Elizabeth looks at me, a myriad of emotions on her face. “You don’t have to do that.” She starts chewing on her thumbnail. I grab her hand away from her mouth and place it on the table.
“I want to. I don’t want you to have to do that by yourself. Whenever you need me, I’ll be there for you, Elizabeth. Always. Therefore, I’m coming with you.”
She nods. “I’d like that. Very much. Thank you, Ryder.” She looks down at our hands and I can feel the mood shift around us. “Ryder?”
“Hmm?”
“Would you like to go out on a date with me?”
Holy shit! Did she just ask me out?
“What?” I state a little too loudly. My heart thuds triple count.
She focuses her sage green sight on me, and I’m instantly caught. “Go out on a date,” she repeats. “With me.”
I can only stare at her. My brain has fritzed out and all I can think is,Holy shit.
“Ryder?”
“What about Jay?”
“What about Jayson? I’m not asking him out. I’m askingyouout.”
There it goes again. My heart speeds up to quadruple time now.
Ten years of my life I’ve spent pining for Elizabeth. I spent almost half of that time watching from the sidelines after Jayson claimed her. Forced to watch all the times he held her and kissed her. All the times I loved her and couldn’t be with her. All the times Elizabeth and I would collide back together, being pulled toward one another by buried feelings that we were forced to suppress because of that one night Jay went behind my back and stole her away from me. The night when she chose him because she didn’t know I was in love with her too.
Now it seems fate has given me a second chance. I think back to what Fallon said to me at the track, and I understand now. I’m being given a second chance with Elizabeth. But that chance may come at a price.
Elizabeth has no memory of what she and Jayson were to each other. What happens if I say yes and her memory comes back? Will she leave me and go back to him? Will I be able to survive it again? Am I brave enough to take this chance? Jay sure as hell is not going to stand by and watch me and Elizabeth date. A selfish part of me doesn’t care. Jay destroyed that nexus of our friendship years ago when he listened to me confess my feelings for Elizabeth, then ran immediately off and professed his love to her. He kissed her. He claimed her. I may have stepped aside, but I have never forgiven him for doing that. I also have never stopped loving Elizabeth.
“It’s fine. I understand if you don’t feel the same way. I apologize if I was too forward,” Elizabeth says quietly and gets up from her chair.
Do something, I yell at myself. Do not let her leave. Do not let her walk away. Don’t be a stupid asshole. Grab ahold of this gift that you have wanted so much, for so long, and take it.
It’s funny how random thoughts pop into your mind at unexpected moments. I remember Elizabeth’s words from the night she came to me after her fight with Jay. The night she chose to kiss me for the first time. The night she chose to stop fighting her feelings about us.
I’m done letting everyone make choices for me. I won’t do it anymore. How do I know what I want if I’m never given a choice, never given a chance to decide for myself?
Right now, she’s making a choice. A choice that is all hers. And she’s choosing me. Not Jayson. Not Julien. Me.
My hand snatches hers and I pull her back down to her chair.
“Yes.”
“Yes?” she asks, a glimmer of hope and happiness in her word’s inflection.
I pull her chair closer to mine and lean in to cup her cheek, rubbing my thumb across its silkiness and reveling in the fact I get to touch her like this.
“Yes,” I tell her with more clarity and determination. “I would love to take you out on a date. But we need to be careful, Elizabeth. Jayson and Julien aren’t going to understand. Especially Jayson.”
“I don’t want to cause any problems between the three of you. It’s like I told Julien. I feel it, that thing that’s between us, and I’m pretty sure you do, too.”
“I do,” I say, acknowledging the truth.
“These past weeks with you, Ryder, have made it clear to me just how much I like being with you. How badly I want to be with you,” she clarifies, “and I would like to be able to explore that…with you. I can’t remember my past, but I would like to start living in my present. I would like it to be with you.”
I continue to caress her cheek with my thumb and she tilts her head, her eyes fluttering close, a sigh escaping her full heart-bow lips. Lips I am dying to kiss.
