Her voice is small, and it almost sounds like her response comes out as a question rather than an answer. There’s something else she’s unsure about, and I need to know what it is.
“It sounds like there’s a ‘but’ coming.”
She shakes her head quickly, stepping toward me with her hand stretched out toward me, but she pulls it back again before it can land on my arm. “No. I just… I was worried you’d wake up this morning and feel like it was a mistake.”
Ouch.
That hurts to hear. Not because ofme, but because she’s so inclined to think that way. Her first reaction to…what happened last night is to think that somehow, I regretted all of it. It hurts to know that she thinks everyone will always regret her. I could never regret her.
I don’t know what to say for a moment; I’m so terrible with words, and I don’t want her to interpret what I’m saying the wrong way, but I don’t want to hesitate long enough to make her think that what she’s saying is true to how I feel. Words just aren’t coming to me; my brain is empty. So, finally, after almost too long, I decide to do something else entirely.
I shakily reach both of my hands up to cup her face, pulling her to me as I press my lips to hers. She doesn’t breathe for a moment, she doesn’t even move; it takes her brain a second to catch up as I kiss her slow and steady. It’s like I can hear the cogs clicking into place in her mind as her hands grasp onto my wrists, and she pushes up to her toes to deepen the kiss.
She tastes of mint and vanilla, and I savor it a bit before pulling away, still holding her face in my hands as I look down at her. I want her to hear me, I want her to see that I’m serious about what I’m about to say.
“I don’t regret anything,” I whisper.
“You don’t?” she squeaks.
Shaking my head, I rub my thumbs along her cheekbones. Her eyes flicker between mine and my lips, like she’s thinking about what to say or do, before her hands slide down from my wrists, dropping to her sides.
“But you might,” she breathes, trying to pull her head from my grasp to stare down at the floor, but I hold her steady, “later on down the road. Maybe you’ll realize that I was a mistake.”
“Maeve…” I rasp, my head shaking back and forth tentatively as I try to gather the words to tell her what I feel in my chest. My mind. “You’re not a mistake. Not to me.”
“I’m always a mistake.” She tries to laugh off the comment, but it falters when she realizes that I don’t think it’s funny.
“The l-longer you keep…feeling this way about yourself because of him,” I whisper, pausing as I gulp, “the longer he will have this power over you. From where I stand, I-I…I don’t think he really knew you at all.”
This time, she does pull away from my grasp. Her eyebrows are drawn so close together, I’m terrified I’ve said the wrong thing.
“I didn’t mean it li?—”
“And you think that you do?”
I blink down at her, immediately regretting ever saying anything. I should’ve kept my mouth shut like I normally would have.
“I know you enough to know that…none of the things you say about yourself are true.” My hands fidget nervously by my sides as I speak. “Things that he had to have planted in your head. Someone like that… They don’t love you. Someone who loves you would never do that to you.”
Foot, insert in mouth, again.
“And what doyouknow about love?” she croaks, narrowing her eyes weakly up at me. “Hmm? Statistics? There’s more to it than facts and knowledge, Tate.”
“Okay.”
That’s all I can say, because I’m scared I’m going to dig my grave so deep, I won’t be able to crawl back out again.
The angry scowl on her face quickly softens into a more somber frown as she peers up at me, her shoulders sagging as she takes a deep breath and drags a hand down her face.
“I’m sorry.”
Shaking my head, I say, “No.I’msorry… I shouldn’t have?—”
“No,” she interrupts swiftly, stepping toward me hesitantly. “I overstepped saying that to you. It was mean, and I didn’t mean that. I’m sorry.”
“I…overstepped, too.” My head drops as I glance down at the ground, chewing at my lip a moment as I think about how to word what I want to say. “I shouldn’t have thrown all of that advice on you like that. It’s your experience, not mine, and you are entitled to feel how you feel. Don’t let me or anyone else try to tell you otherwise.”
Maeve cocks her head and her dark eyes somehow soften even more at my words, before she’s flinging her arms around my waist. Pressing her face into my chest, she squeezes me tightly.
