Page 105 of Best I Never Had

What if she isn’t ready to move on? Or worse, what if she is but not with me?

Just as I groan into my hands, rubbing the heels of my palms into my eyes, I hear Natalia walk out of my room. She’s fully dressed, with her purseclutched between her hands and her rumpled hair tampered down as best she could do without a mirror or hair care products.

She walks up to me as her bare feet pad along the wood floor. She moves cautiously as I stand upright to meet her.

“You want some coffee? Dexter brewed some before he left.”

She keeps her gaze lowered, and her toes twiddle beneath her. “I should actually get going,” she says to the floor. She’s avoiding me.

“Nat,” I whisper.

“Carmen worries if I’m not home on the weekends when she comes home from work so…” She turns her body toward the door.

I reach for her wrist, grasping the soft skin around her pulse point as my thumb rubs into the curve of her palm. “Nat, what are you doing?”

She looks up at me. And the agony in her face pierces through my heart. I can feel her body lurch, almost as if she wants to say something that she shouldn’t. As if there’s something stopping her from baring every bit of her to me when I should be the one person she should never keep anything from.

“Nat,” I plead softly.

She lets out a frustrated sigh and starts to gnaw on her lower lip. “When you got suspended senior year, right after prom, was it because you got into a fight with Alex Spencer?”

I feel like I’ve just suffered whiplash. “What are you talking about?”

“Why did you get into a fight with Alex?” Instead of repeating her question, something that she already knows and isn’t necessarily asking for confirmation, she goes to the root of it.

“I don’t remember.”

She huffs. “Don’t lie to me. I talked to Jenny when we were at your house. She told me you guys broke up after that. Because of me.”

“Nat,” I start to say. Our eyes stay locked on each other, neither one of us backing down in our silent stand-off.

“Why did you get into a fight with Alex?” she finally asks.

“Because he fucking touched you!” I snap. “That fucking creep put his hands on you. And I saw the look on your face. Like you could still feel him touching you, and I wanted to kill him!”

“I wasn’t yours to defend,” she says in a steady voice, too calm in contrast to my angry one.

I look up at her, almost speechless. “I know that.”

“If you knew that, why did you punch him?”

“Because of everything that happened at prom. And I was…”

“You were what, Hayden?”

“I was scared!” I finally throw at her. “Is that what you want to hear?”

“Why didn’t you tell me!”

“How the hell was I supposed to tell you when you were leaving? You were so ready to move out here and live this life that I couldn’t be a part of back then. How was I supposed to tell you those things and watch you walk away from me?”

Tears start to glisten in her eyes, and she starts biting her lower lip before taking a slow, staggered breath. “Is that why you didn’t tell me about what happened between you and Matteo at the bar? Because you were scared?”

This time, I know it’s whiplash. I swerve my head toward her so quickly, I feel a twinge in my neck muscles from the sudden jerk and shock. “How did you know?”

“He told me,” she says flatly. “He came to my apartment earlier this week, and he told me you two got into a fight.”

“Why the fuck was he at your apartment?” I grit, clearly unsettled by the fact that they were together, most likely alone.

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