How You Get the Girl

Don't Give Up on Me

I went home at the end of the day and went up to my room. My mom was at her garden club meeting. She wouldn't be home for another few hours. I thought about stalking Ben on social media but decided to do something more mentally healthy, so I pulled my laptop out of my backpack and poked around on the internet. I watched cat videos on YouTube. I played a few games of solitaire. I looked at shoes. The doorbell rang. I ignored it. The UPS guy could come back later. It rang again. I still ignored it. No one ever just came to the door, it had to be the UPS guy. It rang a third time and I got up. Maybe it was one of the neighbors? Then my phone buzzed. I looked down at it. It was a text message from Ben. My heart skipped a beat or three.

Ben: Let me in Harper

Harper:?

Ben: I'm outside your front door.

I stared down at my phone for a minute. Then I slowly walked downstairs. Ben was here? Did I want Ben to be here? He had ignored me all week. I had really wanted to talk to him and he had ghosted me. I had tried to apologize and he had ignored me. That had been mean. I was not really happy with him right now. I needed to have some self-respect, didn't I? He couldn't just ignore me and expect I would be waiting around when he was ready to talk, could he?

Oh, who was I kidding? Of course, I wanted to see him. I was dying to see him but I was not going to make it completely easy for him. I opened the door.

"Can I come in?" he asked.

I nodded and stepped aside, leading the way up to my bedroom.

I sat down on one end of my bed and he sat on the other. I decided to wait for him to speak. I had always been the first one to say anything when things happened between us. This time it was his turn.

"Harper, I don't want to lose you. I love you."

"What did you say?" I asked. The haze in my brain suddenly clearing.

"I love you," Ben answered.

"You do?" I squeaked.

"Harper, I've been in love with you for a long time now," he said as if I should have known it.

"You have? Why didn't you say anything?" I asked, flustered.

He looked at me in exasperation. "It's not that easy to say. I didn't want to scare you by saying it too soon. And then something always seemed to happen," he said.

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"First Clare showing up, then you started talking about sleeping together. I didn't want you to tell you then because I didn't want you to think I was telling you I loved you to make you want to get back together or just because I wanted to have sex with you. But I've realized that if I wait for the perfect moment I'll never get the chance to tell you. So, I'm telling you now. I love you. I've loved you since you took me on that ridiculous friend date."

"I almost told you a bunch of times too," I confessed. "I think I've loved you since the beginning. I was just never brave enough to admit it." And then I added as almost an afterthought, "And why was our friend date ridiculous?"

"Because no one goes on friend dates. Your either together or your're friends. You confused the hell out of me," Ben answered.

"But you couldn't have started seeing me then. You were with Clare." I said. Oops, that kind of slipped out.

Ben rubbed his hand over his face. "Harper, Clare and I were together for a total of three days in February and I wasn't seeing anyone else. I was too busy falling for you to pay attention to anyone else."