Noah (5th Street series)

Chapter 21 - Part 2

A week after their Rita conversation, Veronica was feeling as indecisive as ever about moving things forward with Noah. His admission about how and why things had happened the day after Thanksgiving and the fact that he gave her the go-ahead to question him—that she was entitled to explanations about his personal life—should've have been a deciding factor. But ironically, something else about that conversation had made her more aware of how frightening it was to put herself out there like that.

The only times in her life that she could remember her heart feeling this incredibly vulnerable and ready to fall apart over a guy had unbelievably both been because of him: first, the night after his fight when she was forced to see him with a groupie and then later that same night when she found out about Rita. But hearing that he'd seen Rita the day after she'd finally given into her desire for him—the very day after he'd admitted to being in love with her—had such an instant crushing effect. It was something she'd never experienced before, and even though it turned out to be nothing, she was now terrified of having to feel that way ever again.

She'd been so thankful that she'd insisted on getting to the bottom of his relationship with Rita because she now had even more reason to keep moving slowly, but things had moved forward a bit. Nothing huge had happened, but there were small significant changes. Like after dinner now when they sat and watched television, she allowed for more snuggling.

And when he'd sneak in more nuzzling of her neck and ears as she cooked or even when they were in her darkroom when he claimed he wanted to learn how to develop photos, she wasn't so quick to put a stop to it. But it was always sweet and gentle. The only times things got heavy were their goodnight kisses, but she'd manage to fight the urge to just pull him in her room and do what she really wanted to do to him.

As much as her hunger to give in completely was getting harder to fight with every day that passed, there was something else that was quick to stop her in her tracks. She'd already seen it even before New Year's. She was becoming excessively dependent on him. While he had his boxing, his training, and his friends, she had little going on aside from him. If it hadn't been for Noah, she would've had the most pathetic and lonely holidays of her life.

Before her mother got sick, she'd never been like this. She had plenty of friends and colleagues. Her photography was a huge part of her life. She even had a blog specifically for her photos and which had even started to make some money. It'd been literally years since she last updated her blog and even longer since she'd uploaded any new photographs.

The fact that Derek had walked away when she'd become too engrossed in the care of her mother to focus on anyone or anything was a huge reminder of a bad habit she'd always had. When there was something big going on in her life, she tended to obsess about it to the point of neglecting everything and everyone else in her life in the process. Sure, her mother's illness should've been an understandable exception; it was still a perfect reminder of how she let one occurrence utterly control every other aspect of her life. She needed to learn how to balance everything now, before she made the same mistake again.

Of course, now everything was happening all at once. She'd gone back to work, she was reviving old friendships, old hobbies, and now Noah was a colossal distraction in the midst of all of it. She needed to get this right, so moving slow was her only option.

Even Nellie, who had disappeared on her for a few months, was back, and they had made a pact to get together at least once a week. She was determined to be able to not only handle but also enjoy even that small change in her life. Tonight was that night. They were getting together again for dinner.

Instead of going out, Nellie had made dinner for them. Rick was out of town on business, and they'd have the place to themselves. Since Veronica had hogged the conversation last week with her worries about Noah, she had every intention of letting Nellie do all the talking and spilling of her guts tonight.