The Overlap Read Online Free Page A

– “think long and hard about this before you actually do anything” were her exact words – and the reaction from my Dad was this disappointed head shaking, as if I had no idea what I was walking away from and would quickly regret that decision. Of the two of them I was more pissed at my mother for what she said, and I almost instantly snapped back with “Okay Mom, I’ll think about some ‘long and hard’ reasons I should stay with Andrew! You want details ?” But I didn’t...
    I suppose I shouldn’t have been surprised by their reaction since my parents met during their junior year in college up in Colorado and got married a month after they graduated, and have been together ever since. They always seem so happy with each other, too. In their world, I guess, someone lucky enough to wind up in the “right” college relationship should grab onto it and not let go, and all would be well with the world.
    What neither one of them realized was that my relationship with Andrew wasn’t necessarily “right,” instead it was... well, it just “was.” It had started off pretty strong, especially since he was much better in bed than any of the other guys I had been with during my first two years in college or in high school before then. About six months after Andrew and I got together, I was at a party one Saturday night when this other girl walked up to me; actually she staggered up to me because she was really drunk, just about falling down twice on the way. When she righted herself she began telling me that she had gone out with Andrew for about two months right after Christmas their freshman year, and then started telling me in detail about how good sex with him had been. Then she said something like “I would hang onto him if I were you, at least through college, just for the intense sex. He’s a lot better than most college guys are; even the older ones. Don’t take this like I’m thinking about trying to steal him from you, but lots of times I wish I were still sleeping with him every so often just for the sex.” (If I had indeed retorted back to my Mom’s “think long and hard” comment when I told her about planning to break up with Andrew, I guess I could have also added this other girl’s “endorsement” as a reason for staying with Andrew, and asked my Mom what she thought about that!)
    Anyway, the two years with Andrew were pretty good for the most part. Not just the sex; we had a lot of fun together. The summer we were both working in San Francisco we spent most weekends going on wine tours up in Napa and Sonoma, or taking long getaway drives both up and down the coast, or seeing the city. That summer had been a whole different dimension to our relationship than our time together during school and back in Phoenix, and had been fantastic.
    But like most second-half-of-college-years relationships, ours came with a built-in expiration date that was timestamped for sometime during the summer following graduation. Neither one of us really talked much about our future (or lack thereof) as our senior year ticked away towards commencement, though one time Andrew did bring up the idea of me asking the consulting firm to switch to being assigned to their Philadelphia office instead of L.A. I gave Andrew a half-hearted answer that I would check into it but didn’t think it was possible because I was slated to work in their Entertainment and Media practice which was based out of L.A. In fact, I had jumped at the chance for that particular job. The summer internship up in San Francisco had been fun, but they had me working mostly with computer industry clients and to be honest, the work itself was pretty boring. But Entertainment and Media? Epic!
    I never did check into switching to a Philadelphia-based job, and I’m pretty sure Andrew knew that I never did, even though I never explicitly told him so. So right around the first of June, about three weeks after graduation, we sat down and mutually decided