I'm In
"Hey, Lin?" Bob's whisper broken the stillness of the night.
"She's sleeping," Linda mumbled in response.
"Why don't we just run away together?" he asked. She sighed and rolled over onto her back.
"Because you hate running," she answered. "Go back to sleep."
"No, I'm serious," he said. "I looked at this place a few days ago. I have just enough savings to make the deposit. It could be perfect for us."
Linda laid there for several seconds without moving or saying anything.
"Lin? Did you fall back to sleep?"
She pushed herself up into a sitting position on her bed, turning on the nearest lamp and putting her glasses back on. He sat up as well.
"This is not the kind of conversation you have at three in the morning, Bob," she told him.
"Sorry."
"You're really serious?" she asked.
"Well, yeah," he said. "What's stopping us?"
Linda frowned and looked at her left hand where her engagement ring was supposed to be. She supposed the day of reckoning couldn't be put off forever, but she certainly hadn't planned on needing to make a decision in the middle of the night like this.
"I- I love you, Linda," Bob started talking again. "I know we haven't been seeing each other for that long, and I know I don't have much. After I put the deposit down on this place I'll have even less, but I want to share this with you."
The look in his eyes was too intense, and she had to turn away for a moment to think. It would break Hugo's heart if she up and left like that. Her mom and dad would probably be just about ready to kill her once they learn about it. Leaving a guy they wholeheartedly approved of for one they never even met. It was crazy. She wasn't crazy. And yet …
She was already cheating on Hugo. She was already doing something her parents would disapprove of. Really, in a way, she already did run away with Bob, in all but the very literal sense. And it felt so right, in a way that it never really did with Hugo, though she hated to admit it. Hugo was safety and security. He knew where he was heading and he didn't ask questions. He could provide for her financially. But Bob, he had a vision, he had goals to achieve and things to prove. He had talent and spark. And in that way, he could provide things that Hugo never could.
"I mean, I can show you the place first," Bob went on. Linda blinked and returned to the present, and wondered how long Bob had been talking while she was lost in her own thoughts. "You shouldn't have to make a decision without seeing it. It wouldn't be fair-"
She held up one hand to stop him.
"It would take up your whole savings?" she asked.
"Yes."
"You're willing to give all of that up for this?"
"Yes."
Linda held his gaze for a couple seconds. She knew how long he had worked to save up all of that. And he was willing to lay it all down for a dream. A dream that included her.
"This is without a doubt the stupidest plan you've ever had," she told him. "Of course I'm in."
She swore the grin he gave her when she said those words could outshine the sun.