I frowned, my heart aching at the pain in his tone. “You have nothing to apologize for.”
“I do.” He held onto me tighter. “I never meant to be like this in front of you.”
“If you can’t be like this in front of me, then who else?” I buried my fingers in his hair, trying to distract myself from the blur of tears in my eyes. “We’re together, aren’t we?”
He remained quiet. The hum of the heater turning on, filling the cracks in between our conversation.
“Aren’t we?” I repeated, feeling a little more desperate as I nudged the top of his head with my nose.
David readjusted, pushing himself up so that his head rested beside mine on the pillow. “I want to be.”
I tucked my hands underneath the side of my face, trying to make out the outline of him in the darkness. “So then, we are.”
“Is it that easy?” He spoke so low I wanted to reach out and touch the curve of his lips to feel the words.
“Why wouldn’t it be?”
“Because nothing ever really is.”
“We could be,” I whispered. “Don’t you think?”
The hope in my voice couldn’t be hidden, nor could my uncertainty. The decade between us had proven one thing and one thing only: we were very good at being each other’s villain.
No hint of fondness had snuck its way in between us until this semester. The ground on which we tread was untested. We couldn’t stake promises here. He was too logical to stake dreams. And I was too cowardly to stake hope.
Instead of answering, David kissed me. It wasn’t hot and desperate like the ones before. This kiss revealed an ache for something deeper, a longing for something that may never come to fruition.
I answered the pressure of his lips with evidence that I wanted him, this, and us, that I would never hold what I saw tonight against him. His pain wasn’t something I stocked up on to be used as ammunition any longer.
“I think this part of me,” he said against my lips. “Will be difficult for you. If you see me like this enough times, you’ll get lost in the dark along with me. We can’t help each other if we’re both lost.”
I shook my head, rejecting his reasoning. “I’d rather be lost together than alone.”
“I’d rather be alone than hurt you anymore than I already have.”
My eyes stung at his confession. “So… what the hell does that mean? Are you… are we…”
David pulled me into his chest. It wasn’t until my cheek pressed against his shirt that I realized my tears had finally shed. The damp cotton softened underneath my confusion.
“Let’s sleep.” David rubbed my back, trying to calm my trembling. “We need rest.”
“I can’t sleep.” I gripped his shirt, pulling it closer to my nose so I could breathe every bit of him in. This may be the last night he let me do it, the last time he let me in.
“I don’t know how you could right now,” I said, resentment sharpening every word on my tongue. “How could you even consider sleep after what you just said?”
“I’m not taking this lightly.” David matched my tone. “I’d never take this lightly?—”
“Then why would you say something like that?” I pulled out of his grasp and sat up. My hands shook as I shoved off the blanket, the heat of the bed too much to manage along with my anger. “Why would you ever say something like that and expect me to close my eyes and wait for the resolution tomorrow? David, do you understand what you’ve done to me this year? I can’t wake up without wanting to hear your voice. I can’t read a book without wanting to know what you’d think. I can’t laugh without wanting you to do the same.”
I sucked in a breath, so ashamed at how quickly I’d fallen or how deeply these feelings for him had rooted within my core. Uprooting would take years. Healing the wound would take longer.
“Yara,” David said firmly. He’d sat up too and cupped my cheek, turning me to him. A sliver of light from outside outlined the edges of his face. Seeing the hurt in his eyes was as sharp and painful as laying my hand on a burning stove. “Every part of me belongs to you, which is why the second I heard you on the other side of the door, I needed to be okay. I wanted to be okay because I can’t stand the thought of youfeeling like you need to fix me. I’m not whole, and I can’t expect you to take that on. I’m not worth being with?—”
“Stop trying to make the fucking decision for me,” I snapped. “You’re not the smartest in the room just because you can process and accept logic. Just because you can siphon off emotion. And you don’t need to be fixed.”
He shook his head as he brushed away a few rogue tears on my cheek.
“Then tell me I’m broken too,” I challenged.
