I had to grow up and start adulting at some point, so I moved into a one-bedroom apartment in the same complex where Danika and I had lived for the past two years. A single bedroom, where I could do whatever I wanted.
Alone.
By myself.
With no one else around.
I wouldn’t have even been in this situation in the first place if I hadn’t switched majors. It put me a full year behind, so when Danika graduated last year, I still had one more to go before I got my degree. It was my own fault, but I wasn’t too mad about it. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life, and this bought me a little more time before I felt like a complete loser.
I envied that part of Mac, even more so after our phone call. He had so much passion and drive. I never talked about anything in my life the way he talked about baseball.
I pondered that for a minute before remembering that I really freaking hated the quiet, so I started wearing a hole in the carpet by walking back and forth, trying to calm myself down. Turning on music didn’t help. Distracting myself with some stupid flying bird game on my phone wasn’t enough either. For the most part, I was fine during the day, but it was the nights that seemed to wreak havoc on my imagination.
Maybe I should ask my parents for one of their dogs. Something to cuddle with whenever I thought the boogeyman was going to murder me in my sleep. Or worse, while I was still awake.
Without thinking, I found myself in the kitchen, pulling out the ingredients I needed to bake some chocolate chip cookies—with sea salt flakes sprinkled on top, of course. Concentrating on baking seemed to quiet my mind even though I could do it with my eyes closed. Mixing and measuring helped me forget to be scared. Or that I was alone in a ground-floor apartment that anyone could access if they really wanted to. I glanced up at the giant sliding glass door that led to a small patio for only a second before checking my mixer, making sure the butter and sugars were thoroughly combined.
The only other time I could remember forgetting to be terrified was the night I’d spent hours on the phone with Mac after the draft. He confessed so many things about the state of his heart when it came to baseball that the fact that I was desperately alone in my apartment had completely slipped my mind. I loved getting to know him that way, and I honestly thought we’d shared something special during that conversation, but then the little jerk went and ignored me for the rest of the summer. All of my texts and messages went unanswered. Eventually, I stopped sending them. I could only take feeling like an idiot so many times. He’d gotten what he needed that night, and then he’d moved on like I’d never existed.
I shouldn’t have been surprised that Mac disappeared on me right after opening up. I had known exactly what kind of guy he was, and I’d gone and caught feelings for him anyway, against my own better judgment. Where all the other guys in the past had lied and spewed out promises and pretty words to get what they wanted, Mac had been open and honest right from the start.
There were no false pretenses with him. He gave you exactly what he told you he would. And then it was up to you to decide if you could handle it or not. When we’d first met, he’d let me know right off the bat that he wasn’t looking for anything serious and that he wasn’t boyfriend material. We’d made out all night, no strings attached, and I’d convinced myself that it had been refreshing to meet someone like him, someone who wasn’t lying just so they could get in my pants.
I’d even told Danika once that I respected Mac’s honesty. She’d laughed.
Laughed.
And then told me that I deserved more than a guy who wanted to make out and walk away in the same breath.
It was the truth. Of course I deserved more, but at the time, I pretended that it was enough. Then, he’d had to go and give me a peek at the real guy inside, and it’d wrecked me. I remembered hanging up the phone that night, shaking with the weight of his confessions, all