I feel bad. It was too soon for us. If we can just get back to California, slip into our normal life, everything will be okay. He’ll pick me up for dinner after my Wednesday class, and I’ll stay over on Friday night. We’ll visit his grandmother at the nursing home, and it’ll all be normal again.
Except, it won’t, because now I know things. Things like—
Holy fuck.
My stomach is gone, slipped right out through my feet. The throngs of people walking past me, suitcases rolling along behind them, turn to vapor. Through the mist I seehim. He’s six feet away, leaning on crutches, gaze fixed on me. His right leg sticks out in front of him, immobilized in a brace.
My head is thick and hazy, and now he’s coming over. Slowly. My breath slams up my throat at the same time I attempt to swallow the pooled saliva in my mouth, and I cough.
He stops inches from me, and I feel his heat. It might be twenty-seven degrees outside, but my body is an inferno. Only he can do this to me. Only Noah can take my world and shake it, emptying from it my secrets and fears, my insecurities and pleasures. It piles up around me like little mounds of coins.
“I’m a gimp, you know. You could’ve at least come to me.”
Noah leans into his crutches, his voice faintly playful. He doesn’t smile, but his eyes look full, like he has words and emotions in triplicate, and they might all come tumbling out in an instant.
“I…couldn’t.” It’s not enough, but I know he’ll understand. My shoulders lift a fraction and drop.
“I get it. I saw you first. I had more time to recover.”
My whole body wants to reach out, touch him, run my fingers over his lips. Two years since we last saw each other. Two years since I’ve felt him, smelled him, tasted him.
Noah, my heart screams.
“Are you okay?” I point to his leg.
“Yeah.” He looks down. “Torn ACL. During a game.”
When his gaze returns to mine, I see it. His vulnerability, the trademark confidence missing. It wrecks me.
“You didn’t see it?” His voice is soft, tinged with hope.
I know what he’s really asking.Do you watch me?And with the answer to that question comes a confirmation neither of us need.You still care.
“No,” I lie, looking out into the crowd of nameless faces. I saw his injury, but it’s best not to go down that road. Any question of residual feelings and it leaves us wide open to possibilities we should no longer have.
“Um, hi.” Matt’s voice bursts through my thoughts. “Here, Ember.” A bag of something lands on the seat beside me. Matt holds out a hand to Noah, and Noah shakes it. It takes Matt less than a second of looking straight at Noah to place him. “Shit! You’re Noah Sutton!”
Noah smiles tightly, pulling his hand away.
“Man, we were watching the game where you got hit.” Matt’s talking quickly, his excitement bowling over any desire to appear cool in front of his favorite soccer player. “That was low. That guy deserved more than a red card.”
Noah’s hair brushes his forehead with his nod. Murmuring his thanks to Matt, his eyes remain laser-focused on me. I shift, uncomfortable, and look away.Yes, I lied to you.
Matt comes to his senses and says my name. I meet his confused gaze. “Do you guys know each other?” He glances from me to Noah.
My legs finally feel strong enough to stand on, so I rise. Two pairs of eyes study me, waiting for my answer. “We went to high school together. Noah, this is Matt.” I gesture between them.
I’m trying not to let guilt flavor my words too much, but it’s there anyway. Matt and I watched the game where Noah was injured. Sort of, anyway. I don’t watch sports. Instead, I was curled up in the sheets of our hotel bed, reading a book. Every so often Matt leapt from the couch and yelled complaints at the game on the TV, and I looked up. He yelled when Noah was injured, even told me Noah was carted off the field, and I didn’t say a word. Not because I didn’t care. I spent the next day furtively looking up every article I could find about Noah’s injury, and still I didn’t tell Matt anything.
I could’ve told him I knew Noah. Matt wouldn’t have cared. He’s not the jealous type. The problem isme. I don’t speak about Noah. I don’t even allow myself to think about Noah. The knowledge that my one great love won’t be my forever love is too much for me, so I just don’t go there.
And yet, here he is, standing in front of me,again.
Noah sucks in a quick breath, but I don’t meet his eyes. What did he expect me to say?Matt, this is Noah Sutton, my high school boyfriend?I can’t reduce us to a juvenile relationship, personified by hand-holding at a Friday night football game and making out in someone’s parents’ car after a date. We were so much more than that.
I look to Matt, not Noah, because I can’t bear to see the hurt in his eyes. Matt’s not looking at me, though. He’s still star-struck by Noah.
“I need to find something for you to sign. The guys at my firm won’t believe me if I don’t have proof.” Matt grabs his bag off the seat and unzips the front section.
