"No,” she says. “I’m being so fucking serious, Beck. Did any of it mean anything?" Her voice is stripped down to its core. "Or was I just—"
"It meant something," I say.
She looks at me.
"It was real for me," I say. "None of it was fake."
She looks at her coffee. "Then explain to me why it feels like you used me?"
"Because of what it looks like,” I admit. “And I get what it looks like, but––” I run a hand through my hair. “I was never supposed to sleep with you.”
She looks up.
"I told you about a girl once," I say. "In your dorm room. You asked me about being in love, and I told you I met her at a tough time. But I knew the first time I saw her, I had to have her."
She's very still.
"That wasn't someone from high school," I say.
I look at her face.
She's already there. I can see her getting there.
"Beck," she says quietly.
"It was you," I say. "In that hallway, kissing your––” I fly my hands in the air because I can’t talk shit about Cody now. It’s obvious that she still loves him, and I’m no better than he is. “Your boyfriend and I thought I would never treat you…fuck.” I put my head in my hands. “It doesn’t matter. I’m not trying to make excuses. We promised to give you the entire truth.”
She looks at me for a long time.
And when I look up at her as I drop my hands, her eyes are wet.
“I don’t know what to say,” she says softly.
I put my coffee down on the counter.
"I'm sorry.”
Two words.
Everything I have.
I can’t fucking stand the distance any longer, so I take four big steps towards her and pull her into a hug. I wrap my arms around her and hold her the way I have always held her — carefully, completely, without agenda — and I feel her exhale against me.
She doesn’t pull away, so that has to mean something.
“You felt like my safe space through the hardest time in my life.”
I cup her face now. “I’m still that same person.”
Her eyes search mine, and then she drops her head onto my chest and says, “I hate to say this, but I’m not that mad at you. I’m pissed off, but there are two people I’m more upset with right now.”
I rest my head on top of hers and soak in those words. She’s notthatmad at me. I can live with that.
She pulls away and inhales, “I want to get this over with. Will you –– send Theo in?”
I swallow the lump in my throat, and I pull away.
She’s kicking me out.
