Dewey Belong Together

by Smartypants Romance

  Shut up, I firmly told my inner voice. I wasn’t having any other symptoms, right? I mean, my mood had been a little low these last few days, despite how I tried to act around Max, but that was because I missed her. It didn’t necessarily mean I was sinking into a mental quagmire. I picked up the bottles one by one and poured the proper amount of each pill into every empty little square in the dispenser. Satisfied, I took my Thursday morning handful and grabbed a drink in the kitchen to wash them down on my way out the door.

  The bird’s wing desk was almost dry, and Norman had told me to get my sweaty self inside for lemonade with Mom while he finished up for the day. We were going to get this project done and shipped on time, barring a disaster, and I felt pumped. I didn’t want to go inside and chat with Mom about her soaps, I wanted to go for a run, or better yet, start sketching out the next computer on our order list. The next few builds were cool PCs only, no desks. Easy as pie.

  I sat down at the desk in the corner of the air-conditioned part of the workshop and started to sketch out some ideas for a PC with a Pride theme, but I couldn’t seem to settle. I felt like I needed to move, to work my legs and burn off some of the energy humming through me even after working a seven-hour day. I got up with my sketch pad and started pacing as I drew, instinctively copying Max’s habit of sticking her tongue out of the corner of her mouth while thinking. My drawing may have been in shades of gray, but I could see the strips of rainbow lights inside the chassis as clear as day, and I toyed with the best way to customize the case itself. The problem wasn’t that I didn’t have ideas, the problem was that I had too many.

  I bumped into the table Norman was working on while I was distracted, and he gave me a “Hey! Watch it” look. He must have seen the notebook in my hands because he asked quietly, “What are you up to? Your work is done for the day. You didn’t even pause for lunch when Olivia brought us sandwiches, man. I think you get a pass on starting another project a half hour before dinnertime. This will keep until tomorrow.”

  I put down the notebook to redo my ponytail which had come loose and noticed my hands shaking. I also noticed the look on Norman’s face. Calm, but almost too much so. I knew that look.

  “I’m fine,” I snapped, surprising myself with how salty I sounded.

  But who was he to look at me that way? As if I was an animal that needed to be approached with caution or something. He’s your best friend, I reminded myself. Leaving my hair loose, I decided to listen to Norman and head inside, not just for a cold drink but to reacquaint myself with the shower. I knew I reeked of sweat and varnish, and I suddenly wanted this whole day to be over so I could crash into bed and wake up tomorrow in a better frame of mind.

  The cell in my back pocket buzzed while I was gulping down my second glass of lemonade in the empty living room, Mom in her room probably riding her meds, and my sister Olivia still not home from work at the grocery store. I tossed together a sandwich for my supper, flopped on the couch to eat, and then yanked the phone out of my pocket. It was an email from Max, and I smiled instantly.

  * * *

  From: Max Peters

  To: Jonathan Owen

  Subject: An Epic Day!

  * * *

  Jonathan:

  I hope your day has gone as well as mine has! I had to tell you as soon as I got home from the library about how freakin’ epic this day was. I had an epiphany this morning while getting ready for work, and damn if I am not chuffed over the whole thing. My boss, Thuy Nguyen, is luckily always open to hearing new ideas, so I approached her today. I said that I would be willing to loan the library my gaming consoles—I’ve got a PS4 and Switch, remember?—one evening a week so teens could have somewhere to get out of the house and have some fun.

  I pointed to studies done on the benefits of gaming, such as increased hand-eye coordination, increased literacy, and the social benefits of making new friends. Plus, it will get them into the library, making them aware of what we offer. Luckily, it wasn’t a hard sell with Thuy. We already have a teen night and educational games installed on the library computers for elementary age kids, and in my view, this is the next logical step.

  I also went way out of my comfort zone and offered to supervise the program if Naomi or Sabrina weren’t available, or if it would unfairly add to their workload. I don’t know if that will happen or not, but at least I took a small step to what I had originally dreamed of when I became a librarian—working with and for the kids. Wow, that was a lot of librarian chatter! I’m sorry, I’m so excited. Who would have thought that life could roll along so quickly if we take steps to make it do so? I will be online later if you want to hit me up for a quest or a chat.

  * * *

  Cheers,

  Max-attack

  * * *

  I let out a puff of air and felt down, probably unreasonably, after reading her email. At least she was writing to me. Although she was writing to me as if I were one of her random gaming buddies, not as her lover. But then, we weren’t lovers anymore, were we? I was the only one in love. For her, I was probably a weekend booty call. Or a stepping-stone on her path to making her life roll along more quickly.

  I sighed and thought about what I knew about Max. I wasn’t being fair. She was strong, brave, loyal, and often kind. She wouldn’t deliberately use me and lose me. But I wanted more than an email.

  Unable to wait another minute, I swallowed the last bite of my sandwich and clicked on the Skype button on my phone. I found her pretty easily and sent an add request. Within a minute, she had approved me, and I clicked through to place a call. I knew I probably looked like hell right now before my shower, but I didn’t care.

  Max picked up on the second ring, smiling at me, with one eyebrow raised in question. She had her hair in one of those side braids from Frozen, and her green eyes were complimented by a hint of eye shadow. Her perfect cupid’s bow mouth lifted in a smile.

  “Hey, Jonathan. What’s up?” she asked, cocking her head to one side. I swallowed hard, and began.

  Chapter 22

  Maxine

  “There’s no crying in Magecraft!”

  ― Maximus_Damage

  Jonathan looked at me with desperation in his eyes, and he appeared exhausted, sweat trickling down his forehead. He must have just finished working. My smile dropped, and I tipped my head to the side in my default listening pose.

  “I can’t keep doing this, Maxine,” he croaked, closing his eyes for a long moment. Before I could ask what he meant, he continued, “We’re talking to each other now like we’re friends, which is a huge step up from before. But it’s not enough! Don’t you feel anything deeper toward me after what we did last weekend? I know it was at least ten years for you since anything like that had happened, but nothing like that has ever happened to me. Not the sex, but the connection between us. I was so sure you felt it too, that you were in it with me. And now I get updates like I’m anyone else you know and are friendly with. Is that how you feel? About me, about us?” His voice steadily rose, not in anger, but in something resembling panic.

  Someone could have tipped me over with a feather in that moment. I swallowed hard and schooled my face into as neutral of an expression that I could make, but I could feel myself blinking rapidly. Do not cry, I told myself. Don’t you dare. Warrior up, already!

  “Jonathan, I felt a lot of things last weekend,” I said, sitting down on my sofa, careful not to jostle the phone too much. “It shook me, hard, getting so many of my defenses beaten down at once. I had only planned on being more outgoing in my life, I hadn’t planned on …” I trailed off.

  “On us. You can say it, Max. You hadn’t planned on us.” His voice was firm, but I swear I saw him pleading with his eyes.

  “No,” I agreed softly. “I hadn’t planned on anything that happened between you and me. That first time I kissed you, I know I was plastered, but I remember feeling very surprised, even though I wanted to kiss you.”
<
br />   Plastered was probably an understatement. I was never drinking tequila again. I swallowed hard and fumbled for my librarian brain to kick in and organize the jumble of thoughts in my head where Jonathan was concerned. But it wasn’t happening; the jumble was still there.

  “Please tell me I’m not alone in this, Max,” he said, licking his bottom lip and still making those kicked puppy eyes.

  I couldn’t pretend to be ignorant of what he was talking about. He had already admitted that he had feelings for me at one time, and given his reaction to our casual contact since he went back to Florida, I had to assume he still had those feelings. So the big scary question before us now was, what did I feel?

  I thought of the email I had drafted on my lunch break and then had been too afraid to send, almost shocked by the depth of my own desires I had voiced in it.

  * * *

  Jonathan:

  * * *

  I'm beginning to feel that we are doomed to a Regency era romance, if a romance is what this is. We write letters, we talk via text. The written word has replaced the spoken, and the miles have replaced the embrace. I've been thinking a lot about what happened between us while you were here, and now to be thrust into a situation where we can’t touch and can’t seem to talk beyond the mundane every day, makes me wonder what it all meant.

  Did spending time together irrevocably change us? At this point, you are essentially indistinguishable from my other friends. I don't want you to be indistinguishable. I don't want to write letters and never see your face. What I do want is a bit more difficult to define. I want to hold you again. I want to whisper secrets as we lie under the covers, and sing out every song we know together. I want to cook for you and have you tell me how terrible it is, then dance with you in the kitchen while we wait for the pizza to arrive.

  * * *

  Yours,

  Max

  * * *

  What he was saying, what he was brave enough to give voice to, wasn’t that far off what I wanted in that letter. But now that I was actually confronted with the feelings, I was confused. How could I feel this deeply about someone I’d only just met in person? It was all so new and scary, and I felt like I couldn’t trust it.

  “I’m going to be completely honest here, because I want there to be nothing but honesty between us, Jonathan,” I started carefully. “I don’t know how I feel. If I did, I would tell you right now, I promise, and I don’t make promises lightly.”

  He closed his eyes and made a low, self-deprecating chuckle. “I know you don’t. You’re so damn honorable that way. Well, let me make myself crystal clear, even if you’re not ready to hear it. I love you. I’ve been in love with you since we met, and I’ll stay in love with you because I know I have no other choice. You’re it for me, Maxine. You.”

  I felt my eyes widen, and that neutral expression fell right off my face. “You can’t know all that, Jonathan. We just met last week,” I said, almost whispering.

  “We met when I was seventeen, and you damn well know it,” he countered, that kicked puppy look gone and replaced by determination. “I can’t begin to count the number of conversations we’ve had, the amount of hours over the years we’ve played together, the two of us. Think, Max. If you really hated me, would you have kept grouping with me? Questing, dueling, fighting, whatever, we’ve been in each other’s lives. You have to acknowledge that.”

  Were he and Lois trading notes behind my back? And what did it mean that both my bestie and my … my … Jonathan, were saying essentially the same thing? As his words sunk in, I knew this wasn’t a point I could argue with him. Jonathan believed himself to be in love with me. Lois had guessed as much, from his behavior and words. They were both right in that there was a lot of history between us, so even though we hadn’t met in person until a week ago, we really had met and been something for a long damn time.

  But what would it mean for me to acknowledge his love for me? This morning, I had thought I needed to declare myself somehow. Now that I had the perfect opening, I wasn’t brave enough to commit to anything. I was scared that this was too much, too soon. Even in my rowdier college days, I had almost no experience with an actual boyfriend, and forget romantic love. I had liked the variety of playing the field too much.

  What had changed since this morning, when I was so keen to put out those feelers about how he felt about the concept of us? Was I discombobulated that he had been the one to bring it up, not me? And over Skype, to boot, where I couldn’t hide behind my avatar? He looked at me expectantly, but I didn’t know what to say.

  “The stuff you said when you were here about not deliberately hurting me over the years, about thinking I was a decent person all along; you meant that,” I said, the sincerity in his earlier words only now resonating with me.

  “Of course I did,” he replied. “I’ve been in love with you the whole time. I didn’t always know how to express my feelings or frustrations. I was immature, and I was attention-seeking. I know that now. And I’ll apologize for how I’ve behaved, over and over, if you need me to.”

  “No, I believe you,” I said, and I realized I meant it. He had no reason to lie. He really believed he loved me. Or rather, he really did love me.

  “Well, thank God for that much,” he said, looking away and scrubbing his hand over his face.

  “Jonathan?” I started, his name a question on my lips. “I’m scared that I can’t trust this yet.” When his face fell, I added, “Honesty, remember? It’s all so new, and I’ve thought about you in such horrible terms for so long. What if I go down this road with you, and it crashes and burns in our faces?”

  He closed his eyes and exhaled loudly, then nodded. When he spoke, there was a tone of defeat in his voice. “Yeah, I get it. Look, I gotta go. I reek and have to shower, and then I should make some supper for Mom and Olivia before I crash. I won’t be online tonight, I’m tired.”

  Suddenly afraid he was going to disconnect, I blurted, “Jonathan!” I caught him by surprise, and his eyes darted back up to the camera. “I’ve missed you. I don’t know how I feel about you, except I’ve never felt like this before either. It feels like this horrible pit in my stomach, but somehow not horrible too. I don’t know. I mean, give me a little time to think about all this, please?”

  A grin split his face. “Yeah, you can have time, sweetheart.” I smirked. I was no sweetheart!

  We waved at each other, and he said, “Talk to you tomorrow, Max. I know you’re heading to the jam then, so when should I call you?”

  “Same Max-time, same Max-channel works for me,” I replied, returning his smile. And with a click, he was gone. I looked to She-Ra and Catra, both buzzing around my legs for food, and said out loud, “Now what?”

  “He straight up said he loves you, no holds barred, while you were on Skype, probably looking like a deer in the headlights?” Lois asked, sipping her iced tea, while I drank the last of my boxed wine.

  I was lounging on the bed in the gaming room, that sandalwood and sunshine smell still lingering around me, facing my laptop. I was wearing my flannel pajamas with a kitten print this time, and my hair was still in its now slightly frazzled fishtail braid from earlier.

  “Yes! I’d never seen him like that, Lois, but then I only ever saw him for four days. Though I’ve talked to him plenty, and heard his voice through the game, and he’s never sounded like that. He was practically desperate.”

  “He was probably desperate to get through that thick skull of yours where your own self-worth is concerned, Maxine. I know you’re trying to come out of your shell or tear down those walls around you—pick your metaphor—but that can’t happen overnight. It has to be a sustained effort over time, or you’ll fall back into bad habits and thought patterns. And one of those is thinking that you’re not worthy of affection or love. I mean, why else would you have denied yourself romantic or sexual relationships for over a decade?”

  I sighed. “Lo, do you always have to go right for the freaking jugular?” I asked
, downing the last of my drink. I put the empty glass on the bedside table and noted that it was now past eleven o’clock. I should be in bed instead of drinking alone and getting life-coached by my bestie. “Can we talk about you for a minute, instead of rehashing the hash that is my love life?”

  Lois laughed. “But your life is so much more interesting than mine! All I do is work a job I don’t love to pay rent on an apartment in a city I don’t love anymore, and of course I have Elsa to take care of.”

  That gave me pause. “Wait, what’s wrong with New York? You used to be nuttier than a squirrel about the city.”

  “I know, but I’m getting older, Max. I’m a single mom, raising a daughter in a city with no backyard, no room for a dog, or a zillion other things I had growing up in the country. I remember chasing lightning bugs and grasshoppers, not finding a condom in the sandbox at the park. I wonder if I’m doing right by her, raising her so differently than how I was. I want her to have those same kinds of childhood memories we both have. And on top of it all, my company is downsizing. I’ve got the feeling I’m on the chopping block, and I don’t know what to do next.”