Page 50 of Yesterday I Cared
"It was great meeting you, Georgie. I hate that it had to be in these circumstances," I say.
"Come on, Ronan, we need to go," Mia urges, tugging my arm. "I had a lovely time, Georgie."
Mia is already dragging me through the restaurant before I can even wrap my mind around what we just did. When we finally get out, she turns to me with a relieved look.
"I don't think I've ever been so happy to see someone in my life," she breathes out. "All we talked about was bugs."
I grin at the full-body shiver that goes through her at the mere mention. "Well, they are an entomologist. I'm sure there are a lot of facts to share, considering there are thousands of species out in the world."
She glares up at me. "But they should have more than one subject to talk about on a date, Ronan. Besides, you didn't necessarily look like you'd found the one with your date."
"Kat set us up," I admit. "I guess she doesn't know me all that well yet. Jasmine came to the date because she'd looked me up and felt confident we'd end up in bed."
I see the rage flare up in Mia’s eyes, but she quickly morphs it into a comforting smile. "That's a shitty way to approach a date. I'm sorry, Ronan."
With a small shrug, I squint against the setting sun. "Both our dates are over now, which means our night is over. Unless you'd like to grab some dessert?"
She hesitates for a second, and I fully expect her to decline. I'll take her home, make sure she gets in all right, and then go find some food for myself. But if there's even the slightest chance she might want to spend time with me, I'm going to take it.
"We had only gotten to the appetizers, and I couldn't even stomach those because of the conversation."
"You mean creepy, crawly bugs." I watch her tense up. "Most of whom have more than a normal amount of legs."
"Stop that!" She swats me across the chest but smiles when I laugh. "There will be no more talk of bugs tonight. I want food, real food. And then we should definitely get dessert."
“Are you sure we don’t need to go save Carter from evil lane lines?” I joke, following as she leads me down the street. I have no idea where she’s taking me, but to be honest, I don’t care. I think I’d follow Mia Sheridan almost anywhere.
Mia turns to give me a smirk, continuing to walk backward. “It’s almost nine o’clock on a Saturday night and he’s in love with his girlfriend. I think our pal is tangled up in someoneelse tonight.”
I groan, pinching the bridge of my nose. “Why did you have to go there?”
Laughing, she turns back around, her skirt flowing in the soft summer breeze. “Come on, O’Brien, there’s usually a food truck around the corner and you have notliveduntil you’ve had their burritos.”
“We’re having a nice night. I’m almost scared to ruin it.”
I turn to look up at him in surprise. “Okay, well, now you have to tell me whatever you were about to say. I don’t care if you ruin it.”
He hesitates for a moment, and I wonder if he realizes he even said that out loud. “This kind of feels like how things felt before, you know?”
The word “before” hits me hard, all the different ways he means it is evident. Before we slept together and changed everything. Before we spent every spare moment of a year talking, talking more than our friends, who are in a committed relationship. Before I treated him normally one day in Indianapolis, only to hate him with everything in me the next day. Before, before, before. I miss the before.
“Yeah, it does” I admit.
“You have to throw me a bone here, Mia,” he pleads. “I can’t fix things between us if I don’t know what I did, and I promise you I don’t know what I did.”
I swallow, and try to find the words, but they simply won’t come. Which is ridiculous because I can vividly picture the day everything changed. The day I heard those awful thingshe said and knew I’d never be more than a hookup to him. If he wasn’t willing to defend my best friend, there’s no way in hell he’d defend me.
“All I know is that we were fine that first day in Indianapolis,” he recalls. My heart drops to the pit of my stomach. “I was signing autographs with Bryce, who was having a small fight with Josie. We were fine. Then, after they worked everything out, you and I suddenly weren’t fine.”
God, he knows. He knows exactly when everything happened. Remembers it eight years later.
“I heard you.”
His head tilts. And despite those words sliding out of my mouth without my permission, the look is pretty freaking adorable. “What?”
Well, I guess there’s no turning back now.
I inhale a long breath. “I had gotten up to stretch my legs. I was walking around, and I saw you watching the meet with a couple of college kids I didn’t recognize.” His eyes are wide. Heknows. “I was going to come down and sit with you, but stopped when I heard what you said.”
