It isn’t a lost car, but a taxi that’s idling at the front of the property. When I look back at Jasmine, she has a sly look on her pretty face, and it only serves to ramp up my heart rate as I wait to see who is climbing out of the car.
Chapter 28
Mia
The plane ride home was even easier for me to deal with than the one I flew out on two weeks ago.
Fourteen days doesn’t seem like a long period of time, but for me, those days were life-changing.
The cabbie doesn’t seem impressed that I’m just sitting in the car looking at the front of the clubhouse as he glares at me in the rearview mirror, but other than a loud sigh, he hasn’t told me to get out.
I’m not waffling between staying or leaving. I know I’m getting out of this car, but it’s what happens after that keeps me glued to the seat for a few minutes longer.
I don’t have to wait long to see how I’ll react to seeing Ryan again after what has seemed like forever because he opens the front door and stands on the threshold. Jasmine knew I was coming, but I begged her not to tell anyone. I’m sure Max knows because she doesn’t keep anything from him, but from the look on Ryan’s face as he tries to determine who’s in the cab, she kept the news from him.
“Lady?” the cabbie finally grunts. “Are we staying, or are we leaving?”
I don’t fault the man for wanting to get on his way, but I’m also mildly annoyed that he’s rushing my moment. Doesn’t he know how important this little slice of time is? Of course, he doesn’t, and why should he? I was silent the entire drive from the airport, and he’s now over an hour away from his normal area. I swipe my debit card through the reader and open the cab door.
Pulling the handle of the single suitcase I traveled with behind me, I climb out of the cab, never taking my eyes off of Ryan. His face is unreadable. He doesn’t rush off the front porch and swing me around in his arms as I imagined. He doesn’t frown and yell like the other scenario I created in my head. He just stands there, impassive as the cab drives away, leaving me standing in the parking lot immediately questioning if I made the right or wrong decision.
“Emmalyn said I was welcome back,” I tell him.
He doesn’t answer me, but that strong jaw of his tenses in response. I want to run my fingers down his face, brush my lips against his, confess everything I’ve been too scared to admit to myself until very recently.
I do none of those things, however. I shuffle my feet, piling the pea gravel with the tip of my boot, and try to figure out what my next move is going to be.
Cold air swirls around me, the ends of the scarf wrapped around my head fluttering in the breeze. I probably look a hot mess. The decision to come back here was just as hasty as the one when I chose to leave. I didn’t think it through, although I’ve known for days that this is where I want to be.
He hasn’t texted or called. He hasn’t tried to reach out at all, but neither have I. It’s not that I didn’t want to. I just knew I had to work through some serious things before I could concentrate on what I left behind, and as I stand here and watch his hands twitch at his sides, I wonder if that was the wrong move. Maybe I should’ve explained or left a note before leaving, but at the time, I didn’t know what was waiting for me in Louisiana. I didn’t know leaving Jason for good was going to be so easy and cathartic. I didn’t know that I’d find my strength and ability to persevere in the middle of the second night I tried to sleep at my parents’ house.
“It’s cold,” Ryan grunts. “Get inside.”
I nod, walking toward him with my small suitcase bumping along the gravel as I make my way toward him. He doesn’t stop in the living room once we enter. He heads for the hallway, and unlike the last time when I kept my distance when he ignored me, I follow right behind him, merely offering a quick wave to Jasmine and Max in the living room.
He’s sitting on his bed when I get to his room, and as not to be presumptuous, I leave my suitcase in the hall near the door and join him inside.
“Have a nice trip?” His words are mumbled as he stares down at his hands as if they hold all his secrets.
“I went straight from the airport to the apartment I shared with Jason.”
He tenses, but he doesn’t respond or look up at me. I hate that his eyes aren’t on me, and I realize the cold from outside has followed us here, only this time the frigidness is flowing from him rather than the north wind sweeping across the property.
“He moved a woman in with him,” I continue. “She was a very nice lady, helped me carry my things to my car.”
“So, I’m a consolation prize?”
When his eyes meet mine, I can see he’s already shutting down. Whatever hope he may have had before is dwindling rapidly.
“I felt absolutely nothing when she opened the door. I wasn’t angry or sad or disappointed. I didn’t care that my things were packed away, or that she replaced the throw pillows on the sofa and the art on the walls. It didn’t bother me that she rearranged the furniture, situating the sofa on the east wall even though it makes no sense because the setting sun glares on the television. None of that mattered. I wasn’t upset or sad when Jason showed up and begged me to stay. I didn’t feel any of the things I felt when you came home from Venezuela and ignored me. I didn’t feel heartbroken about Jason like I do every time you make me feel like an obligation.”
His face grows angry, and unlike it would’ve made me feel weeks ago, I’m no longer scared. I no longer want to back away from him or kiss his lips, so he won’t physically hurt me like the men in Miami did. I’m not saying I’d stand as tall as I am right now if it were anyone else, but I know I can trust Ryan with my safety at least. I have no idea what’s about to happen to my heart.
“Not one second since you arrived here have you ever been an obligation,” he counters. “I wanted you here every single second.”
“Wanted?” I whisper, more to myself than to him.
A word in past tense never hurt me more than that one just did.
“Want,” he corrects. “I want you here, but your arrival in my life has complicated things.”
“Complicated things?” I want to focus on that, but his back-and-forth is giving me whiplash, so first things first. “What’s complicated is you saying all these amazing things to me — insinuating that you want to be with me as more than a comforting person in my life. You wanted to say things I wasn’t ready to hear, which hinted at wanting to move forward in our relationship, and when you got home and wouldn’t even make eye contact with me. You let me hold you that night, and then you were gone before the sun came up.”
“You distract me,” he spits. His face flushes with frustration, but it’s gone in a second, and he refocuses on his hands.
I want to yank his head up by twisting my fingers in his hair, but that kind of physical contact would be wrong. Aggression isn’t the way for either of us to handle this situation.
“You distract me, too.” It’s the truth, but his distractions have helped me feel better. I get the distinct impression that the way I’m distracting him isn’t resulting in positive outcomes.