Stuck with You (The STEMinist Novellas #2) by Ali Hazelwood

            I groan. “I really wish I had the emotional fortitude to hang up on you.”

            “But you don’t. What I’m saying is, maybe Erik will decide that you’ll make for a terrible girlfriend who overreacts and is more trouble than you’re worth. Maybe he’ll decide that he wants to bitch about you on the relationship subreddit. But if you cut him out like you did three weeks ago, you’d just be making this decision for him.”

            I blink, confused, suddenly remembering why I went into engineering. Logarithmic derivatives are so much easier than this relationship shit. “What do you mean?”

            “Sadie, I know you like this guy a lot. I know that if he does decide that he doesn’t want you in his life it’s going to hurt, and that you’re tempted to preemptively pull back to protect yourself. But if you don’t at least give him a chance to choose you, you’ll lose him for sure.”

            I nod slowly, trying to think past the hard knot in my throat. Letting the idea—go for it, just go for it, ask for what you want, be brave—slowly seep through me. Remembering Erik. Remembering the breeze hanging between us on a park bench, on a deserted sidewalk. The way my stomach fluttered at the feelings it carried. Of possibilities. Of maybe.

            This is my new happy place, Erik murmured into the shell of my ear the second time we had sex that night. And then he pushed my sweaty hair away from my forehead, and I looked up at him and thought, His eyes are the exact color of the sky when the sun shines. And I always, always loved the sky.

            “You’re right,” I say. “You’re so right. I should go to him.”

            Hannah smiles. “Well, it’s actually what, one a.m. in New York? I was thinking more of a phone call tomorrow morning. Around ten.”

            “Yes. I should go to him right now.”

            “That’s the exact opposite of—”

            “I gotta go. Love you.”

            I hang up and bounce out of bed, looking for a jacket and my phone. I start ordering an Uber, except—shit. I know where Erik lives, but not his address. I run to the door, simultaneously looking for my keys and typing the closest landmark to his apartment that I can recall. How the hell do you spell—

            “Sadie?”

            I look up. Erik is standing in my open door. Erik, in all his tall, unsmiling, Corporate-Thorship splendor. Wearing the same clothes he had on when I left him plus a light jacket, his hand up in midair and clearly about to knock.

            “Are you going somewhere?”

            “No. Yes. No. I . . .” I take a step back. Another. Another. Erik stays right where he is and my cheeks burn. Am I hallucinating him? Is he really here in Astoria? In my apartment? I hear a loud thunk, and my keys are on the linoleum floor. I need a nap. I need a seven-year nap.

            “Here.” He bends down to pick up the keys, pauses for a second to study my soccer ball key chain, and holds them out to me. “Can I come in for five minutes? Just to talk. If you feel uncomfortable, the hallway’s okay, too—”

            “No. No, I . . .” I clear my throat. “You can come in.”

            A brief hesitation. Then a nod as he steps in and closes the door behind himself. But he doesn’t move any farther inside, stopping in the entrance and simply saying, “Thank you.”

            I was coming to you, I open my mouth to say. I was on my way to tell you many, many confusing things. But the surprise of seeing him here has frozen my bravery, and instead of flooding him with the impassioned speech I would have typed on my Notes app in the Uber, I just stare. Silent.

            For fuck’s sake, what is wrong with me—

            “Here,” he says, holding out a phone. His phone.

            Uh? “Why are you giving this to me?”

            “Because I want you to look through it. The passcode is 1111.”

            I glance at his face. “1111? Are you joking?”

            “Yeah, I know. Just ignore it.”

            I snort. “You can’t ask me that.”

            He sighs. “Fine. You are allowed one comment.”