Page 33 of The Probability of Us

“Oh, shut up.” I smack his stomach again, harder this time. “You’re just playing it up for the crowd now.”

The host pulls back and looks between us, smiling. “I think I speak for everyone here when I say, I hope you do becomeThe Summersone day.”

At the end of the night, someone brings the leader board over to us and lets us write our team name in the top spot. In my best, sunny handwriting, I write the words and add a little sun next to it. I’m about to hand the chalk back over but Warren extends his hand. I raise an eyebrow at him but drop the chalk in his hand. He smiles at me, then leans over and adds a heart at the end.

My heart stutters. Does that mean he feels the same way I do? Does that mean he loves me too?

I look up at him and get lost in those beautiful eyes.

I love you. I love you. I love you.

Before I even realize that we’re both leaning closer, his lips gently press against mine, and I swear it’s love I feel threaded in the tenderness there.

I love you. I lo?—

“All finished?” the bartender who brought over the board asks, not-so-patiently waiting for us to give it back.

Warren hands it back without saying a word. I think I hear Sterling apologize on our behalf, but all I can hear ringing through my head are the words:

I love you. I love you. I love you.

Thirteen

AUGUST CURRENT DAY (THURSDAY)

The bar is a small room off the back of the lobby with just enough space for a few high-top tables in front of the bar top, where most of the seating is. There are two open seats close to the middle and I lead us over. Before I can pull out the black leather seat, it’s being pulled out for me. I give him a closed-lip, nervous smile and sit down.

We haven’t said a word since we entered the hotel. The weight of the what-if’s, what-could-have-been’s, and where-is-this-night-going hang over us, threatening to drop at any moment and break this fragile foundation we’ve been rebuilding. This night—this location—feels different. At The Dizzy Acorn, at work, or even when we’re walking around, I have some level of comfort knowing nothing will happen. Or at least, if it did, we’re weren’t in a location that would be conducive to letting it go too far. But here, we’re sitting in a building that he has a room in. It’d be much too easy to let it go too far.

I wring my hands in my lap and watch the way the blue light lining the arch behind the bar plays off the mirror behind it as the bartenders grab different bottles on display. It’s mesmerizing, but it’s not enough to distract me from the man sitting beside me, watching me with a serene but contemplative expression. He doesn’t say a word but when the bartender comes by, he orders for both of us.

“It’s been so weird being back here this week,” he says, finally taking his eyes off me to look around when our beers get set in front of us. “It feels like I’ve gone back in time.”

“Have you really not been back since you left?” I press my hands flat against my legs, trying to still their shaking before I reach for my drink.

He shakes his head and glances over at me. “I could never work up the courage to face what I left behind.”

I close my eyes and take a long sip of my drink. I’m confident he’s talking about me—us—but struggling to believe him, to trustthis. If he still feels this way, then why did he end things in the first place? Why have I not heard from him until now?

He sighs and I look over at him, getting trapped in his molten eyes. “It’s crazy how it feels like nothing has changed.”

I want to smile and play along, to flirt and laugh, but I can’t, because if I do, it’ll be the first domino to fall down the line that leads us to his room at the end of the night without having the conversations we need to have.

I’ve put it off long enough. I need answers and I need them now, because I only have so much willpower left before I let my lingering feelings for him take over and ignore the logical part of my brain.

“But everythinghaschanged,” I say, looking away to steel my nerves for the gut-wrenching truth of the words I’m about to speak. “If you had asked me seven years ago, I would’ve said, without a doubt that you were the person I was going to marry.” I look back at him and his face falls. “I wassureI was going to spend the rest of my life with you, but now . . .” I shake my head. “I don’t know anything.”

“Analise,” he rasps, reaching out to grab my hand.

My chest tightens, suddenly scared of what he’s going to say again. Maybe I don’t want to know why. Maybe I should’ve taken the easy and fun way. My head shakes faster now. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have?—”

“Iwasgoing to propose,” he says, so softly and it feels like I just took five punches to the chest. All my breath is gone and I’m struggling for air. I’m surprised I’m still in the chair and didn’t fall out of it—I’m surprised my body is still functioning.

“What?” I squeak.

“I had a ring, I had a plan, well, I still have the ring, actually.” My head won’t stop shaking as he so casually says words that shake the foundation of what I thought I knew. “I was going to do it that night, on top of the hill after Il Piacere. The day I got the call, I was going to propose.”

“You . . . that night . . .” I can’t form words. I can’t finish sentences. My entire world has just been flipped on its head. How am I supposed to act like nothing has changed?

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