Chasing My Best Friend's Brother

Chapter 5

Friday night was here before Bianca knew what hit her. She had ended up emailing HR on Jen's recommendation and she thought she had a pretty good meeting with them that morning, and Greg had left her alone all day. It wasn't just her conversation with Jen that had convinced her to file the report but thoughts that had been creeping up into her dreams, giving her those haunting nightmares she had tried so hard to run from. The feelings that Greg had invoked in her the other day; the fear, the vulnerability, it was too similar to the way that Jack had made her feel all those years ago.

She had sworn to herself that she would never be in that kind of situation again and how could she break that promise to herself by letting Greg get away with harrassing her? A shiver worked its way up her body as it often did when she thought of he-who-she-would-prefer-not-to-name, but she wouldn't let him have that power over her anymore, and she wouldn't let Greg have that power either. Reaching this decision had her feeling a little bit lighter and that had her looking forward to having dinner with James. It would be nice to go out with a normal man that didn't make her skin crawl. She was walking towards their meeting spot and as promised he was there waiting for her on 33rd and they got hot dogs, chips, and pop then walked across the street to the park. They finally found a place to sit that overlooked the dog park section of the park.

"I have to say I'm kind of surprised you showed up." Bianca told him breaking the slightly uncomfortable silence that had fallen over them.

"Why? I told you I would meet you here I'm not in the habit of lying."

"I didn't mean to imply that you would have lied. I just thought you might have come up with some excuse not to come. This is only the third time we have ever hung out alone together and I'm not sure we should count the first time."

"Huh," James said, looking pensive for a moment. "I hadn't realized we've never been alone, but you're right Jen is always there."

"We can start a new tradition," she said, winking at him. "Hot dogs in the park every Friday."

"I don't know about that Bianca," he said slowly.

"Oh come on, not even as friends? I bet if Shawn asked you you would."

"Not at the moment," he responded as a dark look flitted over his face.

"Uh-oh trouble in paradise?"

"Do you really care, it doesn't seem like you're the biggest fan of Shawn."

"That might be true" she chuckled, "but, um, I care about you and I know he's your best friend so if it's bothering you, you can talk to me."

He looked at her for a few minutes before actually responding, which shocked the c.rap out of her, and she hoped didn't show on her face. "I'm not too thrilled with the way he acted Wednesday night. He's known Jen her entire life and he treated her like she didn't matter to him at all. I've kind of been avoiding him but we're going to have to talk. I just want to make sure I have myself under control before I do."

"Why's that?"

"Why's what?"

"Why do you need to have your head on before you talk to him? Let him see what a d.ouche he was in the way you approach him."

James laughed, "I guess that's one way I could go about it but it's not that simple."

"What's not simple though? Jen's your sister and he was an a.sshole to her. Let him know."

"Yes Jen is my sister, and I will always be on her side, always."

"But?" Bianca asked, sensing there was a but there.

He let out a rough sigh, "Shawn is more than my best friend. He's also my brother. He has seen me through some of the worst times in my life. I won't let him treat Jen like s.hit but I won't go off on him without talking to him about it first."

"I get it," and she did. It was hard when your fiends were acting like s.hit heads but that didn't mean you just abandoned them to their s.hit head ways, you helped them see the error of their ways instead. "It must suck feeling like you're in the middle of something between them."

"Maybe, but I feel like there's always been a little something between them."

"What do you mean?" She asked feigning innocence. She knew that Jen had a major crush on Shawn and she was curious to see if James knew that as well.

"As her best friend, and someone who has been around the two of them before I'm guessing you already know that Jen has a thing for Shawn. Honestly, I think she always has. But lately I've been noticing that he seems to have a little thing for her too. I don't know if he actually has a crush on her but I've seen the way he looks at her when he doesn't think I'm looking. And you should have seen how jealous he was when he came back to the club and you guys were down there dancing with that big oaf. He acted all concerned like Jen would need a save but he was jealous."

"Please tell me you're not subscribing to the whole, 'he's mean because he likes her' thing?"

"Not at all, I'm not even sure he realizes he's being mean. I think he's just that daft when it comes to her feelings."

"Well he's going to have to get his s.hit together or lose her that's for sure."

"Yeah."

"Anyway, let's not talk about them anymore I want to know about you."

"What do you want to know?"

"Everything." She said then cursed herself when she realized it sounded kind of breathless.

James gave her a skeptical look, "why?"

She looked down not sure how to answer him. Should she tell him the truth and scare him off or should she lie so he'll keep hanging out with her. F.uck it, she was going for the truth. "Because I think your incredible and I want to know everything about you."

"S.hit Bianca, you shouldn't say things like that."

"Why? It's true. James, I think you're-"

"You have to stop this." He said standing abruptly, "I already told you that nothing is going to happen between us. I'm too old and too f.ucked up for you. You've got to stop this."

"Oh please," Bianca scoffed right back at him. "You are only eight years older than me, that's hardly an age gap. And you're not f.ucked up. Something traumatic happened to you and that has had an impact on your life. Well buck up buttercup because s.hit happens, people get dealt s.hitty hands in life every single day. But you know what tough guy? They deal with it. They work through it and they move on. So if you don't like me fine, if you don't want to go on a date with me because you don't want to that's fine too. But don't act like you're too damaged or something for me because I'm not a little girl I can handle hanging out with a guy who isn't perfect."

He stood there looking at her with his eyes wider than she had ever seen. She would have laughed at the look on his face if this wasn't such a serious conversation. "I get what you're saying Bianca I do, so please try to understand that I do very much need to work on myself before I can entertain the idea of going out with you. You're right. I do have things I need to deal with and I haven't, which makes me less than perfect dating material right now."

She smiled at him, "at least you're not trying to make dumb excuses for not hanging out with me. That one I can accept, so friends?"

"Sure, friends" he told her shaking the hand she held out to him. Then before she could second guess herself she used their joined hands to pull herself closer to him and placed a gentle kiss on his cheek. She pulled back and started talking to him again before he could chastise her for what she did.

"Do you want to walk a friend home? It's starting to get dark and a woman in this city can never be too careful."

"Sure" he chuckled as they started to walk out of the park.

She could so do this, there was nothing wrong with taking things slow while he worked on himself, and she could even offer to help him if he needed it.