Page 99 of The Fate Of Us

Wanna go for a walk?

Together?

If that’s okay.

I blinked at my screen, before firing back,

What about the crowds?

I don’t care.

Then neither do I.

I meet her outside, down a street just behind the lot. Hidden away from the few men withcameras who like to manifest out the front, allowing us to slip away without a hitch.

I find her as I round the corner, blue jeans and a white linen crop top covering her body, hercurls sitting just below her shoulders with a pair of tortoiseshell sunglasses resting atop her head. Pretty as ever. Breathtaking, like always.

A glimmer of a smile appears on her lips when she sees me, and that does nothing butmake me smile too. A big one. One I used to give her all the time, but now I rarely ever let anyone see. She shuffles on her feet, staring at the tips of her toes for a second before her head comes springing back up.

“Hi.” She whispers, looking up at me with her lashes practically hitting her brows.

“Hi,” I say back down to her. And when I realise her mouth is gaping and her eyes aresearching mine because she doesn’t know what to say next, I spare her the task and hold out my arm. “Shall we?”

After a moment or two, she nods, the corner of her mouth peeking up and dimpling hercheek, as she locks her arm around mine.

Then we fall into step, as she slips on her sunglasses and I pull mine out of my backpocket, which, paired with the cap I’m wearing, makes for a handy disguise.

I got a tonne of shit from Jacob after I told him to wear the combo, murmuring somethingabout plotting my murder because he'd been stopped a thousand times.

All it took was for me to remind him that he met Flo the day I suggested that… and thenhis goofy smile took over and he never mentioned it again.

But he was fussing for nothing, it’s a staple. Not only does it hide who we are, but it doeswell to block out the harsh glare of the golden hour that we’ve stumbled into. I feel the warmth wash over me as we turn onto a busy street, the crowds that we navigate through not bothering me like they usually would.

Any guesses as to why?

“Why’d you say yes, to walking with me?” She breaks the silence. “I thought after lastweek you would’ve… you know.”

“What?”

Her shoulders roll back, the brush of her skin against mine crowding my arms with goosebumps and filling my stomach with butterflies. “Ignored me.”

I shrug back at her, dodging a group of tourists on a walking tour before merging us intoan open patch of the sidewalk. “You asked.”

I felt her look up at me. “You can go on a walk with someone you hate just because sheasked?”

“I’d probably do anything you asked, Addy. Regardless of how I felt about you.” I replyto her, her eyes falling off me as we stop ahead of a crosswalk, cars zipping past us.

“So you’re not denying that you hate me?” A laugh that held nothing but disappointmentweaved through her words, as she kept her eyes ahead.

“I think I’m still confused about how I feel. Especially after… recent events.” I say to thetop of her head, her stubbornness to meet my eyes radiating off her. But I keep talking anyway. “Why did you want to walk with me?”

Out of the corner of my eye, I see the sign switch to walk, causing the body of peoplesurrounding us to shuffle across the street.

She shrugs back at me as we start to walk. “We haven’t spoken since the morning after you found me.” Finally, she brings her eyes, still covered by the sunglasses, to face me. “I thought we could clear the air before we go home.”

Home: where all this began.

“You know, it still feels weird talking to you like this… so… normally,” I admit, as wedip down a side street, mingling with more crowds. “Is it the same for you?”

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