I'd like to thank my beta Mike for being so great and helping me with this. Thanks for the reviews and please keep them coming :)
"So, how did it go?" She asked with a squirmy expression. He smiled a little. Any other girl would've been hoping for it to be a soap opera break up. For entertainment purposes only.
"At first she didn't even believe me."
"What? How? Why?" She looked really confused.
"I met her and then I told her it was over. I had fallen in love with someone else. She didn't believe me. She said I was too much of a playboy to have fallen in love."
Her expression turned from confusion to shock and then to curiosity.
"Who is the lucky girl?" She asked with well hidden bated breath. Alicia hoped she looked just intrigued, but she really wanted him to say it was her. Not that she wanted him to be so serious so soon, but she liked him and was afraid to let herself feel anything further than that only to end up being one more of his flings and one-night-stands. Such a statement would make it easier to think it wouldn't turn out that way.
He shrugged, shaking his head. "I, ah, no one. I told her that because it would be easier and more definitive than to say I wanted my college freedom. Only it backfired and it took her a while to believe it.
Will's expressions when he told Alicia this were confusing. He started to say one thing then changed it. He looked up at the ceiling at first then down to the floor. He was nervous and it showed, but why? Was he scared? Of what? This was not like the confident bachelor she had come to care for. He acted like he, could it be? He would have to say the words!
"Oh… ah… good… thinking?" Alicia really hoped she sounded a lot more convincing saying this aloud than in her head; that Will couldn't notice how disappointed she was.
A weird silence filled the room.
Luckily Will soon broke it.
"So, how was your Christmas break? I hope less awkward than mine, with Helena everyday at my house after the break up. Because of course, Sarah had to become best friends with her. Our friendship has nothing to do with you guys. Stop being so selfish, she's spending Hanukkah with us because her family is in Bali. I swear she was doing it on purpose only to piss me off. Sorry, your Christmas?" He smiled.
"Oh, you know, my mom has a new boyfriend, that she swears is the one. Owen was… well, being Owen. Very annoying, wanting to know everything about law school, especially about my love life…"
*Cough* "Lack of" *Cough*He mocked.
"Hey, I have been on dates. I just prefer to concentrate on my studies. "
"Correction, date. You've only gone out with that Introduction to Law guy. You have to enjoy your junior year, Alicia. It's only going to get worse. And sometime I would like to meet Owen, you speak so much about him… he seems cool."
"Yeah, I think you two would really get along. Criticizing my prioritizing values and playing matchmakers for me." At this, he chuckled. "And I'm not like you. I think it's better to wait for the right person and not waste time fooling around."
He made a face that screamed 'absurd' and said: "Since when is having fun a waste of time? Plus, you have to know what's on the market, know variety. If you marry the first person you date, you end up being 40 years old regretting all the interesting people you didn't go out with, wondering what if. My motto is: Do, so you regret the things that you did, not the things you didn't do."
"Wow, very philosophic. And just a lame excuse to sleep around." She always made him laugh.
"Yeah, well, it works. With most girls." He raised his eyebrows and smiled in a seductive way and she laughed.
"I do not believe you. That you actually tell this stuff to girls. No, that, I can believe – based on some of the things I've been told myself – but that they fall for it. So you really plan on settling down? Will Gardner, the heartbreaker?"
"I do. When the right girl comes along."
He gave her a look and that weird silence took over the room once again.