“Why?” He frowns.
“The same reason I never listened to any of your music.” I cast him a look. “I know I hurt you that day, but it never occurred to me that you would be angry or sad about it for very long.” My shoulders lift and fall. “I figured you would have gotten over it immediately and forgotten all about me. That…that wasn’t something I wanted to face.”
Adam’s boots fall to the ground. He slides to the edge of chair. “Vienna. How was I supposed to get over that? You don’t just get over something like that.” He bites the inside of his lip. “I never got over it. Not even now.”
Those grounded, weighty eyes peel back my defenses. The pain in my stomach returns to its usual business, the heaviness in my core deepening. He might as well be edging me into a corner, I can almost feel the scratchy tree back on my palm.
We’ve just had two contradictory conversations.
I stand, moving to walk back to the door.
“Friends,” I whisper, pausing over him. “You offered friendship.”
He searches my face. “If that’s what you want.”
I don’t know what I want. Two days ago, I wanted to get away from him as fast as possible, yesterday I wanted him to ravish me against a tree, and today I want to sit beside him on this porch every morning until the end of days.
My life hasn’t often revolved around what I want. I don’t seem to get the things I want. Reality and practicality always win out in the end, best buddies with the universe, voices burrowing in my brain asking, Who do you think you are?
“That’s all we can have,” I answer Adam, entering the house.
He’s quick on my tail.
“Why?” he demands.
“You hated me two days ago.”
“No, I didn’t,” he argues. “I wanted to hate you. I tried to be mad at you. It didn’t last long.”
I stomp into the kitchen and drop my mug in the sink. This line of conversation only exists because of last night, I’m sure of it. I spin around. “Why? Because we’re hot for each other?”
He snaps his neck, taken aback. “Well for one –”
“That’s not enough, Adam.” I grab the mug out of his hands.
“I wasn’t done with that,” he says.
“You should go home.”
He follows me around the island while I put the creamer away. “We just had a nice conversation, why are you being hostile?”
“A nice conversation?” I shut the fridge, and he’s an inch from my face. “It might have started that way, but that conversation went way off the rails.”
“How so?”
“Because you said you wanted to be friends and you would keep your hands to yourself and then you gave me that look, and it’s worse than touching me.”
“What look?” he asks, leaning closer, cornering me.
“You know.”
“No, tell me.”
“The way every girl wants to be looked at,” I breathe. “Like I’m the light at the end of the tunnel or an oxygen source. Sunshine.”
“Moonlight,” he counters, his voice low. His hands brace between the kitchen counter and the island, trapping me in his path.
I tip my head to his. “That’s the look. Right there.”