One Big Mistake: a friends to lovers rom-com

by Whitney Barbetti

  “And to tell no lies,” he added. “Best friends first.”

  “Best friends first,” I agreed, curling my finger tighter around his. “No hurt. No lies.”

  “None.” He turned his hand and while holding my gaze, he pressed his lips to the back of my hand. “We’re going to have to talk about this. Soon.” He unlooped our pinkies and then emitted a loud yawn.

  “Okay.”

  “But tonight,” he said, stretching an arm toward me. “We’re going to sleep under your moon.”

  I studied his arm for a long moment and didn’t move.

  “What?” he asked.

  “No cuddling,” I reminded him.

  “Oh,” he scoffed. “Don’t call it cuddling then. Come on,” his fingers twisted up in my hair and with little reluctance, I scooted close, using his arm as a pillow despite the pile of them around us.

  I placed a hand on his chest, feeling his warmth in my fingertips. “I don’t know, Keane. This feels a lot like cuddling.”

  His lips landed on the top of my head. “Because it is. But you’re still not close enough.”

  I scooted closer still, so that my mouth was at his neck. Despite it being unseasonably warm, I knew there would be a slight chill overnight. “That better?”

  “Slightly. I want you closer still.”

  I wrapped my arm around his back and his arms curled around me in a bear hug. I tightened my hold on him like I was afraid he’d let me go. Because I was afraid.

  23

  KEANE

  It had been a week since I’d seen Navy. This time, I couldn’t blame it on one of us avoiding each other, but on the other circumstances that had separated us like Navy covering for the still-absent Delilah and my brother’s cabin kicking my ass from sunup to sundown. Framing was starting to go up, which meant it was actually looking like something. A shell, but soon enough it would be actual walls and ceilings and roofing.

  But still, I missed her. Our talk the Sunday prior had only reinforced the need I had to see her. Which was why I made my way into town early. We were supposed to have our movie date at her aunt Isabel’s house that night, so I had to go to town. But since I was early, I decided to stop at the store, check in.

  When I waltzed through the door, I was greeted by my least favorite person on the planet: Roger. He was smiling so wide I was surprised it didn’t crack his face in half as he rang up a customer.

  He was an okay dude, I guessed. But mostly just annoying. I knew he had the hots for Navy, and that was probably the main reason he had worked at the music store for so long. I sized him up, wondering if he was Navy’s type. He was tall, thin, with barely-there muscles. Maybe to someone who wasn’t me, he might be attractive if you were into model-looking dudes, but since that wasn’t my flavor, he just annoyed the fuck out of me. Mostly because he existed, and partially because he wanted Navy.

  And this little shit had gotten so much in-person time with Navy, when I’d had so little.

  I had never given this much thought to Roger before. I mean, I’d always not liked him. But the way I felt then as I stared at him, it was something else. Was it jealousy? I didn’t know, having not been acquainted with the feeling in some time.

  Fuck. I was jealous. This guy got to talk to Navy every fucking day. I didn’t give a fuck if he was talking lot numbers of recorders with her, the fact that he got to look at her and I didn’t pissed me off.

  Our last night together in the bed of my truck flashed through my mind. I’d been so fucking close to kissing her. I’d kissed along her skin like it was the most fucking natural thing in the world, but the way my pulse had skipped, the way my breathing had grown labored, told me that it was more.

  Of course it was more. I loved Navy. And not just as my dance partner or drinking buddy or platonic cuddler or my best friend. I fucking loved her, in the ways that didn’t make sense. I loved how her hair always slipped out of her scrunchies and the way her eyes warmed when she smiled, and the way she moved heaven and earth to make someone’s life easier. I loved how she looked at me, I loved the feel of her hands in mine, and I fucking loved the way she made my heart settle when she was in my arms.

  I wasn’t sure of much in my life, but I was sure that I was sick of tiptoeing around Navy. I needed to tell her how I felt, let the chips fall where they may and deal with the consequences after.

  But I couldn’t believe I was realizing all of this while looking at fucking fuck face Roger of all people.

  As the customer walked toward the door, his gaze followed them until it collided with mine. The extra wide smile fell, and he stared at me like I was a fly someone had accidentally let in.

  “Hey, Roger,” I said, giving him a two-finger salute as I headed back toward where I assumed Navy was, in the office.

  “Don’t go back there,” Roger said, coming around the counter and holding his hands up.

  “Why?”

  “She’s…” He blocked me when I sidestepped him. “Really busy, okay? She doesn’t need you in here causing a ruckus.”

  Did he even know me? I might be distracting, but I didn’t cause a ruckus. Well, hardly ever. “I’m pretty sure she’ll be okay with me saying hi.”

  “Did she know you were coming? Because she asked me to leave her alone a half hour ago so she could concentrate.”

  She didn’t know. And I resisted the urge to tell him that she probably asked him to leave her alone because he was annoying as fuck. “I’ll just wave hello and come back. Okay?”

  “I really think…”

  I sidestepped him, successfully this time, and walked toward the back of the store anyway. There were two large glass windows that looked out from the office onto the floor, so I knew she’d see me. If she really was as busy as Roger claimed, I’d see it and leave her alone.

  She was bent forward, her face in her hands as she stared at an empty table. I walked by the windows once, but when she didn’t lift her head to see me, I became concerned.

  Making sure Roger wasn’t spying on us, I opened the door to the office—which was almost never closed like it was now—and said, “Psst.”

  Navy lifted her head. Her eyes were tired and her hair was a mess and she looked like she carried the weight of the entire fucking world on her shoulders. And she didn’t say hi. Fuck. I wanted to wrap her up, take her away from here. Somewhere where stress couldn’t reach her. Where the pain in her eyes was just a memory. How did she manage to look so beautiful, even when she was so obviously wrecked?

  “You okay?” I stepped one foot into the office, not wanting to intrude but also not wanting to leave her alone looking the way she did.

  “No.” When she spoke, I could hear her sniffling in that one word. Then I saw the pile of tissues in the trash can. “I feel like a giant fuck up.” She gestured to the table like there was something there for me to understand why she felt that way. But it was just an empty table, save for a box of tissues.

  I came into the office and shut the door behind me, then lowered the blinds that separated the office from the rest of the store. “What’s going on?” I slid into the chair beside her, putting an arm around her as she held her head up with her arm on the table. There it was, that settling that happened when I touched her. All the noise faded away; all my anxieties left my body. It was just her. It was always her.

  “Delilah quit,” she said, plucking a tissue from the tissue box. “She hasn’t been showing up for all her shifts and only signing up for a couple here and there as it was, but she quit. And she blamed me.”

  “You?” I squeezed her shoulder. “You’ve been more accommodating than you really needed to be.”

  “I got assertive with her.” She blew her nose and crumpled up the tissue. “Reminded her that she was supposed to take four days a week, at least, unless she has something going on. Which she told me she did, a few times—bailing early on a shift and making Roger or I cover—whichever one of us wasn’t already working.” She heaved a heavy sigh. “I found out that she
’s been bailing to go to concerts with Brad, or shopping with her friends. Now that her friends are out of school for the summer, she has blown off work.”

  “And it’s your fault that she’s a flake?”

  “It’s my fault for pushing her to the point of quitting. Which she did, an hour ago.” She buried her face in her hands.

  “Doesn’t Isabel come home soon?”

  She laughed without humor. “Yeah. Tomorrow. She’s coming home to one less employee and one niece who couldn’t hold it together for three and a half weeks.” She sniffled and I handed her another tissue. “And Jade has been really on one lately. She snuck out—well, she tried to. I caught her.”

  “When?”

  “The Friday before we had the movie night at the cabin. She’s going to get herself into trouble.”

  “I mean, I think it’s pretty normal behavior for a teen to sneak out.”

  “Her boyfriend is twenty. She’s only sixteen,” Navy snapped. Then she pressed her fingers to her temples. “Sorry. I just feel like a giant failure. Between Jade and Violet, I feel more like a mom than a sister. You were right, and so were they. But I don’t know how to keep them safe when I’m not constantly worried about them.”

  I brushed stray tendrils away from her face. “You survived those periods of your life when you were their ages.”

  “Yeah, well, I wasn’t pregnant like Violet, and I didn’t have an adult boyfriend like Jade. It’s different.”

  There was no use arguing with her, not when she was wallowing this much. Navy was usually cheery, more light than dark. All this strain was wearing on her, physically and emotionally. “When your aunt comes back, you need to take a break, for you. Maybe come up to the cabin for a few days or something.”

  “It’ll be hard to do that since we’re short an employee.”

  “What can I do?”

  Navy cradled her head in her hands. “Remind me of who I am. I feel like I don’t even know myself anymore.”

  “You’re still you. You’re allowed to change your mind, your feelings. That doesn’t make you any less you.”

  “I don’t feel like myself.”

  “You’re still yourself. Life is just kicking your ass right now. Once we’re on the other side of this, things will go back to normal.”

  “I don’t even know what normal is anymore.”

  She had every right to feel that way, because I didn’t know what was normal anymore either. I just knew it made me feel mangled to see her like this. It wasn’t in Navy’s nature to fall apart; she was always making a plan with step-by-step directions.

  “Is that your phone?” she asked, causing me to pause. There was a vibration coming from my pocket. Without even looking at it, I muted it with a press to one of the volume buttons.

  “What do you say you finish your shift, we go get some Chinese food and then watch a movie? I’ll even let you pick it.”

  She gave me a small laugh. “No Spartacus?”

  “I mean,” I said with a shrug. “I wouldn’t say no if you picked it out.”

  “Don’t hold your breath,” she said on a laugh. “This was supposed to be a solo pity party.” She crumpled her last tissue and tossed it in the already overflowing trashcan.

  “Yeah, well you got company. Get used to it.”

  She gave me a watery smile, and I held my hand out. “Let’s go. You don’t have much time left, right? Until you close?”

  She glanced at her watch. “About an hour. She cocked her head to the side. Why are you here so early?”

  “I was already in town. No point in going back to the cabin only to turn back around. Come on, I’ll go grab you a coffee with all that fancy shit you like in it from the place next door.”

  “Okay,” she said, heaving a sigh as she stood.

  “I’ll take this out on my way.” I bagged the office trash and followed her out of the office.

  “Thanks, Keane,” she said, going up on her tiptoes to give me a kiss on the cheek when we reached the front of the store. “Caramel and mocha syrup, okay?”

  “Fuck yeah,” I said, and gave her a squeeze before I walked outside of the store.

  I tossed the garbage bag in the dumpsters behind the building and my phone started vibrating again. I’d forgotten about the missed call in the store and by the time I pulled my phone from my pocket, I saw three missed calls in total. All from Navy’s sister, Jade.

  Why the hell was Jade calling me? Before I could come up with any answers, I called her back. She answered halfway through the first ring.

  “Thank God,” she breathed through the phone.

  “Jade?”

  “Can you help me?”

  “Yeah, I’m actually at the music store right now. Want me to get Navy?”

  “No!” Jade yelled. “Do not get Navy. She’ll kill me. And I’d really like to live to seventeen.”

  “What’s going on? Where are you?”

  “I’m not exactly sure. I can send you my location.” I heard wind and cars around her. “I just need you to pick me up and bring me back to town.”

  I looked back at the store. “I really feel like I should get your sister with this,” I said uneasily.

  “No, seriously, Keane. She will for sure kill me if I don’t get back to town before she gets home from work.” Her voice was panicky and high-pitched.

  “What’s going on?”

  She heaved a sigh. “It’s a long story. I just need you to get here, okay? If you tell Navy, she might pass out from stress.”

  Fuck. I grinded my teeth. After the way I’d seen Navy barely hanging on inside the store, I could only imagine how she’d react to whatever trouble Jade had gotten herself into. I resolved to explain it to Navy after I’d gotten Jade. Chances were, she’d close the store early so she could go pick her sister up herself. I knew it was hard for her to accept help, so if I could do this one small thing for her to lighten her load, I would.

  “Fine. Give me the address.”

  “I’ll text my location to you. Thank you, Keane. Thank you.”

  She hung up and I stared down at my phone, waiting for the text to come through as I walked next door to the cafe that served the milky coffee drinks Navy loved so much.

  Fuck. She was a full thirty minutes away, in the big city no less. What the hell was she doing thirty minutes away? She didn’t even have her license. I guessed it didn’t matter; I’d need to high tail my ass out there and back before Navy got home from work.

  As I stood in line for the coffee, I felt my leg shaking nervously. I needed to lie to Navy, cancel tonight or tell her I’d be late. I couldn’t think of a good lie to use, because I wasn’t used to lying to her. About anything. By the time I walked back toward the store, frosty drink in hand, I was still at a loss.

  Roger was still manning the register, and he flicked a condescending gaze over my coffee. “Is Navy back in the office?”

  “Why should I tell you?” he asked with a sneer. “You’ll just go and bother her again.”

  Man, I wished the drink I held in my hands wasn’t for Navy, only so I could dump it on Roger’s stupid mug. “I don’t bother her.”

  “Yeah, you do. You act like you’re her boyfriend or something.”

  “Why does it matter to you? You’re not her boyfriend either.” And you never will be, I added to myself. What a little shit.

  “I just don’t think you need to hang around her all the time.”

  I didn’t have the time or patience for this. “Is she in the office or not, Roger?”

  “Just leave her drink here. I’ll make sure she gets it.”

  Nice try. I didn’t trust this guy as far as I could throw him. He’d be more likely to toss it and say I took off, and besides I needed to cancel plans with her anyway which required me actually talking to her. “I’ll just have to search the store, then.”

  Once again, Roger stepped in front of me and as he opened his mouth to attempt to stop me, Navy appeared from one of the aisles. Her hair was
fixed, but her eyes still appeared weary.

  “Move,” I said to Roger, and then stepped around him to give Navy her drink.

  “Keane,” she said gently, pulling me toward the baby grand piano and out of Roger’s view. “You can’t be rude to Roger.”

  “Why not? He’s a tool.”

  She looked at me with an impatient flat line to her mouth. “He’s the only other employee besides me right now.”

  “Yeah, and he wants in your pants. Badly.”

  She grimaced. “Don’t be so loud.” She grabbed my arm and steered me further still. “The point is, don’t antagonize him. Please.”

  “I’m not.” I threw an arm toward where Roger probably lurked like the creep he was. “But he was in my way, twice. Like he’s your fucking bodyguard and you’re Whitney Houston.”

  “Don’t be dramatic.” She placed her hands on her hips. “He’s a good employee. We can’t afford to lose another one.”

  “Your aunt can’t afford to lose you. Roger, on the other hand… I’m sure she can easily replace that jackass.”

  “Maybe it’s best if you go,” she said gently, easing her hold on my arm. “We’ll meet up later.”

  Here it was. Time for me to admit. “Yeah, so it turns out something’s come up. Let’s postpone our movie night.”

  Navy cocked her head to the side, studying me. “Something has come up? In the five minutes since you went to get that drink?” When I extended it toward her, she crossed her arms over her chest, not taking it. “Or are you just mad about Roger?”

  “I’m not mad about him,” I said, but I wasn’t convincing enough. I sure did sound like I was pissed about that little shit. “Something’s come up. We’ll do it another day.” I raked a hand over my hair, wanting to get the fuck out of the store as soon as possible. My minutes were ticking away. I didn’t have enough time to get Jade out of whatever mess she’d gotten herself into and bring her back in time before Navy noticed if I didn’t leave within the next few minutes. “Are you going to take this?” I asked with more impatience than I’d intended. I held the cup out to Navy, but she made no move for it. When I lifted my head and met her eyes, I saw suspicion and maybe a little hurt.