“Yes, sir!” Levi exclaimed, forgetting for the moment why he was sulking in his car to begin with. “Thank you, sir!”
The chancellor ended the call, and Levi threw open his door. His first instinct was to rush to Haddie’s classroom and try to catch her before her day began, but he stopped halfway through the parking lot.
Haddie.
They were supposed to have months to figure this out, and now they had weeks. What was he going to say to her now?Remember how I said I loved you but didn’t mean it? Well, funny thing. I did mean it, and I’m also leaving in four weeks.
Yeah, no. That was not a bomb he was going to drop on her minutes before her students arrived, and it certainly wasn’t one todrop before her team’s big game tomorrow.
So he’d wait one night. After her game, he’d simply put everything out in the open, and they’d figure it out together. Maybe it wasn’t a rock-star move, but it was the only move he could make.
Chapter 26
Haddie was still on cloud nine after yet another win, this time withthe home bleachers almost three-quarters of the way full. True to his word, Levi—with Emma’s help, she guessed—crafted another viral reel. And by viral, she meant locally viral, but still. It got both the boys’ and girls’ soccer teams to turn a high school hallway into a flash mob during one of yesterday’s passing periods, with Muskie—a.k.a. Levi—dancing along as the teams lip-synched Whitney’s “I Wanna Dance with Somebody.” It also go butts in seats for the game.
But the short ride home was filled with stilted stops and starts, just like yesterday.
“Super proud of you and the teams for another great effort at social media marketing,” she told Levi as he drove with both his hands on the wheel at a steady ten and two.
“Thanks,” he replied, pressing his lips into a smile that didn’t reach his eyes.
After several seconds of silence, Haddie added, “Should we celebrate the same way we did after your winning game?” She nudged him with her elbow. “I was thinking that the couch might be feelingleft out. Maybe instead of the dreaded decision between my bed and your bed,” she teased.
Levi shrugged. “Sure. Couch sex. Sounds good.”
The truck rolled to a stop in front of the hardware shop, and Haddie unfastened her seat belt so she could turn to face him.
“Hey…what is up with you this week?” she asked. “I thought things were going so well. Didn’t you?”
He sighed. “Can we talk upstairs? I really don’t feel like doing this in my truck.”
“Doing what?” she asked.
Levi groaned and finally turned to face her.
“Jesus, Haddie. I know my timing was shit, but I told you I loved you, and you bailed. Maybe not physically because I get that you are still here, and we are still us to a degree. But I can’t unsay what I said or unfeel what I feel, and I kind of get the feeling that you’re happier believing what is so obviously a lie.”
Haddie’s brows drew together and she shook her head, trying to make meaning out of what he was saying.
“I didn’t bail, Levi.” But her words came out more defensively than she’d intended.
“You disappeared from the bed the first chance you got and literally froze when I touched you until I told you to forget what I said.”
Haddie laughed, not that anything about this was funny. “There is no way you love me after knowing me for a month.”
“Why not?” Levi threw his head against the back of his seat. “I’ve spent more time with women I don’t love even after knowinga week in that I wasn’t committed for the long haul. Why can’t I know with you that I am?”
Haddie held her hands up in surrender. “This is the dumbest argument. Let’s just go upstairs, maybe have a drink to celebrate, and then I can remind you why we work so well with things the way they were before you said what you think is true but actually isn’t.”
She hopped out of the truck and through the doorway that led up to their apartment before he had a chance to respond.
They weren’t in love. Haddie had only agreed to try an actual relationship. If she let the L word into the picture, then it was only a matter of time before someone got hurt, and she was starting to think that Emma had it all wrong, that the someone in question wasn’t Levi…but her.
Haddie heard Levi jogging up the stairs behind her. She stopped only to grab the mail from in front of their door and then strode inside.
“Haddie…” Levi called from behind her, following her into the kitchen where she was sorting the mail into piles on the counter.
She stopped when she got to a thick envelope made of strong paper stock. She was staring at a hand-written message on the back above an embossed university seal.
