“Why?”
“Because I ran off. I left you on that beach wondering where I went and then all these years have passed with nothing. I should’ve stayed. I never should’ve left.”
“Nora, stop. It’s okay, seriously,” I assert, making sure she knows I don’t blame her for any of this. “We found each other again and that’s all that matters.”
By now she’s once again pressed against my body and I wrap my arm around her shoulders pulling her closer. The room is gripped with silence all over, the sound of our breathing, melodic and in time together is all that consumes it.
“Sometimes there is more said through silence than you can ever say with words,” Nora whispers against my chest, her warm breath floating through my shirt and my heart practically stops in my chest at her words. It brings me back to that day on the beach when I realized I wanted nothing else in the world than the girl sitting next to me. I never thought I would fall in love with someone I barely knew but I did, and as I sit here with her, I realize I’m still in love with her.
I thought I loved Bridgitte, but what I felt for her has nothing on the intensity and pull I feel with Nora. There have been moments when I felt like my heart might explode in my chest and she makes it hard to breathe. My fingers tingle when I touch her, like they’re on fire, a burning sensation I never want to end. And I’ve felt all of this in just this short amount of time I’ve spent with her.
“Sometimes we’re given choices, but there’s no choice in them at all,” I respond hoping she understands she made the only choice she had at the time and now she will always be my only choice.
“Do you have someone at home?” she asks with some hesitation in her voice and I feel her breathe out in relief when I answer no.
“You?” I ask back almost certain I know the answer to my question. I saw her with someone just a few short weeks ago, someone she was clearly in a relationship with.
“No,” she says quietly and then looks up at me. Every time I see her face, her beautiful brown eyes and the perfectness of her features, she takes my breath away. I’m stunned for a few seconds, each time wanting to kiss her and tell her how beautiful she is.
“But I saw you with someone,” I admit and immediately regret it. I’m not sure how it’s going to come across. I’m concerned she’s going to think I’ve been stalking her, watching her like some creepy fucking weirdo.
“What do you mean?” she asks pulling away from me, but she still doesn’t seem bothered by my comment. She’s more confused than anything.
“I came to find you a few weeks ago and I saw you outside your apartment with another guy—”
“It was you,” she states with shock in her voice, interrupting me. “I thought I saw you outside my apartment, but…” She trails off but then picks back up again quickly. “Why did you leave? Why didn’t you say anything? Why didn’t you come back?” The more she questions, the more I hear the panic set in in her voice. Her nervousness grows palpable and I can practically feel it radiating from her. She thinks she did something wrong and I watch her demeanor change as she slips further away from me.
“I left because you were happy,” I say but it doesn’t seem to ease her fears. I reach for her hand, threading her fingers with mine. “Nora, I know what it’s like to look for someone for so long and to completely disrupt your life. I saw that you were happy and had moved on. I couldn’t ruin that for you. I saw that you didn’t need me anymore, regardless of if I needed you.”
“I did need you. I still do,” she practically shouts, but even as she says it, we both know how strange it sounds. How can this possibly work? It’s been thirteen years and we’ve created lives of our own that don’t include each other. Is this something we’re both willing to give up?
The thought lingers in my head and after all this time I know how fucked up it is to question it. This is what we’ve both wanted obviously, but how logical is it really?
“Where do we go from here?” I ask her, my hand still holding hers and her eyes still focused on my face.
“I don’t know, but right now, I know I don’t want you to leave,” she responds, this time a small smile forming on her perfect lips.
Still needing an answer because I have to be sure, I ask, “So is he…” I stop short, not knowing exactly how to word it without it coming across desperate or intrusive. Without a word Nora shakes her head and I feel a sudden release of relief wash over me. I had no idea how much the thought of her being in a relationship was still affecting me.
As much as I tried to convince myself she didn’t belong to me, I’ve always felt a sense of ownership over her, like she will always be mine. And now knowing she’s not with someone, I’m finding an overwhelming need to make things work between us, that I want to see where this will go.
“I tried to make it work,” she says seemingly out of nowhere and I need no explanation of what she’s talking about. “I couldn’t though. It always came back to you.”
I smile at her words. It feels good to know I haven’t been the only one.
“Same here,” I tell her and she cocks her head to the side as if she’s questioning me and I realize we know basically nothing about each other’s lives. We’re strangers.
“I was engaged, but I couldn’t do it. Every second thought I had was you, you were my every thought,” I say. “I was more in love with you than I ever was with her and we were together for years.”
“It’s hard to explain that you fell in love with someone you barely knew,” Nora adds and I nod my head in response. “But I did and I still am. Seeing you now, having you here with me and as emotional as I am, I want this, Elliot. I want to make this work.”
Her declaration is sudden and I’m caught slightly off guard because this is not the response I expected. Honestly, I had no idea what to expect, but after searching for all these years, how can we just walk away from each other now? How can we not try to make this work?
“Me too.”
“When do you have to leave?” Nora asks me, her eyes still shiny with tears, but behind them there is hope, hope that this isn’t just a dead end.
“I haven’t booked a return flight yet,” I admit and a part of me feels like a fucking idiot for being so confident. I almost look away from her, but her face lights up and as her eyes crinkle in the corners, she smiles at me and it’s effortless.
“A return flight to San Diego?” she questions, her head cocked adorably to the side as I watch the memories come flooding back to her. I can see it on her face, an almost idealistic remembrance of what we were back then and what we had.
“No, I live in Chicago now,” I say and she shies away, the happiness of her memories of us fading quickly. I never realized how much stake we both put into things remaining the same, and while I didn’t entirely expect Nora to be living in Boston when I found her, I truly couldn’t picture her life at all.
Maybe it was easier for her because we met where I lived. It was my home and there was the familiarity there, something she remembers as a place I felt comfortable or maybe her memory serves her well to picture me there.