“Thanks,” she mumbles and reaches for the door handle.
“Wait—” I snap and she gives me a look before I get out of my car. I go around the front and through the windshield her brown eyes are wide saucers that I can’t seem to read.
I open the passenger side door for her and she’s looking up at me with the same wide eyes, and I don’t know what to say or do. I’ve always opened the door for her. The door on the ferris wheel, the door to our old apartment, the door to my old car, the shower door when she’d join me, the door of anything we’ve ever gone into or out of.
I reach out my hand hoping she’ll take it and let me help her.
She doesn’t. She gets out on her own and I drop my hand, putting it in my pocket and feeling that sting in my chest.
I close the door after her and lean against the car. “Thanks,” she says again.
“I know where you live now,” I quip.
“I knew this was a mistake,” she sighs, opening her small purse and taking out her keys.
“Was it?”
“It is if you become a deranged stalker.”
I huff a laugh and cross my arms. “I’m not a stalker.”
“Give it some time,” she says. “I already see it happening.”
“I don’t mind the chase.”
“Oh, I remember.”
I arch a brow. “Do you?”
“Impossible to forget when all you did was beg me to go on a date with you.”
I scoff. “I didnotbeg.”
She guffaws. “Sure.”
“But I’m willing to beg now.”
“Beg or grovel?” Lana crosses her arms now and cocks her hip, her brow high and waiting.
“Both.”
“It’s not that easy, Christian.”
“Say it again,” I say quickly, without even thinking.
“It’s not that easy.”
“No, not that.” I push off the car and take a few steps until I’m towering over her, her head tilted back. “My name.”
Her breath hitches. “No.”
My hands flex and clench, aching to touch her and hold her. To mold themselves to the curves and dimensions of her body to reacquaint themselves. To hold proof of her existence.“Why not?”
“I don’t like your name.”
My lip twitches. “Liar.”
“Goodnight,” she says, her exhale shaky, “Christian.”
