The Girl in Blue

28- The Girl Gets Sneaky

Sutton

"This is a really bad idea," I mumble, more to myself than to Devon, who is sitting across from me in the union as we have lunch together.

"No, it's a really good thing," He assures me quickly. "It's good to see you again, Sutton."

"Yeah," I sigh, leaning back in my chair. I have a salad in front of me, only nibbled at, because I'm not really hungry. I know that this is a bad idea, despite what Devon claims, because we're broken up and we have been for a while. We're done, we shouldn't be having lunch like we're friends because we're not. I didn't even tell Jonah about this, which makes this even a worse idea. The whole thing makes me feel nauseous and I shouldn't have agreed to it in the first place.

"Well, anyway, how have you been with your classes?" He asks me.

"Classes have been good," I confirm with a nod. "Keeping me busy but I'm keeping up with everything. What about you?"

"Busy. As always," He comments and then he takes a bite of his chicken taco. "The department is in the running for a grant so I've been helping the grad students write the proposal."

"That's impressive," I say. "Congratulations."

"It's only impressive if we get the grant," He says, being his typical competitive self. "It's to facilitate the research of robotics to help prevent and treat diseases. I won't be in charge of the research but I'm hoping that they'll let me assist if I schmooze them enough."

He's starting to go off on his tangent about robotics which he has always been so passionate about. His eyes are lighting up in the way that I use to love. I always loved watching him talk about his electronics because of how he lights up like this just thinking about his studies. Well... I did love it until it destroyed our relationship.

"Jonah is getting out of class soon, I should go," I realize as I look at the time on my phone.

"Right, sure," He clears his throat and takes another bite of his food. "Well, hey, it was really great seeing you again, Sutton. Maybe we can do it again?"

"I don't think that's a good idea," I shake my head. Jonah doesn't know that I've met with Devon today and I'm not going to tell him. He doesn't need to know, it's not like anything happened with Devon. I just think that he wouldn't appreciate it and he'd probably get the wrong idea if I told him. "I've told you that I have a boyfriend and I don't want to give him the wrong idea."

"I'm not trying to complicate things," He insists again. "And I'm not trying to steal you away from your boyfriend. I've just been missing you lately. If you change your mind, text me maybe?"

I get up from the table and gather my things so that I can meet Jonah after his class gets out in a few minutes in the building across the courtyard. "I will think about it," I tell him just to make things easier and then I'm leaving the union. It was nice seeing Devon again because it reminded me of all of the good times that we had. It was nice to see his eyes light up like they do when he gets passionate about what he's talking about. I've missed it.

But it'd be weird if we became friends—especially with Jonah in the picture—and I don't want things to get weird. I also don't want to sabotage this wonderful thing that I have with Jonah. It's not as intense as what I had with Devon but that's only because we're still in the beginning stages of our relationship. I really like Jonah and I know that we'll get there.

It's cold outside so I wait for Jonah right inside the door of the building that he has class in and I stay out of the way out of all of the other students going in and out of the building. When I see him, we greet each other with a quick kiss before heading out into the nipping cold.