The Love Square

by Jessica Calla

  Clare hung up without listening to Dylan’s good-bye and watched another plane fly overhead.

  He met someone.

  She stared at her feet and shook her head. Of course he did, you idiot. He’s Dylan Barnes. Did you really think he’d be interested in you? Clare Davis from Nebraska? He never offered her anything more than friendship, so any feelings that went above and beyond, well, that was her being stupid. Stupid, stupid, idiot.

  Clare drove to her apartment and wearily lugged her bags into her bedroom. She scooped up Angelica, who meowed angrily. Mary had left a note on the kitchen counter.

  Angelica was angelic. A package came for you. See you at work!

  A big, rectangular package sat on the couch under a pile of mail. The postmark read New York, and Dylan’s name was scribbled in the corner.

  She sighed and opened it. It was a book of famous photographs of New York City. She flipped through in awe, her stomach twisting because she would probably never take a photograph as beautiful as the ones in the book. Then she read his note.

  NE—A street vendor outside my hotel was selling this book and it made me think of you. Shipping it so I don’t have to carry it. Miss you. Wish you were here with me to see these places in person. See you soon. DB.

  Obviously written before “Jenna.”

  She spent another minute browsing through the book. New York looked even scarier than LA, but she was definitely intrigued. Someday, she would get there.

  Angelica mewed for Clare. “What’s up, Jelly?” Clare watched the cat plop down on her laptop.

  She could find a picture of Dylan at his premiere by now—the premiere he’d probably gone to with “Jenna.” Did she want to put herself through that? She knew the answer to that question was a definitive no, but she’d never be able to fall asleep without seeing, and she really wanted to fall asleep.

  Clare gave the cat a shove and took the laptop to the couch, where she searched for the movie premiere. She found the pictures almost immediately. Most were of the major stars of the film, so she clicked through until she got to Dylan and his date.

  He looked drop-dead gorgeous in his light-colored suit—beautiful and familiar. Even though making Dylan look good wasn’t exactly the most difficult job in the world, Gretchen was a genius when it came to styling him to perfection. Dylan hated his hair, but Clare understood why his agent wouldn’t let him cut it. It begged for hands to run through it. His smile was bright white.

  What made the picture so incredible, though, was the expression on his face as he looked at his date. Holding her hand, his whole body angled toward her, his eyes focused only on her. Clare followed the line of his shoulder, to his arm, to his hand where it connected with her.

  Feeling a little nauseous, she turned her attention to “I-met-someone-her-name-is-Jenna.” The caption read:

  Dylan Barnes and girlfriend.

  Girlfriend? Really? Clare calculated that on Saturday night when the picture was taken, they had probably known each other twenty-four hours. Stupid paparazzi. With a deep breath, she focused on Jenna.

  As much as Clare hated to admit it, Jenna was nothing less than exquisite. She was everything Clare wasn’t—tall and statuesque, tan, with long, dark, thick hair that hung in waves down her back. Her short, purple dress showed off thin, graceful arms and crazy-long legs. In her heels, she was just an inch or so shorter than Dylan.

  Jenna gazed at Dylan, who had the same goofy grin. As though they couldn’t wait to get away from there and hop into the nearest bed together. This is who Dylan Barnes dates, Clare told herself, studying the picture again.

  The knot in her stomach intensified. Clare could deal with Dylan having a girlfriend eventually, hopefully. She just hoped she wouldn’t lose his friendship over it.

  She emailed the picture to Cindy. In the subject line, she wrote:

  “Ugh. I’m an idiot.”

  She typed a sad face before she hit Send, shut the computer, and dragged herself to bed, momentarily avoiding the questions she wanted to ask herself—Am I crazy? Did I really dump my boyfriend of eight years? What am I doing in California? All she wanted was to sleep soundly and recover from her crap-ass weekend. Then, she would wake up and think. Regroup.

  ***

  Alex

  Alex woke Monday morning with a jolt. Even though he was seriously hungover from the weekend, he knew Dylan would be gone and Jenna would be back to normal, ready for their run.

  Since Friday, he had been a mess. Not only because the two of them had cut themselves off from the rest of the world for the weekend, but because he missed her.

  Alex continued to beat himself up over his offer to hook Dylan up with Jenna. Seriously, what was I thinking? The real problem was his misplaced reliance on Jenna’s declaration of love. Just because she loved him didn’t mean she would wait around for him. Just as Steve had warned, sooner or later she would find someone. He was counting on the fact it would be later, and not one of his best friends.

  He pulled on his running shorts, threw on a T-shirt, tied his sneakers, bounded out of his apartment, and jumped the stairs, three at a time, to get to the sixth floor.

  He used his key and opened Jenna’s door. The early morning sun streaked through her tall windows. “Stecs,” he yelled. “Let’s go.” He bounced into the kitchen and set up the coffee. “Come on. Get your fat ass up.”

  “Go away,” she yelled from the bedroom. After hitting Brew on the coffee machine, he picked up her remote and turned on the television, flopping onto the couch to wait for her. He didn’t hear her moving around in her room.

  “Jen? Up,” he yelled again.

  “Go away,” she answered.

  Two go aways was a lot from Jenna, so Alex, ready to give her a “let’s go running” pep talk, walked to the bedroom and pushed open the door. Unfazed, he walked through the dark room and pulled open Jenna’s curtains.

  Sunlight lit the room, and when he turned to look at Jenna, there she was, with Dylan lying next to her. Although wrapped in her sheets, they were clearly naked, and he had clearly woken them. Dylan propped himself on his elbow, and Jenna hid under the sheet.

  “You have got to be kidding me,” Alex said. “You two are still at it? I think you missed your flight, D-Barnes.”

  “Shut the curtains,” Jenna whined, squinting.

  “No. That’s enough of this. You two have to rejoin the living world.”

  “Fuck you, Alex. I’m not running today,” Jenna said, rubbing her eyes. “Damn, that coffee smells fantastic.”

  Dylan sat up on the side of the bed, his back to Alex, and pulled on his boxers. Alex watched him lean back down and kiss Jenna’s cheek. “I’m going to take a shower. We need food. Pops, let’s go get breakfast.”

  “Pops?” Jenna asked.

  “Popovich,” Alex said. “I’m going for a run.”

  “Come on, asshole. I’m only here for a couple of more days. You can run anytime. Let’s go eat.”

  “Jenna and I run on Monday mornings, right?” he said, looking at Jenna.

  “I can’t run today, Alex,” she said.

  “I’ll let you two work this out,” Dylan said as he stood and walked into the bathroom. “My vote’s for food.”

  As soon as the door clicked shut and the water started running, Jenna glared at Alex. “What are you doing? Go run. I’m not coming.”

  She looked gorgeous, sitting there with the sunlight behind her, her naked torso stretched over her bent knees. Her hair fell down her back as she held the sheet to her chest. He could see all the way down her bare spine to the tan line on her hips. She looked like an angel. An incredibly sexy angel. Fucking Barnes.

  He swallowed hard and tore his eyes away. “It’s Monday, Jen. Run, work, rehearsal,” he stuttered as he went to her closet and dug out her running sneakers.

  “I called out. I’m not going anywhere unless it’s a necessity. Food, water, sex. Some of that coffee. That’s all that’s on the agenda for me.” She lay back down an
d stretched as Alex threw clothes at her.

  She tossed them on the floor. “I’m serious, Alex. I haven’t had sex in years. Dylan’s amazing, and he’s leaving Wednesday, so consider me signed off from the real world until then.”

  Alex stared at her. “Really?”

  “Really.”

  “You are being so selfish right now,” Alex said at the sight of her smug expression.

  “Why?” She sat up again, the sheet barely covering her this time. “Because you don’t have your running partner?”

  Alex’s cheeks warmed with a mixture of anger, embarrassment, and desire. “Put some clothes on, for Christ’s sake.”

  She stood up, wrapping the sheet around her as she pulled it off the bed. “Fuck you, Alex. You know how many times I’ve walked upstairs to find someone sauntering out of your bed? Now you know how it feels.”

  “You never caught me in bed with your best friend,” Alex said.

  “Your best friend? He didn’t even know I existed. You never even thought to mention me to him. Am I so low on your list of priorities?”

  “You’re right. I never mentioned you. Can you figure out why? I knew this would happen. I fucking knew it.” Alex paced around the room.

  “Don’t give me that bullshit, Alex. Don’t go playing jealous with me. You didn’t want me, so what do you care? Not to mention you told Dylan to go for it with me. Did you think he wouldn’t be interested? What’s your game?”

  “I’m not the one with the game, Jenna,” he said, remembering how she’d stared him down from the dance floor. “And I’m disappointed in you.”

  She held the sheet in her teeth and turned her covered front to Alex as she wiggled into a long T-shirt. Ironically, Alex recognized the shirt as one of his. “Disappointed?” she said, spitting out the sheet.

  “I didn’t think you were the one-night-stand type,” Alex said.

  “You’re slut-shaming me?” She marched around the room, muttering about his insensitivity and insanity, picking up clothes off the floor. “You’ve been telling me to hook up with someone for months. Here I am, with someone you basically threw at me, Alex, who you tell me is the greatest guy, et cetera, et cetera, and now you, of all people, come down here all judgmental about one-night stands? Hello? Pot calling kettle?”

  Dylan shut off the water in the bathroom while Alex and Jenna stared each other down. Jenna was right—he was totally being a dick. He, technically, had told Dylan to go for it with Jenna, and he did want her to be happy. Heaven knew she’d needed to get laid since the night Alex met her, and he knew Dylan wouldn’t hurt her. Still, he resented the situation, and for some reason he wanted to murder Dylan and walk out on Jenna, but instead he mustered his patience and sanity and whispered, “Okay. You’re right. Everything you say is right.”

  Dylan rumbled around in the bathroom as Jenna pointed for Alex to follow her to the kitchen, where she clanked around in the cabinets, found their mugs, and poured the coffee Alex had brewed.

  “I didn’t know Dylan was here. I only made enough for the two of us,” Alex said.

  Jenna sighed and went to the cabinet to get another coffee mug. “I don’t know what to do about you. But I am sorry I upset you.”

  Alex looked into his steaming mug. “You don’t have to be sorry.” He hated her for looking so damn adorable, holding her giant mug, wearing nothing but his T-shirt.

  “I do,” she said. “I should have been in touch with you more this weekend. I should have been nicer this morning instead of telling you to go away and to fuck off.”

  They sat in silence for a moment. Alex studied her as she sipped from her mug, lost in thought. She did look happy, and maybe a little wild. Knots twisted in her long hair, and he tried not to imagine how they got there. He looked away, studying her cabinets, until she giggled.

  “He’s just so yummy,” she said, smiling as she squeezed her mug into her chest.

  Alex shook his head. “All right, Stecs. I can’t do girl talk with you about my friend. It’s too weird.” Dreamy Dylan was the last thing he wanted to hear about.

  “Where have you been hiding him?”

  “Enough, seriously.”

  Dylan walked out of the bedroom, fully clothed, and joined them in the kitchen. Jenna handed him a cup of coffee.

  “Thanks,” he said, his wet hair falling over his eyes. Both Alex and Jenna stared at him. Even Alex had to admit Dylan was way too perfect to be fair competition. “So what’s the plan? Breakfast?” Dylan asked.

  Jenna looked to Alex, eyebrows raised. In one look, he could see the hope in her eyes, that everything would work out and they could all be best friends. “Yeah,” Alex said. “Breakfast. How does the diner sound?”

  “Perfect,” Jenna said, and she kissed Alex on the cheek. “I’m going to get dressed.” She disappeared into her bedroom with her coffee mug.

  Dylan and Alex sat at the kitchen table. “Everything okay with you two?” Dylan asked.

  “Yeah. Sorry for my little tantrum this morning. I wasn’t expecting you to be here.”

  “I kind of got caught up in Jenna this weekend. Wasn’t ready to leave yet,” Dylan said. “She’s kind of amazing.”

  “She is. She’s also my best friend. So be nice.” Alex was sure being nice wouldn’t be a problem for Dylan. He was nice to a fault.

  “I have no intention of being anything but,” Dylan said before taking a gulp of his coffee.

  “What are your intentions?”

  “What are you, her father? I don’t know. We have two more days to discuss,” Dylan answered. “Is all this okay with you? Because if it’s not, you have to let me know.”

  Alex wanted nothing more than to shout, “No! It’s not okay with me!” But he couldn’t do that to Dylan, and especially not to Jenna. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen her so happy and relaxed. “It’s fine,” he said. “Hell, it was my idea, I guess. I’m not used to sharing her, though.”

  Jenna came back into the room dressed in a tank top, her jeans, and flip-flops. She had brushed her hair and pulled it back into a ponytail, and when she walked past Alex, he caught a whiff of her flowery scent.

  “I’m starving,” she said, sitting on Dylan’s lap. “Let’s eat.”

  Watching her push Dylan’s hair from his eyes, Alex felt his breakfast come up before he’d even eaten it. He wasn’t sure he was going to survive this relationship for two more days.

  Chapter 13

  Dylan

  “So what should we do now?” Dylan asked after they returned from breakfast.

  Jenna smiled her wicked, sexy grin and pulled the rubber band out of her hair, releasing her ponytail as she crept toward the bedroom.

  “As enticing as you are,” he said, “I think since we are actually clothed for the first time in what? Twenty-four hours? We should try to keep our hands off each other.”

  “Why?” she asked innocently.

  “Because I want to talk to you, and it’s hard enough to form a coherent sentence looking at you fully clothed, but when you’re naked, it’s damn near impossible.”

  “Really? You want to talk?”

  “Really,” he said. “Talk with me.” If she pushed, he would have no resistance, and they’d end up right back in bed together. Not that he didn’t want to end up back in bed, but because he wanted to know her.

  “Okay, then. Since I have you for a few more days, I guess we can spare a couple hours clothed. I’m not sure how long I can hold out, though.”

  She grinned and his insides twisted. “Gosh, you’re beautiful. That smile is…wow. Let’s try. Let’s have a calm, honest, ‘get to know you’ session. Ask me something.”

  She folded her legs under her as they sat on the couch. “Why do you say ‘gosh’ so much?”

  “That’s the first thing you want to know about me? Why I say ‘gosh’?”

  She nodded.

  Dylan thought of Clare for the first time that day. “My friend Clare says ‘gosh darned’ all the t
ime, and I guess it caught on with me.”

  “Clare? Please tell me she isn’t your girlfriend…or wife.”

  “No, she’s a friend. She’s kind of to me what Alex is to you, I imagine.”

  Jenna took his hand and fumbled with his fingers. “I think I should be up front about something,” she said. “It’s about me and Alex.”

  “Okay,” he said cautiously.

  “A few months ago, I asked him out. He said no.” She looked to him but he didn’t react.

  “We had been getting close. I…we are close. Best friends, really. I wanted to take a step, but he didn’t. At first I was upset, but I realize we are better this way. I do love him. Like a friend, but more.” Jenna stretched her legs over her coffee table and sank into the couch.

  He rubbed her knee. “I don’t know if I should say sorry or that I’m happy I got a chance,” he said.

  “You don’t have to say anything. It is what it is, and I wanted to tell you that what happened this morning? He gets like that sometimes.” Jenna told the story about Alex following her on her blind date.

  “I feel bad for Pops, you know? He has a hard time with commitment.”

  “Weird thing is,” Jenna said, “he’s so committed to his friends. I know so much about you and Steve and how you were there for him growing up. He loves you guys. Despite him not telling you about me, I know he loves me. With romantic relationships, though, he can’t seem to deal. Maybe because of his mom.”

  Dylan didn’t know the extent of Jenna’s knowledge about Alex’s childhood, so he didn’t offer any information.

  She looked down at their hands resting on her leg. “I have screwed-up parents too. They both left me. Differently than Alex’s mom left him, though. At least they told me to my face. And I was eighteen, not fourteen. I hate his mother for doing that to him.”

  He heard how much she cared in her voice. “I’m sorry you had to go through that with your parents. Alex is lucky to have you to take care of him.”