Chapter 36: Inevitable Fallout
** Eli **
A whole day had passed since the last "practice session" with Harper, and Eli was still having a hard time recovering from it.
A hard time, indeed. He had spent almost an hour in the shower after Harper left last night. It felt mortifying to admit that, a whole decade after adolescence, he'd yet to see another day when he had to take care of his own needs. Even more mortifying to admit that the girl who triggered it was—
He grunted, still unable to wrap his own head around the thought.
He had known Harper for half of his life, ever since she was a little girl in ponytails bouncing around the house with her toys. Maybe the earlier years in one's memories tend to leave a stronger impression than the rest, or maybe he had simply been too close to Tyler to have empathized with his perspective ... Either way, Eli could swear that Harper had always been like a little sister to him, and nothing more. He had barely even registered her as a "woman" in the same way that he'd thought of all the others ... until now.
And now, as if seeing her in a completely new light for the first time, his body just suddenly decided to react. To want her. To ignore the fact that she was his best friend's sister, that she had clearly drawn the line and made it clear that their meetups didn't constitute dating, and want her. In a way that was even more eager than he had felt for any other women in recent memory.
It seemed pretty seriously messed up.
Eli got up from his sofa and strode into the dining room, planting himself in a dinner chair instead. He couldn't handle sitting on that sofa anymore without being reminded of last night, and he was almost getting hard again just thinking about it. Pretty seriously messed up indeed.
Unsure what he could use to distract himself from the unwanted thoughts, he glanced at his phone. Then he remembered that the notification from Harper's web novel update had come in a couple of hours ago, and he had made the mistake of trying to read it immediately. Two paragraphs in, he had realized in agony that the girl had almost transcribed their "lesson" word by word into the new Chapter, and that reading the entire scene was almost certainly going to lead him to another long shower. The rest would have to wait.
He ran a hand down his face. What a great situation he had gotten himself into. It had barely been two weeks since he got back in touch with Harper, yet so many things had already changed completely between them. And to think that he'd be visiting her company next week, trying to wipe such thoughts from his head while listening to her presentation ...
Yeah.
Speaking of the presentation, though ...