“And I believed you,” she looks at me harshly for a few seconds. “I trusted you. I believed what you said and I thought you might be different from the bastard I thought you were,” she concludes, turning and walking bare-footed away from me.
I watch her walk away, unable to speak or rationalise, or do anything at all that would demonstrate to her that I’m not a complete arsehole. Before she turns the corner, I run after her, grabbing her shoulder.
She looks at me again with the same harsh expression on her face, before I pull her to me and she hides her face in my neck.
A year ago, she begged me to stay. A year later, I’m the one begging her not to leave.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper into her hair. “For everything.”
She tries to wriggle away but I tighten my grip on her.
“Please don’t leave like this.”
She pushes me away, putting her hands on my chest and stepping back a few paces.
“You’re confusing me! I don’t know what to think, if it’s right, if we could ever have—”
“Everything, Riley, you can have it all.”
Me. You can have all of me.
“What are you looking for, Ian? What is it that you want?”
“You. I only want you.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“Well, you’ll have to. You are the only thing I want. I wanted the same thing a year ago and I want it now, more than ever.”
“I’m not strong enough for this. If everything were to go back to how it was, I wouldn’t be able to bear it alone.”
“You don’t need to,” I tell her, taking her hand and squeezing it slightly. “You don’t have to go through anything alone, Riley.”
“You don’t understand. It hurts me, Ian. Everything hurts me. It hurts to eat, to sleep, to remember. Some days it’s hard for me to breathe.”
“Then on those days I’ll do the breathing for you,” I tell her, smiling at her and letting my thumbs slide down to her cheeks.
“You don’t really think that.”
“I can stand anything, but only if you’re with me.”
“I’m a mess, Ian.”
I take her face in my hands and I speak to her with my heart.
“You’remyfucking mess.”
Because that’s the way it is, I always knew it had to be her. And I won’t let her go anywhere until I’ve given it everything I’ve got.
She has to know who I am, what I’m willing to give and how I am able to love. She needs to understand that she can just be who she is with me, because that’s all I want.
“We can start from scratch. Me and you, together. Nothing forced, no rushing things. Nothing that you aren’t ready to face.”
She looks at me suspiciously.
“One night, with me. You’ll tell me everything you want to and I’ll do the same. We’ll be honest with each other. We’ll be ourselves. We can try it just once. And if after that you don’t want me, then I’ll disappear.”
I see the doubt in her eyes but I know that she’s about to give in.
“Tomorrow night, I’ll come by and pick you up at seven.”
She thinks about it for a few more seconds before saying: “With what, that thing?” pointing to my motorbike.
I can’t hold back my smile.
“You know where I live,” she concludes, before turning away and walking down the street.
