Matthew never changed her mind either. Not really.
One time when Matt was in Mount Pleasant for work, after his show he’d driven down and brought Thai takeout to Molly’s. The booking manager at the job had given him a few hundred dollars in casino chips as a perk, probably thinking the guests would like it if a semi-celebrity showed up and played with them. Matt wasn’t in to gambling, though, so he saved them for Molly and told her he’d forgotten to cash them in before he left.
She tensed up the instant she saw them. “I can’t take these.”
He frowned. “What? Why?”
“You don’t just hand a friend hundreds of dollars. It’s not appropriate.”
Not appropriate. They’d had this convo enough times already that the sound of the phrase made his jaw lock. Matt wasn’t taking no for an answer, though.
“Please, Molly.” He tried to fold them up inside her fingers. “I’d have to drive back over an hour to cash them in. It’s not worth it.”
She pulled her hand away. “If it’s not worth it for you, why is it for me?”
Um…cause you’re poor? Matt’d never say that. Not out loud. “Mate, I have to get on a plane in the morning. Wouldn’t you drive a less than three-hour round trip to earn four hundred dollars? Your freelancing doesn’t pay over a hundred an hour. Anyway, I thought you didn’t have any jobs the rest of the week.”
Molly shrugged. “I’ll go cash them in, then, and I’ll send you the money.”
“No. Why would I take the money? You’re the one doing the work.”
“So you’re giving me a job?” She shook her head and crossed her arms over her lovely chest. “Matt, no. This doesn’t feel right. I mean, what are you paying me for?”
Like he wanted to make a prostitute of her or something. It wasn’t that way. He only wanted Molly to know there could be perks to being with him. He would never use her or force her, and she knew it.
Matt slapped the chips down smack! onto her coffee table and swore. “You try to do something nice for a friend, and they’re always looking for strings attached. Whatever. I’m leaving them there. Throw them away if you don’t want them.”
“But, Matt—”
“Why do you make being nice to you so hard?” He swore again.
Molly went all contrite in a snap, like Matt knew she would. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to accuse you of anything. You’ve been a great friend. I’m not ungrateful.”
He scoffed.
“I love you, Matt. You’re the dearest friend I ever had, but I get confused sometimes.”
“How could you possibly be confused here?” Matt threw up his hands. “Our friendship is the only thing in my life that makes sense to me.” That much was true.
“But you know, right? It’s just a friendship. With no benefits. No partnership perks.”
Matt gave Molly his wide-eyed innocent look. “Of course,” he lied.
That same conversation had played out a dozen different ways over the years. Hundreds of times, really.
So. Many. Lies.
She had to understand, though. Matt only wanted to make love with Molly, because he loved her. Only now the same love made him wish—to a degree somewhere between halfway and infinite powers multiplied—that he could undo it. Because whatever they had between them all these years, Matthew’d mucked it up last night.
The fridge door stood open. Propped by Molly’s hip, it pumped the cool air into the kitchen while the old compressor chugged like a tired freight train.
Molly was green. What is she doing?
With head bent and a frown on her lovely face, Molly stared at the rumpled rag rug on the floor in front of the fridge. Started to squat down. Winced, straightened.
Matt’s stomach turned inside out.
Molly lowered herself to kneeling and straightened the cursed homemade floor-covering.
She looked so small.
Not like last night. Matt didn’t do one-nighters, and this sweet angel was everything to him. What had happened meant more than he could say. But it was the smallest part of what Molly gave him. Matthew told himself he’d let it go forever if he had to do so to keep the rest of it.
She stood up, slow and stiff. Like an old woman, not the energetic girl who still sometimes passed for a teenager.
He’d hurt her. Hard as he’d tried not to.
Molly was his only real friend. The lone pearl in a manure-pile of shallow, consumerist fakers and tools. The one who let him into her life without throwing on a different painted mask every time they were together. The only person who knew the password to his IPhone, because he trusted she’d never do anything worse with the knowledge than set his ringtone to Justin Bieber as a joke.
He hadn’t meant to kiss her.
Why can’t I say “I’m sorry”? Don’t be mental. Just speak.
Matt cared for her. He knew Molly didn’t want anything more with him—ever. He’d been okay with it only because he would’ve done anything not to lose her.
He wanted to kiss her again. Even though it was a big mistake, in Matt’s fantasy world, it wasn’t. In Matt’s mind, he saw himself going to Molly now, wrapping his arms around her waist from behind, kissing her neck, reaching for…
Yeah, Matt wanted her. Who could blame him? Molly was gorgeous! In a real way, too, not in the patented Hollywood, a-few-too-many-visits-to-the-plastic-surgeon kind of way.
But he hadn’t meant for it—for last night, for any of it—to happen. And he wasn’t at all proud of it.
Sure, he’d thought about it before once or twice. Okay, many, many times. But Matt wasn’t proud of that either, and he hadn’t intended for it to happen in real life. Well…not really, anyway. Or, maybe only half?
Or somewhere between halfway and infinite powers multiplied…
But it…it did. Everything—Matt’s mind, his emotions, his body—had just… “gotten out of hand,” as the fools known as “they” would say.
He could give himself a break for that, couldn’t he? Especially after how long it had been for him.
Matt’s brain flashed him a few bits of memory from their night together.
He’d always expected it would take a lot to draw Molly out that way. On the contrary, her boldness had surprised Matt. Even early on, when they were just making out. Her mouth grinned against his, the giggles bubbled up to his ears from deep in her chest. Ankles crossed at the small of his back. Lips, insistent, drawing a fiery line from Matt’s jaw to his collarbone...
Molly’s earlier reticence had nothing to do with shyness, insecurity, or—definitely not—lack of interest, in him or physical intimacy in general. If he wasn’t convinced of all that while they were yet fully clothed, the instant she peeled up the hem of Matt’s t-shirt, he knew for sure.
And after that…she’d thrown up some hurdles, but he’d taken it slow and gotten over—or under—all of them until finally, finally, everything Matt’d imagined and more had come to pass.
It was done.
His face and neck burned again. Matt was dizzy, and not in a good way.
Because not everything he’d fantasized had happened.
Not the happy-together-forever part.