Page 82 of Yours, For Good

Nora

PAIN ETCHED DEEP WRINKLES around his eyes. It helped to see he felt enough to respond like that, but it didn't take me closer to a decision.

If I cut everything clean, it would hurt. At the core of me, I didn't want to walk away and never look back. I would ache for decades, the echo of it following me around wherever I went, and what would happen if I ever saw him again by spending time near Julia?

On the other hand, sticking around meant being brave enough to give it time, give him a chance to repair the break, and get close again. Closer, most likely. It might help avoid the pain for now, but it would only make it worse in the future.

He remained crouching at my feet. His blue eyes kept steady on me, ready to take more of my feelings.

"Are you not going to fight me back?" I asked.

His mouth tensed. "Do you want me to fight back? I don't have an argument here. I capitalized on your assumption that Mr. B. was old. On your letters. I got to know things you didn't mean for me to know. You know my reasons and my choices now. You know how I feel. Everything is up to you, Nora."

"Then don't fight me back, but say something, please."

Help me decide if I should forgive you.

"This I haven't said enough." His breathing quickened, and a shudder seemed to run down his spine. "You have all of me. My heart. My commitment to do anything to earn your forgiveness. I will take every ounce of your anger— I deserve it. You deserve your rage at me. Just… don't cut me off. Let me prove…"

I curled into myself, my arms tucked on my lap as I leaned forward. It brought us close.

He didn't retreat. His eyes refocused, his pupils adjusting to me.

"Was it fake, Javier? All those moments together. Was it all part of a grand scheme?"

"Please, Nora… to what end? There is no evil scheme. You know what motivated me. I tried so hard not to take too much. To give you as much choice as I could. I need to know every way in which I failed, so I can… so I can show you I regret what it did to you. That I recognize I fucked up when I tried to do it all— I couldn't protect the program and you at the same time, and thinking I could took away your choice. I should have done the hard thing, but I didn't, and I denied you a say in what happened between us."

"Did you do more than hide Mr. B. from me?"

"No. Everything I said or did was true. Hesitating to dance with you until you walked away and found someone else. Every text, every screenshot comment. When we watched fireworks together— that was all me. Always me, I promise."

"You said in your email you want to figure out what's friendship and what's romance. That I make you want to do that…"

"It's true. It's all true. And I want to do better— I promise."

"What if we're confused and we're meant to be friends? What if the feelings that made me kiss you and made you kiss me back— what if it was all a… a… fluke?"

"I don't think it was…" Urge threaded in his voice.

His protest died in a breath. I leaned closer to him, to a point where he would have no choice but to interpret my advance as an invitation for a kiss.

He blinked a few times. "Nora…"

A kiss was a testable action. If kissing him had been a confused accident; if feeling like I soared with his lips on mine was nothing more than a stroke of luck, where the stars aligned for a single moment to never meet again in the sky, that was something we could answer. Cutting it clean would be easier, then.

My heart fluttered. I craned my neck forward, offering my mouth to him.

"Neither of us planned for romance in our lives," I said. "Maybe that's not what's on the table at all for us."

He moved closer, leaving him only a breath away from me. "You look like you want to put our kiss on trial. Like you want to analyze what might happen if we kiss again."

I wet my lips. "Correct."

His mouth parted. His breath fanned my lips, my face. "Do you want me to kiss you?"

"Do you want to kiss me?"

He released a gust of air like my question was hard to understand. His hands came up to hover near my face, in a position that made it clear he wanted to cradle my head. He held back and didn't touch me; I could feel the warmth of his skin radiating on mine.