Page 175 of Call Me Baby 2: Side B

His mouth parts⁠—

then snaps shut again.

“What?” I say.

“You got somethin’ to say?”

Andrew wets his bottom lip.

“Got nada. Changed my mind.”

I roll my head back. “Drew, if you got somethin’ to say, just say it.”

His fingers trace the line of my mini skirt. “I don’t trust myself to say it anymore.” He lifts a shoulder. “Better if I keep this one to myself.”

I click my tongue.

“Yeah. I don’t think so.”

He pushes up his sleeve,

standing straighter. “Aight, fine.”

And that eyebrow goes up, like⁠—

don’t forget, baby. You asked for it.

“You keep actin’ like this is a choice. But it’s not,” he says, gesturing between us. “It’s already happening. We’re knee-deep. We’re already fuckin’ in it.” He throws his arm back, thumb toward the dark. “Sorry to disappoint you, but we already crossed your lines and broke your rules night one. We did that. Together. And for two months you been scramblin’, tryin’ to re-write it, fix it, forget it. But you can’t. It’s done. And ever since? You and me got a bad habit of wantin' each other.”

He says night one, and my mind flashes to him in the basement, mid-orgasm—pulse in his throat, eyes soaked, lips shaking against mine—until his voice yanks me back.

His arm falls to his side.

“C’mon, Allison.

“Give us a fair shot at this.

“Let’s do it together, right now.

“You and me.”

I step back from him.

I can’t think straight when he’s this close.

His hand curls into a fist, his chest holding through the silence, Adam’s apple dragging under a tight jaw.

The seconds tick slow, cold air chewing at the tips of my ears, snow crunching under someone’s boots as they pass.

I should tell him to fuck off.

But the whole time I’m standing there,

staring at him through my lashes,

I’m thinking,

Yeah, he’s fucking crazy.