“Yeah.” Sully arranged the papers in his arms so I wouldn’t be able to see the words on them before nervously raking a hand through his hair. “Borrowed Theo’s university log-in to access Canvas. And when I say borrow, I mean stole, because he doesn’t know that I know how to hack into his accounts, and we really don’t need to tell him. I just really needed to—I just wanted to be prepared and—” He dragged a hand down his face. “Turns out, there’s no such thing as being fully prepared because I didn’t even think, I didn’t even think…”
His expression crumbled, and nothing could have kept me away from him.
“Sawyer.” I took a step and then another, until I was circling my arms around his middle. Sully hesitated only a second before hugging me back, tossing the article on the couch, forgotten. I buried my face in his chest, holding him close. And I understood what he meant last night—that even though I was as close as I could possibly be, it still didn’t feel close enough. He rasped my name into my hair, and I closed my eyes, breathing him in. I didn’t really know what to say. Other than something I wasn’t sure if I had said yet. “Thank you.”
“You don’t—God, you don’t have to say that.”
“But I want to,” I insisted. “I want to thank you. For everything. For caring.”
Sully put his hands on my shoulders and pulled back so he could look at me. “Forcaring?”
I frowned, confused by the tone of his voice.
“Eleanor, I don’tcarefor you, I—” He rubbed a hand over his mouth at the last second, cutting himself off. He glanced at the ceiling, seeming to debate something for a very long moment before finally deciding to look back at me. His voice was lower when he spoke, tentative. “I just need you to know that saying Icarefor you is a gross understatement. Okay?”
He waited, as patient as ever, until I found my voice. “Okay.”
“Okay,” he repeated with a nod and then pulled away, continuing what he’d been doing before—walking around, picking up miscellaneous things, tidying the place.
I stood there, taking it in. Taking him in, here, in this space. This space that was his and not mine.
He had his own spaces in college, of course. But I’d known them, slept in them. In a sense, they were partly mine.
But not here.
“It’s a little weird.”
“What?” Sully’s head swiveled toward me, and I realized I’d said the words aloud.
“This,” I admitted. “Being here. Having a better picture of you, your life. It’s…” I shrugged. “Well, I suppose it’s nice seeing. Knowing.” A pause. “I think I want to know more.”
He went back to rummaging in the closet, clearly looking for something. “There’s nothing else to tell or see, El.”
I pursed my lips, disagreeing. Five years had passed. Five years where he’d done things that I had no idea about.
I thought of the people strolling on the streets below, the bustle of weekend activity. Had he done all the things that I’d imagined we’d do together?
“What do you usually do on Sundays?” I asked.
Sully emerged from the closet with a fall jacket in hand. He strode closer, throwing it on the couch before shrugging. “Notmuch, honestly. If Noah’s playing, I watch his games with the guys at a bar around the corner.”
“Is Noah playing today?”
Slowly, he nodded.
“What time?”
“Noon.”
I checked the time on my phone and scowled. “You weren’t going to tell me that Noah had a game like right…now?”
“I don’t know.” Sully picked a pen off his counter, which jutted between the living room and the kitchen and had a row of barstools tucked beneath it. He gripped the pen in his hand, clicking the end with his thumb. “You only mildly like football and?—”
“Butyoulike football,” I reminded him. “And it’s your brother playing. Who is also my friend.”
“Yeah, but—” The clicking continued, even as he walked over to grab his TV remote off the coffee table. “I mean, we can totally watch the game if you want.”
He was completely missing my point.
