“I’ll be fine,” she says, looking up at me, eyelids heavy.
“I’ll walk you home.”
“You don’t … you already drove me …” Wren mumbles, not finishing a single one of her sentences. I bring my hand up to brush a stray lock of kinky hair out of her face.
“I don’t care how many times I have to do it, I’ll always make sure you get home safe. Come on, let’s go.” She wobbles on her heels and manages to find her purse in the bleachers where she and the girls were sitting, and then she’s next to me, leaning into me as we leave the gymnasium.
I get her outside and the night air is cool, which perks her up and she stands a little taller as she walks beside me. We’re the only ones on the quiet, dark street, lit up by the yellow glow of street lamps.
“I can’t believe you beat me,” Wren whines, and scuffs her feet along the ground like a child who has been told no. “You did it in cold blood, too.”
“How did I have anything to do with you losing? You threw a lousy ball.” I nudge her shoulder, trying to keep the conversation light.
“You knew what you were doing, standing there with your body and your face.” I can’t help but grin. Wren was looking at me. I was enough to distract her, steal her attention.
“I can’t exactly help that I have a body and a face,” I tease.
“I hate you.” She says it with an amused lilt in her voice, but the words hit me somewhere deep. I turn slightly towards her as we walk, and I study her with her darkcrimped ponytail, the crimson lipstick starting to come off. Her face is set in a pensive scowl.
“You hate me?” I ask her. It wouldn’t have been a question in my mind a couple weeks ago. When Wren first arrived in Heartwood, Iknewshe hated me. Loathed me. But now … I’m hoping her answer might have changed. She thinks for a moment before heaving a sigh.
“Yeah. I hate that you broke my heart, and I hate that I never got over you.” Her voice wobbles now, and her tone shifts like she might be about to cry. Her drunken admission catches me off guard—whatever I thought she was going to say, I wasn’t expecting that.
I don’t know what to say, so I say nothing. Truthfully, I don’t think we should be having this conversation now. I’m buzzed, but not so buzzed that I don’t know when to put on the brakes. Once we start, this is a train that won’t be stopped, and who knows what we might say under the influence. I’m not taking any chances.
“It’s true,” Wren keeps going. If she’s going to continue talking about this, then I have to keep quiet and not take anything she says to heart. “I don’t think I ever stopped loving you.”
Except that.
That I can’t ignore, because it’s the question plaguing me for the last ten years. Do I regret breaking up with Wren? No. I did it for her own good, because she was never going to be able to achieve her full potential attached to me.
Claire told me as much, and I’ll never forget our conversation. Because when Claire told me that I needed to support her dreams and help her do the things she needed to do, Iheard her message loud and clear. It was a truth she had uncovered within me that I already knew in my soul.
I wasn’t good enough for Wren. She wasleaguesahead of me in everything we did. I played along to try and show her I could keep up, but once we left high school and got out into the real world … it was clear I didn’t have what it took, didn’t have the means to keep chasing her.
I learned to be okay with that. I learned to be content with what I have, secure in who I am. But I never stopped questioning if Wren still thought about me.
“Miller …” It’s all I can manage right now, and my brain has lost the ability to form words. I tell myself that this might not be true, that Wren is drunk, and she could be saying anything. But tears have collected on her lower lashes, so at least some part of this is real.
“I’ve been so angry at you for so long. I blamed you for all the ways I failed. I was lonely, and I blamed you for not being able to make friends because I was moping. I’d start dating someone, and then I’d blame you when it ended because I couldn’t open my heart to another person. Then I decided it was easier to hate you. It hurt less to hate you.”
There it is. Poppy was right. Wren hid behind anger and hating me so she didn’t have to feel, and I’m a complete idiot for not seeing it. I glance back over at Wren as we turn onto her street. Trails of tears mark her cheeks, mascara and that God-awful blue eyeshadow smudged under her eyes.
She’s so beautiful like this, vulnerable and raw. A state I’m fairly sure only I’ve been lucky enough to witness. An ache radiates from behind my sternum and urges me to wrap an arm around her shoulders as we walk.
We make our way past the couple of houses that precede hers, eventually arriving at her front door, and I take a risk I’ve been wanting to since I first saw her. I reach for her hand and twine my fingers through hers.
“I wish things could have been different. I do. I never wanted to hurt you.” My chest cracks as I say it, causing a burning sensation behind my eyes. “I would do anything to take it all back, anything to make this okay.”
“Kiss me,” she whispers, and now my heart shatters because I want to do it so badly, but not like this.
“Miller,” I say again. Where are my goddamned words tonight? “I can’t …”
Her throat bobs as she swallows and gives a small nod.
“I see.”
Fuck.
