Page 26 of On Thin Ice

“Tell me how I can fix this Callie, I promise I can fix it.” He pleads, his eyes crinkling with desperation.

God, I feel like my heart is going to crack down the centre looking at him like that. I tried so hard to offend him for a while, to put him off me and make him see that I didn’t like him. But now, seeing him hurting like this is making me contemplate pouring poison directly into my eyeballs so I don’t have to watch his face collapse like that.

I sniff, holding back the tears that I know are inevitably going to fall soon. “You didn’t do anything wrong Sean, in fact you did everything right.” “Tell me what made you run out on me then. I thought we were making progress and then you left me there, after I all but got on my knees and begged you not to go.”

I want to scream at him that he’s right and I don’t know what’s wrong with me, but I don’t.

“I'm sorry I did that, it was shitty of me and I'm sorry for avoiding you since then, it’s just what I do when I get scared, I run.” I let my face fall, keeping my eyes off his.

“You don’t need to be scared Callie, and I'm not mad at you for leaving, I just want to know why.” He inches closer to me, our bodies now about a foot away from each other and I can feel the heat drawing me to him. “You just told Molly that you don’t see any negatives to being with me and you can see how hard I'm trying to prove that I want to change for you, yet you’re still holding me at arms length.” He sighs and his shoulders slump. “You were so worried about me losing interest in you after we had sex and then you totally flipped the switch and wanted nothing to do with me.” He looks so defeated, so hurt and the moisture falls from my eyes before I can stop it. Sean finds my face again and when he sees the tears tracking down my cheeks he takes one stride towards me and cups my face in his warm hands. His thumbs are rough in the most comforting way, the way they run along my cheekbones and his warm, concerned eyes dip down to meet mine.

“Talk to me baby, tell me truthfully what’s holding you back.” His voice is like fresh coffee, smooth and warm, his vanilla laced breath tickling my nose and tempting me to kiss him. All I've wanted to do for the last four days was kiss that man.

I let out a heavy breath. “I told you we shouldn’t have had sex. It was a mistake, I wasn’t emotionally ready and I let myself have you when I shouldn’t have.” I take another breath, my shoulder lifting and falling weakly. “Because I'll never have you, not really and that’s what scares me Sean can’t you see that?”

His grip on my face tightens and his nose brushes against mine, increasing the taste of his breath on my tongue. “You can have me Callie, you can have all of me.”

“There’s always a part of you I won’t have, the part that will be satisfied with me for a while and then will start to miss the game, miss taking a new girl home every night and the excitement of that.” My lips part on a jagged breath again and Sean takes his hands off my face. “I can’t give you variety Sean, I'm trying to make you see that.”

He throws his hands in the air and blows out a sharp puff of exasperation at me. “I don’t want fucking variety Callie! I’ve had variety my whole adult life and I'm so damn bored of it. I’m a big boy now and I'm craving more, ever since we met and you told me to go and fuck myself I've wanted more. You’ve changed something in me Callie and I want you, just you.” He steps closer to me again, pulling me to his chest, his arm snaked around my waist. “I want you every day and every night and there’s nothing you can say to make that not true.” He ends his rant in a whisper, the passion draining from his voice and transforming into a plea again. I want to say yes, he can have me and that’s the end of it, easy, but life isn’t always like that. I have to tell him about Joel, this isn’t fair on him. “Joel wants me back.” I blurt as his hands drop from my waist again, shock and confusion making a haze float across his eyes.

“What? Since when?” He says, forehead crinkling with worry and betrayal. I feel an enormous pang of guilt for keeping this from him, but when the hell was I supposed to tell him? On our date? Or maybe just after we had sex for the first time? No, there was no way I could have told him then.

I look down, guilt crawling all over my skin like spiders. “He’s been texting me, asking me to forgive him, to give him another chance. He’s been saying that he misses me and that…” I look up to Sean’s face, the crumpled worry now replaced with what can only be described as utter panic. “He loves me.”

Sean runs a heavy hand over his dark stubble. “Do you miss him? L-love him?” His voice is strained with gut wrenching pain as he forces the L word off his tongue. His chocolate eyes burn into mine and I can’t even blink, I'm stuck to the spot, my feet refusing to budge when my head tells them to run, run away from this terrifying conversation. Flecks of my pink nail varnish float to the ground as I scratch and pick at it nervously before slowly shaking my head. What am I thinking? Of course I don’t love Joel anymore, the feelings I once had for him are buried deep in the back of my mind but there’s no chance of them resurfacing, they’re firmly anchored down.

I inhale quietly. “I didn’t know how I felt or what I wanted last week, that’s another reason I was so confused after we had sex.” Sean’s face has softened a little, the realisation that I don’t love Joel anymore and am purely trying to explain my erratic and downright cold behaviour towards him. “My head's been swimming Sean, and I think I'm at a point where I’d rather drown than carry on treading water like this, fighting over what I want and what I think I should want.”

Sean’s still staring at me, his face changing expression with each new word that comes out of my mouth, like he doesn’t know how he should react. This could force him the other way, make him realise that I'm more effort than I'm worth and he’d rather a life without me in it. I’ve been dishonest with him and I have to admit, if it was the other way around it’s more than likely I would have told him never to talk to me again. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you,” I whisper, stepping towards him and closing the gap between us. “I just didn’t know how to and I wasn’t sure what I wanted, then we had sex and I felt awful like…like I was leading you on.” My eyes fall to the ground again, my nail varnish following it as I pick at it anxiously. I can’t even look at his face, not now everything is out in the open. I know what’s going to happen, what should happen. Sean should tell me I was wrong to keep something like that from him, that I shouldn’t have slept with him and that he never wants to see me again. That’s what should happen, but of course Sean is like a real life, huge, muscular angel. So instead, what comes off his lips is much softer and gentler. “I understand Cal,” I look up then, that being the last sentence I expected to hear him say. “I mean of course I wish you’d have told me, but I understand why you didn’t.” His hands find my waist, resting against my cold skin and warming it with his touch. “I know we’ve only been taking this ‘slow’ for like a week,” He finger quotes the air, smiling bashfully and I let out a teary chuckle. The truth is we’ve never been slow, not since the second we locked eyes for the first time in that penalty box. “But I can feel myself changing. All I've done is think about you since we slept together and I'm not exaggerating when I say I’ve never thought about a girl after we’ve had sex. Can we try this relationship thing properly? Please Cal, I know what I want.”

He takes my jaw in his hands, running his thumbs along my cheeks and I let my eyes flutter closed. I want to say hell yes, let’s crack this thing wide open and just jump, but the fear still has me in it’s grip and I can’t work out for the life of me how to wriggle free. I think I need his help. “I don’t know Sean, I'm reluctant to give myself fully to someone again after last time.” His face dips and his lips brush against mine, floating and making my knees weak, the urge to smash my lips onto his is lighting a fire in the pit of my stomach.

“Do you want Joel back?” He whispers, his sweet breath warming my lips, his scratchy stubble brushing my chin.

I shake my head. “I thought maybe I did…but I don’t. The way he treated me wasn’t right and I don’t want that again.”

“Do you want me?” He says, lifting his head and towering over me as usual, one arm still snaked around my waist. “I hope you do because I'm afraid you’re stuck with me.” He attempts a smile but it’s weak and I know he needs to hear the words, that I want him and only him.

I wrap my arms around his solid torso and rest my chin on his chest, looking up into the depths of his swampy eyes. “I think I'm starting to love being stuck with you.”

His face relaxes, the lines on his forehead vanishing and he blows out a breath laced with relief. “Thank god,” He sighs, his nose brushes mine as he tips his head down, our foreheads touching.

Sean pushes the hair from my face and whispers, “I really want to kiss you, can I?”

My head bobs eagerly in a nod and I yank his face down to mine, our mouths colliding in a hot and breathy kiss. His tongue swipes against mine and I grab a fistful of his jacket in each hand to keep me on my feet, rising up on my tiptoes to increase the ferocity between our lips.

“I love the way you make me feel Sean, I don’t think anyone has ever treated me the way you do.” I say against his parted lips, letting my heals fall back to the ground and making me a whole foot shorter than him again.

His blinding grin spreads across his dimpled cheeks and he scoops me off the ground, lifting me to his level with both arms trapping my waist. He leaves a few open mouthed kisses on my neck as I bury my face into his, inhaling ever drop of his delicious scent. I can feel him still smiling against my neck before he pulls back, still holding me against him, my feet an entire foot away from the ground.

“So, you’re my girlfriend now right? Or am I supposed to ask you properly? I don’t know how any of this works Cal, you have to help me.” He places me gently to my feet and I laugh, lacing our fingers together as he rubs the back of his neck nervously with his other hand. I still find it weird seeing him like this, all the arrogance out of sight and the real Sean showing his vulnerable side, just for me.

“I mean, you can get down on one knee if you want and ask me t—” My words are stopped in their tracks when Sean lowers himself to the ground, one knee out in front of him like he’s proposing. “I was joking.” I say, watching as a smirk widens his face.

“Callie Burch, will you please do me the honour of being my girlfriend?” He coos, his hand holding mine and a sharp laugh bursts from my lips. “You really should stop picking your nails.” He raises an eyebrow, eyeing my half eaten fingernails.

“You should really stop taking everything I say so literally.” “So? Will you?” He smiles, his dimples deepening.

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