“And it’s over.”
“Yes.”
“And you’re going back to Carlisle.”
“Yes.”
“Then what are you doing?”
I laugh once.
Not because it is funny.
Because she has cut through every elegant sentence I might have built and gone straight for the load-bearing wall.
“I don’t know,” I say.
Her face closes a fraction.
“No,” I add quickly. “No, that came out wrong. I know why I came back. I don’t know the logistics yet. I don’t know what this looks like tomorrow or next week or around shifts or deadlines or the fact that you live here andI live in Carlisle and my life has been built around running towards whatever looks like the next bigger thing.”
Her eyes do something then.
A guarded flicker.
I hate that I put it there.
“But I know I don’t want to get in that car and choose the old version of sensible because I’m afraid of what happens if I say the actual thing out loud.”
Her voice is quieter when she asks, “What actual thing?”
My heart goes once, hard.
Then steadies.
This is it, then.
No clever angle.
No sharp framing.
No making uncertainty do the work because I am toocowardly to say what I mean.
“You,” I say.
She blinks.
I almost smile, because apparently all my language has abandoned me at the crucial moment.
“You,” I say again, slightly better. “This. Us, if you want there to be an us. I know that’s a lot, and I know the timing is ridiculous, and I know I have not earned the right to ask for easy trust. But I’m asking for the chance to try.”
Her mouth parts.
Not much.
Enough that I nearly lose the thread entirely.
“Why?” she asks.
