Keep Me If You Can (If You Can #3)

25. Merciless

Chapter twenty-five

Merciless

I doubted JP actually wanted me to make myself at home.

Not because he didn’t want me to feel welcome. But my home was a disaster and JP was suspiciously tidy. His apartment was cleaner than mine had been after I skipped class to clean it that one day and he hadn’t even know I’d be coming over.

There were no piles of clothes near the plush armchair in his living room. No remote controls sticking out of the cracks between the cushions on the leather couch, although there was a hideous throw blanket made of not-quite-complementary squares of crocheted yarn slung over the armrest and a few books stacked on the glass coffee table. But the throw blanket was folded neatly and the books clearly had a place they were supposed to go; the well-stocked bookshelf on the wall had gaps that fit the ones he’d pulled out.

So I didn’t make myself at home by throwing clothes all over the floor or adding dirty dishes to his empty sink, but I did make myself comfortable. When JP returned not quite half an hour later, I was on his couch curled up in the throw blanket, my feet tucked under me as I scrolled through my phone.

“This is cozy,” I said as the smell of pad thai permeated his apartment.

“My apartment?” he asked.

“This blanket.” I unwrapped myself and stood. “I see why you have it out, despite it not matching your sleek modern aesthetic.”

He chuckled softly. “A friend made it for me.”

I tried to fold the blanket as tidily as I’d found it but failed. “They must have really liked you. Or hated you.”

“A little of both.” He set the boxes of pad thai on the table, then turned and held out a similar white plastic bag to the one my dad had found earlier. “Do you want this now?”

I nodded, my tongue suddenly too big for my mouth, and took the bag from him.

“I’ll be right here,” he said.

That made things both better and worse, somehow. As I ripped the cardboard box open in the bathroom and pulled out the instructions, I could hear him pulling plates from the cupboard louder than strictly necessary. Shaking, I skimmed the instructions, then took the test out and followed them as fast as possible.

All so I could hurry up and wait for the longest three minutes of my fucking life.

JP’s eyes snapped up as soon as I walked into the kitchen. “Well?”

My face turned red, even as I looked away from him. “It’ll be a few minutes. I didn’t want to wait alone.”

I half-expected him to make fun of me, but JP just smiled and started splitting the pad thai between our plates.

“So I went to the same place for this test,” he said conversationally. “And wouldn’t you know, it’s the same guy working. This older guy, probably has a soccer team full of kids at home. Lucky me, he remembers me from earlier. So he goes off about how if the first test was negative, it could be positive, but doing a second test on the same day wouldn’t work and I needed to ‘tell my woman’ to wait until tomorrow. And I get it, he’s trying to be helpful, but there’s a lineup of four people behind me and plenty of others in the store.”

“Let me guess,” I said. “You embarrassed the poor guy.”

“Of course not,” he said. “I just asked if the second girl was less likely to be pregnant if the first girl was.”

I rolled my eyes, but there was no stopping the reluctant laugh on my lips. JP smiled, then finished putting the food on the plates before coming to stand next to me.

“Think it’s ready?” he asked.

It was. I’d already felt my phone vibrate to say the timer was done. But I stared at the hallway, fear gluing my feet to the floor and my palms to the sides of my thighs.

Which was stupid. It was so stupid. All that was down that hall was a piece of plastic with an answer on it. It wasn’t a shark. Or a lion. Or a man with a gun. Or my dad.

It was just an answer.

But I’d never been so scared in my life.

“Babe?” JP asked. “Are you going to check it?”

I nodded, then swallowed hard. “Unless, um. You want to. See if it’s ready.”

His arm went around my shoulder again and he pressed his lips to the side of my head, then walked to the bathroom with a sense of calm I couldn’t understand. I stayed where I was, waiting, until he reappeared a moment later.

“Well?” I asked.

“It’s ready,” he said.

I stared at him, waiting, my heart in my throat. “And?”

“Oh,” he said. “You wanted me to tell you what it said, too?”

“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me,” I said, and stormed forward to push past him to the bathroom.

JP laughed, catching me around the waist. “Babe, wait. I—”

“You’re such a f-fucking asshole,” I said.

I don’t know if it was the stammer or the fact that because he’d grabbed me, he was close enough to see the tears in my eyes, but JP’s laugh faded instantly.

“It’s negative,” he said. “Nell, it’s negative.”

“I need to s-see it.” The words shook, wavering on my voice as I tried to squirm away from him.

“Here.” He shoved his other hand towards me. “Look.”

I hadn’t noticed him holding it. I stopped squirming and yanked the test out of his hand, holding it up to my eyes and staring hard at the little window.

One pink line.

One strong pink line, just like the box had said. Not two. Not even a faint hint of a question of a second line showed.

“Nellie?” JP said. “I wasn’t trying to fuck with you. I—”

“Where’s your garbage can?”

“What?”

“I want to throw this out and never think about it again.”

He showed me where his garbage can was and let me do the honours of tossing the stupid fucking piece of plastic that had changed everything—even though I wasn’t fucking pregnant—into it. As soon as I had, I washed my hands again, wiping my fingers along my cheeks to make sure none of the tears had leaked out before taking a breath.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

“What happened to never thinking about it again?” I asked. “It’s done. It’s negative. Now everything can go back to normal.”

“Can it?” he asked, raising his eyebrows.

“Of course. Aside from, you know, the whole thing where my dad hates me and all that other stuff. But the rest of it, the… this.” I gestured at us. “We can go back to normal.”

He looked like he was about to agree. I could see it on his lips, the instinctive response, before it fizzled out. He looked at me, then glanced to the side.

And I knew.

I knew what he was going to say.

I knew what was coming, and my stomach clenched, and I opened my mouth to say something— anything —that might stop it, but JP spoke before I could.

“No, we can’t,” JP said.

“Yes we can,” I said.

He shook his head. “Nellie, we have to talk about this.”

“No we don’t.”

“You’re not the only one involved.” His voice was gentle the same way someone reluctantly pressing a knife into your stomach was gentle. “This isn’t fair to me.”

“So what, you feel like because you stood up to my dad for me that I owe you an explanation?”

A hint of anger flared in his eyes. “You don’t owe me shit and you never will. But just because you don’t owe me an explanation doesn’t mean I’m not hoping for one.”

I stuttered for a moment before glaring at him. “You’re lawyering me again.”

He half-laughed. “You can’t just accuse me of ‘lawyering’ you when you don’t like that I’m right.”

“I can do anything.”

He smiled sadly. “Well, I can’t. I can’t do this. I like you—”

“As a friend,” I said.

“Nellie—”

“You like me as a friend , JP.” It came out like I was begging. Pleading. The vocal equivalent of falling to my knees and grovelling with everything in me for him to stop.

But JP was a merciless bastard.

“No,” he said. “Not just as a friend.”

“JP, please,” I whispered. “Not now.”

“When, then?” There was regret in his eyes, but he still shook his head. “I’ve been trying. I thought I could keep dancing around whatever I was feeling—”

“You shouldn’t be feeling anything!” The words came out far harsher than I intended them, but he didn’t react. “Don’t do this to me.”

The usual, playful expression on his face was gone, and in its place was one of solemn resignation. “I’m not doing anything to you. But after… after everything last time, I told myself I couldn’t do it anymore. I need to hold myself to that because I’m not being fair to either of us, and now this… fuck, Nell, I can’t pretend to be your friend. It might’ve started that way, but I can’t anymore. I care about you, a lot. More than I want to, trust me. It’d be a hell of a lot easier if I didn’t.”

“You sure know how to flatter a girl.”

“Do you want flattery, honesty, or to pretend there’s nothing between us?” he asked bluntly. “You only get one.”

I opened my mouth to reply, but the answer caught in my throat. I didn’t need him to flatter me. Of course I didn’t need that. And I wanted to tell him to pretend there was nothing between us. That was what I had wanted all along.

But I’d be picking a lie.

I could only pick one thing, and I couldn’t bring myself to say the word. It stuck in my throat, held back by the throbbing of my pulse through swollen veins, trapped by the dry terror in my mouth.

The bastard knew it, too, and his stupid face softened as he looked at me, practically trembling in front of him.

“None of this is about you,” he said. “Or anything you did. Or anything I… I know I’m in your friend zone. I’m not trying to get out of it.”

“Then what is the point ?” My voice shook. “Why are you doing this?”

“Because the last time I had something like this happen—“”

“The last time?!” A laugh bubbled out unintentionally. “There was a ‘last time’ you had a pregnancy scare and then decided to tell the girl you’re fuck buddies with that feelings have entered the room?”

It would have been easier if anything I said got to him. Instead, he just took it, not quite looking at me, not quite reacting, not letting my words weaken the resolve he’d mustered up.

“The last time I messed around with a friend and feelings ‘entered the room,’” he said. “Because yeah. I’ve been there before.”

“And you let it happen again,” I said. “With me. After I asked you not to.”

“I didn’t let it happen.” His jaw flexed. “It just did. I thought I could ignore it. I couldn’t. And the last few weeks, I’ve been losing my mind telling myself it wasn’t gonna happen again and it is.”

“What is?”

He sighed. “Nell, I lost the only other person I have ever in my life wanted to be more with. I can’t do this again.”

I gestured a little too aggressively. “So you think by telling me you’re suddenly feeling things I’m just going to give in and give you what you want?”

He shook his head.

“What, then? You’re standing here telling me you lost someone because you wanted something more than you agreed on, like I’m going to choose differently than the girl who left you—”

“No one left ,” he said. “That’s not what I meant by lost.”

“Then what—”

“He died, Nell.”

I stopped.

JP wasn’t looking at me. His eyes were cast down and to my left, staring at a spot on the floor like avoiding my gaze meant I couldn’t see the vulnerability and pain scrawled across his face.

Fuck.

Fuck .

“JP, I—”

“—didn’t know.” His throat flexed as he swallowed. “I know you didn’t. I didn’t tell you.”

“Why?”

“Why would I?” he asked, flicking his eyes up for a moment. “You’re my sister’s best friend. I wasn’t going to suddenly spill my deepest, darkest secrets to you just because we started fucking.”

My throat tightened. He wasn’t wrong. I’d spilled more than one of my deepest, darkest secrets to him, on top of his presence during some of the deepest, darkest moments of my life, but I wasn’t entitled to his just because he’d put his dick in me.

“It was never supposed to be anything more than fucking around,” he said. “That’s what Sam and I agreed to. But, like, we were… close. Close enough that when we were both single and busy with school and midterms and internships and all that shit, neither of us thought it was weird to propose we, uh, help each other out.” His face turned red. “You take a friendship like that and mix fucking into it and things change.”

Pain prickled on my thumb and I realized I’d been picking at it mercilessly, the skin around my nail going from raw to broken, drops of blood blooming along the nail bed. I grabbed the hem of my shirt, rolling the fabric around my thumb as subtly as I could.

“I was the one who didn’t want to tell anyone,” he continued. “I wanted more, don’t get me wrong. The sappy shit. I wanted to fuckin’, like, hold his hand in public and stuff. But I was so fucking worried about what people might think. If it would ruin things. What my dad would say.”

I both could and couldn’t relate. I knew what it was like to not want my dad to know something. But I had the benefit of a second life. Of cities between us. Of being able to safely drop the charade so I could take a break from the fear.

I couldn’t imagine what it would be like to hide from everyone the way JP felt he had to. But thinking about it hurt.

“We fought about it. It had been at least a year that we’d been messing around exclusively and Sam was sick of it being a secret. He… he told someone.” JP shifted in place. “At the party. That night. I left him there. I spent the whole night thinking about it and deciding I didn’t want to lose what we had. And then he was gone. I don’t know if he even got my text telling him we were okay.”

Somehow, the way he talked about it hurt even more. His tone was matter-of-fact; forlorn, but like he barely registered that every single detail made all of it that much worse.

He hadn’t just lost someone.

They hadn’t just fought about coming out to people.

JP’s dad hadn’t just told him to hold it together at a friend’s funeral.

He’d lost Sam forever. They’d fought the night he died. And that funeral hadn’t been for just a friend .

“I’m so sorry,” I whispered.

JP shook his head. “Don’t. I don’t want an apology.”

“It’s sympathy.”

“I don’t want that either.”

“What do you want then?” I wasn’t sure if I was annoyed or frustrated or just grasping for something to say. “Or were you telling me this so I’d change my mind and give you a chance?”

He laughed, thankfully, considering it was a pretty harsh accusation. “No. I’m not trying guilt you into being with me, Nell.”

“Even though all of this stemmed from you saying you can’t lose someone again.”

“That’s not the part I can’t go through.” He finally looked up from the spot on the floor, capturing my gaze instantly. “I can go through you not wanting me. Easily. It sucks, but I’ll survive. What I can’t do is be caught in between. No matter what you refuse to admit, there’s been something there for a while—”

“There has not,” I snapped, my face heating up. “You’re wrong.”

He shrugged. “Tell yourself what you need to. But I can’t keep existing in this fucking purgatory of not being together but not being just friends. I’ve been there. I’ve done that. I’m never going to get out of it because Sam is gone and I’ll never fucking know. I can’t keep doing it with you, too.”

Silence filled the space between us as I processed what he’d said and the simmering determination beneath his nonchalant attitude.

“How long have you—” I started.

“Months,” he said.

“You could’ve told me when you knew,” I said. “It’s not my fault you—”

“It is,” he said bluntly. “It’s my fault, too, but you don’t get to walk away blameless. Because I tried, Nellie. But you said no, or don’t, or not now. And honestly… Look, I like you. But we were supposed to be friends, and that’s not a great way of treating friends. I like myself enough to know I don’t have to put up with that.”

“So, I’ve been a bad friend?” I replied, my voice shaking more than I wanted it to.

He studied me for a moment, blue eyes boring into mine. I couldn’t look away, but I also couldn’t give him what he wanted.

“I’m in love with you,” he said.

My stomach dropped.

“And that’s not what you want,” he continued. “I get that. I’m not asking you to change what you want for me.”

“Then why are we having this conversation?” I whispered.

“Because I can’t be just your friend.”

I nodded slowly, biting my lip for the dual purpose of distracting myself with a brief prick of pain and to keep my lip from quivering.

“If you can’t be my friend and I can’t be… more than your friend…” I looked up at him, not ready to finish the sentence.

“It’s okay, babe.” A sad smile made his cheek twitch. “Say it.”

Once upon a time, my mom had called JP a heartbreaker.

I’d thought she meant he was a bad person. Because who would want to break hearts? But of course, she’d meant it in the way that moms always knew which little boys would grow up to be the type of men who discarded the hearts of the women who wanted them without care and without mercy.

But she was wrong.

JP wasn’t a heartbreaker. He cared too much to be one. He might have been merciless, but not when it came to hearts.

But I guess one of the many things I didn’t want to admit JP and I had in common was our ability to be merciless.

Because in hindsight, the pieces were all there. The hints. The realization that he’d been trying to tell me about this for months. Since before the Diamond Gala. Since the night Anne-Marie had nearly caught us in his bedroom, at least.

And I’d ignored it willfully.

I’d ignored him mercilessly.

And now, standing in front of each other, everything spilling out of the slashes he’d put in the surprisingly delicate wall of ignorance, I was going to have to keep being merciless.

I was going to have to be the heartbreaker.

And I wasn’t quite sure whose heart it was.

“This is it, then,” I said. “We’re not friends anymore.”

“Okay,” he agreed quietly. “We’re not friends anymore.”

I pressed my lips together. “Alright. I’m gonna go.”

“You don’t have to,” he said. “You can stay in the guest room or—”

“You wouldn’t do that for someone you’re not friends with.”

He stopped speaking, then nodded once. “Right.”

I mirrored his nod, not looking at him. “Okay. Bye, JP.”

He watched silently as I turned to leave his apartment. Just as I opened the door, he spoke one last time.

“I’ll miss you, Nell.”