car.

  “Hey, you want a ride?” I recognize the voice, and with recognition comes a pang that I don’t want to deal with right now. Now I recognize the Mercedes idling next to me.

  I do want a ride. My hair wants a ride, my soaked underwear wants a ride. My calculus homework probably wants a ride, too, but it only speaks in code so I’m never sure exactly what it’s saying.

  But not in this car. More importantly, not with Cam Simons.

  I try not to, but I’m sure my lips twist in a scowl. So much for smiling. Sorry, Dad.

  “No thanks,” I say, turning my face back in the direction of my apartment and half a mile of rain and puddles.

  The car creeps forward with me. “Come on, Aimee,” he says, his voice smooth and deep and sexy like always, but carrying an undertone of hurt. It’s the kind of voice that sends funny tingly sensations down your arms and legs when he points it at you. Well, in my case, sent tingly sensations. “You’re soaking wet. I’ll let you get rainwater all over my seats. You can even smear some mud in here, too, if you want.”

  I try not to pay attention to him, but the dome light comes on inside the car and I turn to it like a dog who spies a squirrel. Not because I want to get in the car. Totally don’t want to get in the car. But I still turn toward the light and there he is, his head ducked down so he can see me out the window. His eyebrows are up expectantly, almost to his sandy hair. His perfect smile is somehow diffident. His hand is extended to pop the door open.

  It would get me out of the rain. Cut my walk to two minutes. I could sit and not talk to Cam for two minutes.

  It’s not like you have to sleep with him, a smooth, reasonable voice inside me says. It is, I notice, the same voice that tells me I have the willpower to only eat half the piece of cheesecake, to only watch one episode of the new season of my favorite Netflix show.

  Would that really be true, though? Could I accept the favor without inviting him up to my apartment?

  Of course, that smooth voice says. All that’s over, remember?

  I grimace and take a step toward the car.

  The latch clicks and the door opens an inch.

  “I won’t bite,” he says, and I see the glint of his insufferable, utterly self-confident grin. “Unless you want me to.”

  A shiver runs up my back that has absolutely nothing to do with the pouring rain, and I almost give in. Again.

  Goddamn it. Fucking Cam.

  I close my eyes, shake my head.

  “I’ll be fine,” I say, and turn away.

  It’s not that far, really. Just a short walk. And besides, I like the rain. It’s a good warm-up to a long, cold shower.

  Cam

  I know as soon as the words slip out of my mouth that I’ve fucked it up. Again. There’s a moment, a brief moment, when Aimee’s dark eyes crinkle with that hint of a smile that I’ve missed, and I’m certain she’ll let me give her a ride home.

  And that’s all I want to do. Just have that minute or two with her sitting beside me. I don’t even give a shit about her getting the seat wet. Just…just that little bit of time. I could pretend that things are the way they were when we were friends, before all that other stuff. She could just be my friend, Aimee Strauss, and I could be her insufferable buddy, Cam Simons. The Dynamic Duo, inseparable since second grade. We could pretend all that complicated stuff never came between us. I could flirt with her mercilessly because nothing could come of it, and she could give me that wry look that she always gave me and we could both start laughing.

  Except that’s the problem, isn’t it. The flirting was just fun and nothing could come of it…until something came of it. And, honestly, I don’t want to go back to being “just friends”.

  But I’m a total dipshit, and in my nervousness I fall back on old habits. “I won’t bite…unless you want me to.”

  Jesus.

  I watch her bite her lip and for just a second I almost think she’s still going to open the door. But then she shakes her head and I know I’m lost.

  It’s what I deserve. Probably.

  She walks
away, her blue dress coursing water and plastered to her. You’d think someone walking away in the rain would look forlorn, but not Aimee. She looks just as straight-backed and proud as she always has even with her sneakers full of water. My chest feels as if something deep and vital is being uprooted from me.

  I feel as if I have to say something, anything, as she walks away, so I open my mouth and blurt words. As usual—or at least as usual when it comes to Aimee Strauss—my words fall a long way short of that small target area that could be labeled, “The Right Words”.

  “To be continued, Aimee!”

  What the fuck. That sounds more like a stalker’s threat than something a friend would say.

  You should be over this, I tell myself. It’s been months.

  Seven months. Seven months, one week, three days.

  You’d think that would be enough time to allow the strange ache in my chest to subside to a feeling I could ignore. You’d think.

  On a good day I can close my eyes for almost five seconds without seeing her face.

  I sit at the curb a while longer, staring at indistinct images out my windshield.

  Seriously, what the fuck is wrong with you, man?

  Good question. I put the car in drive and make a U-turn in front of somebody in a lifted pickup. The pickup blares the horn. Fuck them.

  For a few minutes I drive somewhat aimlessly, clearing my mind. Emotional entanglements are not my thing. I don’t believe in them. Emotions with a girl get in the way of scoring with the next girl, and variety is the spice of life.

  No sense being rich if you can’t have variety.

  Of course, that’s the new problem to complicate my life, isn’t it?

  I make a right onto Ash Avenue, drumming my fingers on my steering wheel.

  Fucking Dad.

  Dad thinks that I’m a shiftless philanderer. Which might be true, but I am what he made me, or at least what he allowed me to be with twenty-plus years of absenteeism and board-meeting distance. He also thinks there is a strong possibility that, due to the “softening effects” of my life of privilege, I might never contribute meaningfully to the empire he’s built. Which might also be true.

  So he’s decided to make some changes.

  More to the point, he’s decided I have to make some changes. Or else. And of course those changes just take an already awkward and painful situation and make it oh-so-much worse.

  The rain on the roof of the car normally has a sedative effect on me. I’m a naturally kinetic person, I feel better when I’m moving, but the soft drumming typically calms me. But as I make a left into a parking lot, I’m anything but calm. My nerves are jangling and I want to punch something.

  I didn’t see Aimee on the street by accident. I sought her out.

  Because I have a mission. A task that has been set before me. I hate it, and I hate the implications it has on my life. And I can think of no one other than Aimee Strauss who can help me with it.

  So here I am, sitting in the parking lot of her apartment complex, feeling like a stalker. I shouldn’t feel this way. I’ve been here a hundred times to pick Aimee up, to drop her off, to hang out. But now the feeling of unwelcome is almost palpable and rather than being a guest I am an interloper.

  I turn the review so I can look myself in the eye. “Stop being a bitch,” I say aloud. The voice inside says, What’s the use of being an entitled rich prick if you can’t act entitled?

  I nod at the wisdom of my interior monologue and open the door. Rain immediately slants in and drenches my left leg. Nothing to do now but to do it. I step out and a puddle swallows my Portuguese loafers. Even though I had committed to the idea of getting wet and miserable, I still say, “Fuck.”

  But maybe if I look enough like a drowned puppy Aimee will take mercy on me and let me in.

  She lives on the third floor, like an uncivilized beast. When she showed me the place three years ago I said, “You know you’re on your own getting all your shit in here, right?”

  Aimee slapped me on the arm. “And what is the use of having a guy best friend—” and she squeezed my arm appreciatively, “who works out if he can’t help you move into a third floor apartment?”

  I eyed the stairs. “I’ll hire movers to do it. Like any good best friend would do.”

  But she shook her head. “It will be fun,” she insisted.

  It wasn’t. It was moving furniture, which is a pretty damn long way from being fun. But I was doing it with Aimee, so it was okay. And Eric, third man in our triumvirate of lifelong friendship, came over to help with the heavy stuff, so the move didn’t entirely fall to my magnificent physique. Still, after it was all over I said, “I hope you never plan on moving from here, because I will not be available to help you get all that stuff down again.”

  The stairs to her apartment are uncovered, so my long, slow walk to her door is entirely exposed. By the time I get to her door my gray wool pants are black and my silk shirt is a second skin. I almost want to check myself out in one of the windows as I pass, see if I look just-washed-up-on-shore enough, but I refrain.

  Her door still has the plaque her dad gave her when she moved out here. At the top it shows a couple of homey drawings: a cherry pie, a cup of coffee. At the bottom, a revolver with smoke curling from the muzzle. It reads, “Friends always welcome. All others, not so much.”

  I’ve always known which I was when I knocked on this door, but now…well…not so much.

  I knock. My knuckles feel fragile against the heavy wood door, and the sound seems insubstantial. Thunder peals across the sky. Rain continues to abuse me. The door does not open. I wait a few seconds, then knock again. She has to be here. I can’t think of anywhere else she might have been going.

  Unless she has a study group. But no. She wouldn’t go to a study group soaked to the bone.

  Or maybe, that sly voice in my head says, she’s seeing someone. Someone nearby. I’ll bet a new boyfriend wouldn’t mind helping her out of her wet clothes at all.

  I feel as if I’ve just been punched in the gut. Then I shake my head. No. I’d know if she was seeing someone.

  Would you?

  Of course. I’m her best—

  You were.

  I raise my fist again to knock one last time. But fuck it. She’s not coming to the door. I almost give up, walk back to my car. But then my father’s voice replaces the one in my head.

  “…cutting you out…”

  I pull my waterproof notebook from my breast pocket and pull the little pen from the leather loop. The notebook has page after page of phone numbers and names written in loops and drunken swirls, an archive of women I met in bars and parties after Aimee broke up with me. Women I was never able to bring myself to go home with, or even call later for a hook-up. The pages are a reminder that I have been totally unlike myself these past months. That the brief time I was with Aimee as “more than friends” has somehow robbed me of my mojo. But that’s not right. I just no longer feel like using my mojo.

  I still have my mojo, goddamn it. It’s important to keep yourself grounded.

  I flip pages until I find an empty sheet. Drops start to soak into the page and I scrawl my message as quick as I can, rip the sheet from the book, and slide it under the door.

  It’ll have to do.

  A Natural Biological Reaction

  Sixteen Months Earlier

  Aimee

  Blame it on being tired. Exhausted, really. It was Thursday, and I had come, almost, to the end of the most grueling finals weeks of my college career. All that was left was the exam for intermediate statistics the next day, and before that I needed—had to have—a good night’s sleep.

  As if.

  As I packed my book and notes into my backpack, I realized the library was almost entirely deserted. In the gigantic reading room, there was only me and the librarian assistant at his desk, and he was looking pretty pointedly at me, and then at the giant clock on the wall.

  The library was about to close, and here
I was being one of the last people to drag out of here. Again. Which meant I’d lost track of time—again—and it was nearly midnight.

  I wandered out of the reading room, the giant wooden door swinging silently shut behind me. I was uneasy at the thought of walking home alone, and considered calling Cam for a ride. He wouldn’t be doing anything right now. Definitely not studying. Of course, he might be out drinking. Or with his girlfriend (what was this one’s name, again?). I felt a pang of irritation at that, and told myself it was because I felt a least a little resentful that I worked so hard and Cam never bothered. Definitely not because Cam might be with a woman at the moment.

  I shook my head, half-smiling to myself as I walked through the library. No, not irritated at all, really. Just bewildered that some people seemed to have it so easy, while the rest of us had to work so hard to move ahead in life. Make so many sacrifices.

  The breakup with Jacob still burned. It shouldn’t have. It’s not like I’d been in love or anything. We’d only dated for six months and that is definitely not enough time to fall in love.

  Jacob, apparently, hadn’t felt that way. In the middle of the semester he had proposed that we “take things to the next level,” which to him meant that I should move into his apartment and we should decide on one matching set of dishes.

  There were a lot of reasons I said no. For one, while I could date a man who had an Aerosmith poster hanging on the wall in his bedroom—unframed—I couldn’t bring myself to sleep under that poster every night. Plus, while it was a nice distraction to have someone to spend time with (keep it honest, Aimee…it was nice to have someone to have sex with), Jacob needed far too much attention, and I couldn’t afford the time to live with someone who thought they should be the center of my world right now. My priorities were elsewhere.

  And I just wasn’t feeling it, honestly. Jacob was handsome, and as a pre-med student he definitely had a future. He was decent enough in bed. But he didn’t make me laugh. Like me, he was serious most of the time and face it, one of me was enough.

  So I told him I wouldn’t move in with him and he broke up with me. Fair enough. We weren’t going in the same direct anyway. It was fine.