Irreplaceable {1}

Chapter 11

Leo's comfort movie is The Princess Bride. When I saw the opening, I gasped and quickly finished grabbing snacks so I could join him on the couch. I sat down so quickly I almost sat on top of him. I wasn't paying attention, but he laughed, and I tried to shrug it off.

We watched the movie right next to each other, our legs touching and sharing bowls of snack on our laps. I felt at ease finally when the movie ended and it kind of made me nervous that he would have to leave. I glanced at the time, it wasn't late it was only about dinner time. Leo looked at the time too, "do you have stuff for dinner? Should we order something?"

He was sticking around, that made me relax a little. Roxy must've intercepted the pizza guy when she left, which made me a little upset she didn't share.

I took out my phone and opened a food app, "we're ordering. Roxy and I do groceries on Sunday nights but I wasn't here."

Leo nodded, "what are we feeling like?"

I scrolled with him looking over my shoulder and commenting on things. Eventually we picked something and I ordered. "I will send you money," Leo said, while taking out his phone.

"No," I pushed his hand away, "you got last night's dinner, I will get tonight."

Leo laughed, "I'm not a student without a job."

I glared at him, "just this time then."

He laughed even more at that, but I paid for the food and then turned back to the TV. It was just at the Netflix screen, "do we want to watch another movie?"

Just then his phone rang, I saw the name flash before he answered, it was Levi. "Hey man," he said and didn't move. I could hear that Levi was responding, but I couldn't hear what he was saying.

"Really?" Leo continued, "you think I can help? ...Does Emily want to meet her? ...Well why that? ...I love you guys man, but I'm not doing that to Marie. ...No, you weren't with Marie for the last couple hours to see how its affecting her. ...Yes, I realize its hard for Emily too, but there are too many people involved in this. ...No, I'm not asking. ...You know where Marie lives, come here with Emily if you're really that stressed." Then Leo hung up the phone before Levi could say anything else.

He was tense, I was tense. That was a conversation I did not know that I did not want to hear.

After a few minutes of silence while we both tried to gather our thoughts, I broke the silence, "what does Levi want me to do?" I would like to make that decision, not Leo. Even if it was a bad idea, probably.

Leo looked at me uneasily, "he wants me to take you on a date in public. So it looks like we're a thing, rather than you and him."

I was right, it was a bad idea.

Leo didn't give me time to respond, he continued. "But that is putting you more into the public and you've already been freaking out. So it's a terrible idea, and we're not even dating we are still just trying to be friends."

I blinked at him, he had said it so quickly I almost didn't follow.

We are trying to be friends.

Not dating.

"If we go out in public, everyone will think that we are dating, not just friends?" I asked slowly.

Leo got even more cautious, he looked at me like I was a wild animal he was trying to not scare away. I felt like I was about to jump off a cliff with no bottom.

Leo slowly nodded his head, "yeah, pretty much."

I stepped mentally towards the bottomless cliff with my next question, "but we can still go on dates to get to know each other as friends before anything happens."