I’m so focused on the bushes and random trees where people could hide when I get home that I don’t pay close enough attention to the cars around me.
And that’s when the ambush happens.
I’m sitting in Ryker’s truck, taking a hot minute to pull up socials and see what Jake actually said about me, when the passenger door opens and the man who just wrecked my heart slides into the seat.
“Please,” he says in that posh British accent that still makes my vagina a little swoony, damn her. “Please, may I have two minutes of your time to explain myself and apologize?”
I squeeze my eyes shut tight and my legs shut tighter. “Go on. Say what you need to say so we can just get this over with.”
He inhales loudly, but he doesn’t immediately speak.
I count to five, staring at the last family picture we had taken before Mom and Dad died. It’s been the background of my phone for over eleven years now.
And I’m realizing it might be time to change it.
“Clock’s ticking,” I say, hoping my voice doesn’t sound froggy like I’ve been crying.
Simon takes another deep breath again, but this time, he fills the silence. “The day I met you is the day my entire world changed. I failed to recognize the magnitude of your impact on my life until I’d already begun changing the script so as to not resemble anything that would impede on your family’s privacy,but I was wrong to not tell you that you inspired me. I was wrong to not tell you that you inspired me in more ways than simply sparking the idea of a story that has shifted and woven its way into being something entirely different, and that I’ve nonetheless informed the studio I will not be delivering after all.”
The sun is beating through the truck’s windshield, heating the interior of the cab and making me a little sweaty.
Or possibly that’s the effect of Simon sitting next to me.
Saying all of the right things so far.
“It’s not simply your family’s tragedy, Bea. It’s you. You inspire me. Your determination to make anything work, good or bad, once you’ve got an idea in your head. The burger bus. Our revenge date against your wanker of an ex. Seeing to it that your brothers have every opportunity regardless of the time or expense required. The way you can so easily reassure me that I’m not a fuckup of a parent for having had your own experience. Your refusal to accept less than you deserve from those of us who want to exist in your orbit. You—you are the best person I have ever known, the only person who could make me believe in family, who could make me believe that I, too, belong in a family, and the best person to complement me and all of my own hang-ups and traumas and stubborn ideas.”
My breath wobbles.
My eyes burn.
I want to believe him.
I want to forgive him.
But I don’t know if I can trust him.
“You should have told me,” I whisper.
“I should have,” he agrees. “And I would very much like to make this up to you if you’ll let me. I want to prove to you that I can be the man you deserve. The man I’ve always been afraid to be, but the man that I know I need to be.”
If I sit in this truck one more minute, I’m going to start crying.
And I absolutely donotwant Simon to see me cry.
I don’t know if it’s my own pride not wanting him to see me hurt, or if it’s worry that he’ll feel worse if he sees me hurt, and that makes me mad too.
I don’t want to care if he’s hurt.
But I can’t help myself.
He’s still in there. In my heart.
My hopelessly romantic heart.
“I don’t know.”
It’s all I can force out without completely losing control of my emotions.
