Beyond Walls

Chapter5

“Isla Monroe. Did you just call me gorgeous and admit you’ve thought about dating me?”

Her face went nuclear. “That’s what you got from that entire speech?”

“Oh, I got all of it. But those were my favorite parts.” He set down his beer, turned so they were facing each other fully.

“Want to know what I think?”

“Do I have a choice?”

“Not really.” He stepped closer, not crowding, just… present. “I think you’re used to putting yourself in boxes. Work Isla. Friend Isla. Daughter Isla. Each one with rules and expectations and appropriate behavior. And you’re excellent at it. You excel at being what you’re supposed to be.”

“That’s a criticism?”

“No, an observation. But here’s the thing.” His voice dropped lower, more intimate. “I don’t want you in a box, Isla. I don’t want the version of you that’s appropriate or expected. I want the version that eats three cookies and laughs too loud and looks at my paintings like they matter. The version that gets excited about consumer behavior analysis and stays too late at work because you love what you do. The version that stood in my doorway last week looking terrified and brave at the same time.”

Her heart was doing that complicated thing again. “Damien.....”

“You asked which version of me is real. They all are. I contain multitudes, or whatever that poem says. So do you. And yeah, I think you’re attractive as hell, and yes, part of me wants to find out if you kiss the way I imagine you do. But more than that?” He reached out, tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear, a gesture so casual and intimate it made her breath catch. “I like you. The real, complicated, won’tt-fit-in-a-box version of you. I like talking to you. I like the way your face lights up when you talk about work. I like that you bite your lip when you’re nervous and that you drink your coffee black and that you’re simultaneously confident and uncertain in the most interesting ways.”

Isla couldn’t breathe. She couldn't think. “I’m not good at casual.”

“Who said anything about casual?” Damien said.

“You literally just told me you don’t do relationships,” said Isla

“I said I don’t do them well. That’s different from not being willing to try.” He smiled, soft and a little vulnerable. “And for what it’s worth? I’ve been running away from you too. Every time I see you, every conversation we have, I feel myself getting interested in ways I usually avoid. You scare me a little bit, Isla Monroe. In the best way.”

She should walk away. Should thank him for his honesty and retreat to her apartment and the safety of her routines. Should not stand here on this rooftop with the lights of the city around them and let herself believe that this could be anything other than complicated.

But god, she was so tired of being confused.

“I don’t know how to do this,” she admitted quietly.

“Do what?”

“This. Whatever this is. I don’t know the rules.”

“Then let’s make our own.” He held out his hand, palm up, offering. “Start simple. Be friends. Real friends. Hang out, talk, spend time together without the weird tension of trying to figure out if we’re flirting or being neighborly or what.”

“You think we can do that?” She looked at his offered hand, then back at his face. “Just be friends?”

“Honestly? Probably not.” His grin was crooked, self-deprecating. “But we can try. And if it becomes more, then it becomes more. And if it doesn’t, at least I’ll have a friend who laughs at my jokes and tells me when I have paint on my neck.”

“You have paint on your neck right now, by the way.”

“See? Already valuable.” He kept his hand extended. “What do you say?”

Isla looked at his hand. At his face. At the hope and uncertainty there that probably matched her own.

She took his hand.

“Friends,” she said.

His fingers closed around hers, warm and solid. “Friends.”

“With no weird tension.”

“Absolutely none.”

“And no late-night wine-fueled confessions about how attractive we find each other.”

“That ship has sailed, but sure, we can pretend.”

She laughed, and something in her chest loosened. They sat. They talked. Hours passed without Isla noticing, the conversation flowing from work to art to childhood memories to the best pizza places in the city. The string lights turned on by themselves at some point, making everything look warm and cozy, and it felt like they were in their own little world up here.

When they finally said goodnight and parted at their respective doors, Isla got ready for bed with a smile she couldn’t hide. Friends. It was a good plan. A safe plan.