She turned and headed back home, determined to rescue the date.
Twenty-Six
Now
Callie swallowed hard, throat tight. Had she just yelled,‘Well, maybe I do want to talk about it!’at Mae? Had she lost her mind? She was in no position to turn up at Mae’s flat and demand conversations about their past.
But she’d done it now. She was in it.
Mae’s eyes flashed. ‘Talk aboutwhat, exactly?’
That was a good repost, because it immediately put Callie on the back foot. But she had to answer. This might be her only chance to spit it out. ‘About, about, you know—’
But Mae wasn’t actually listening. She was raging. ‘You can’t just show up here with your camera crew and your old memories and y-y-yourfaceand act like I’m the one being unreasonable.’
‘Myface?’ Callie sputtered.
‘You know what I mean.’
‘I don’t!’
‘You—’ Mae threw up her hands, pacing two steps and back. ‘You make everything complicated just by being here. It’s like being eighteen again, and I don’twantthat.’
‘Maybe I don’t want to be eighteen again either!’ Callie shot back. ‘Maybe I came here to actually talk like I should have before—’
Mae laughed without humour. ‘You came here because youhadto. Because Neil said so. So don’t give me that.’
Callie’s chest felt tight, and her mouth opened. And out it came, the words slipping out before she could stop them. ‘Yes… I know that’s why I came back. But Iwantedit to happen.’
It was the truth. She had been scared. She had been sick. But she had wanted this. Wanted all of it.
‘I wanted to be pushed back to you. Because I never stopped thinking about you,’ she finished, tasting copper in her mouth.
Mae looked terrified. ‘Bullshit.’
‘It’s not!’
They were standing too close now. The argument had dragged them toward each other like gravity. Mae’s breath was uneven. Callie’s was worse.
‘You piss me off so much,’ Mae whispered. ‘You always did.’
‘Good,’ Callie whispered back, though she had no idea why.
Mae’s throat bobbed. ‘I hate this. I hate you being here.’
‘Then tell me to leave.’
‘Ishould.’
Callie waited. Then Mae grabbed the front of Callie’s coat. And Callie thought,Sweet Jesus, are we coming to violence?
And then Mae’s face crashed into Callie’s. But it wasn’t violence. Not completely.
Callie made a startled sound against Mae’s mouth as her hands flew up, gripping Mae’s waist like she was holding on for dear life. Was she shocked? She must have been. It didn’t really feel that way, though. It was more the sensation of total and utter relief.
It didn’t last long. Maybe seconds. Seconds that lasted forever and the blink of an eye.
When they broke apart, breathing like they’d run miles, Mae whispered, ‘What am I doing?’
