Silently, I went and sat in the chair on her other side.
“I have to call her family,” he said after a long while. “They're going to kill me. Michelle will have me castrated.”
I smiled at the weak joke but Kamran wasn't looking at me. He hadn't torn his gaze from her sleeping face once.
“I fucked up,” he finally whispered, his voice so low I wouldn't have heard it if I hadn't known it was coming.
Call it intuition, but something told me, Kamran was looking for someone to blame and he couldn't take all the blame himself. We hadbothbeen on that couch.
“Yeah, maybe you should have told her sooner,” I said, hoping to remind him. “But youweretrying, Kam. That was the whole reason we were even there. And she kept prolonging the inevitable. You know that.”
To my surprise, he nodded resolutely.
“Yeah, I know,” he agreed and finally, his eyes sought mine out and I didn't think I liked what I saw there.
“Kamran—”
“What the hell have we even been doing to begin with?” he asked hopelessly. “What haveIbeen doing?”
My throat closed up in fear. I couldn't say a word.
“I was—ammarried, Ryan... I—I've never been a cheater. Ihateshit like that. Why did I do it?”
“Because,” I choked and I wanted to take his shoulders and shake him until he remembered telling me that I was the person heloved.
“We love each other,” I managed but my voice trembled. “Don't take it back now.”
His gaze dropped to the floor.
“It's not that,” he said, quietly. “I just...”
He trailed off, seeming to search for the words but they didn't come.
After a while, he just sighed and reached out, resting his hand over Melissa's where it rested limply on the covers.
I couldn't take my eyes off of him though, and Kamran must have known it because he didn't look at me for ages. When he eventually did, there was a sureness there that hadn't been before.
“Melissa was my first really serious girlfriend,” he said. “We met when I was like, twenty-two.”
I nodded, wondering where he was going with this.
“I know. I was there,” I reminded him.
He shut his eyes.
“Yeah,” he breathed. “You were there too. I met the two most important people in my life at around the same time and just ran with it. I didn't want to let either of you go, to be honest.”
I swallowed.
“Kamran, just tell me what you're thinking,” I begged.
He licked his lips and ran a hand through his hair, looking so conflicted.
“I'm thinking that... maybe it was foolish to rush the way we did,” he finally admitted. “I was in a relationship for eight years, and then I went straight into another one before the last one was even over. I know being with you wasn't a mistake, just... the timingwas.I should have ended things with her properly first.”
I stared at him for so long my eyes started to water. I wanted to argue. But he didn't regret our time together, just that he was still married while it happened. How could I argue with that? He was right. I had wanted that too. I had wanted us to bereal.Instead, we'd been hidden behind closed doors for the most part.
“You're right,” I said, although it hurt to admit it.
