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“We were pretty cute it seems,” She mutters humorlessly. Were? My heart stops. I swallow as I look back at Ana with panic in my eyes and she mouths ‘calm down’ to me.
She stops scrolling. “Do you have any pictures from our wedding?” The way she says ‘wedding’ feels foreign. Forced and awkward, even. Like she felt uncomfortable saying it.
“Yeah, let me find some.” I motion for her to give me my phone, and she puts it in my hand, carefully as if to avoid touching me. I try to not think about that too much. I find an album of wedding pictures. We didn’t have an elaborate ceremony, but a simple one in the park by her parent’s house. It was her family, Ana, and a few of our friends from high school and college and that was it. I don’t have any family but her. I give her my phone again.
She looks through our wedding pictures. The first one was us kissing at the end of the ceremony after the officiant declared us ‘husband and wife’. I had on a light gray jacket and pants and a white button down. She wore a long white dress that fluttered, flowed and draped around her perfectly. I remember when I saw her walking towards me on her parents’ arms. It felt like I took my first real breath at that moment. I remember thinking, ‘she can’t be real’. But she was. She was real. And she was mine. Is mine. Is. Mine.
She scrolls through them, seeing more from the ceremony, some portrait shots of us together in the park and then a lot of us with our family. We were laughing and dancing and celebrating.
“They’re beautiful,” She says tightly, then reaches towards me to return my phone.
“You can keep looking if you want,” I say as kindly as I can before I tuck my phone back into my pocket.
“No, it’s okay. I’m okay,” She dismisses me. I stay there, sitting next to her, praying she won’t ask me to leave or to move away.
“Is there anything you want to ask me? Or talk about?” I ask gently. She avoids my eyes and doesn’t answer right away.
“I don’t know.” Her voice sounds so small; it breaks my heart for the millionth time.
“Listen, Mads. I can’t even begin to understand how confusing this must be for you. I’m trying really hard not to make you feel worse. I don’t want to overwhelm you. I don’t want to scare you away. But I just want you to know that I love you. So much. I know you don’t remember that. But you are everything to me. You are my life. I know you remember me, but you only remember the me that I was before I knew you. I was a jerk, to you…to everyone. I’m so sorry that you have those memories of me,” I explain. I hold my hands together tightly, longing to touch her but resisting the urge.
She remains still and silent for a moment. Then she looks up at me with those beautiful bright green eyes. Straight into my eyes and my soul. “So when did you stop being a jerk?”
ELEVEN
MADELINE, THEN
I barely remember getting ready this morning.
I was rushing around trying to get to campus as fast as I could. I didn’t have class with Decker today, but I knew where he would be this morning because he is always in the library on Thursday mornings before his class starts. I throw my hair up into a ponytail, only needing to fix a few bumps and pieces, and then I quickly put on leggings, boots and a big knit sweater before grabbing my jacket and running out the door.
When I get to campus, I speed-walk to the library with my to-go mug of coffee in my hand. I’m trying to dart out of the way of people and not spill my coffee. Again, my lack of coordination threatens to doom me. I spot him after a few minutes, his tall and looming figure weaving through the crowd. He is heading towards the library quite a ways up ahead of me. He is wearing his black jacket, dark jeans and the intimidating looking black boots he normally wears. I wonder if he rides a motorcycle? I never thought about that before. Those boots look like they would fit in with a motorcycle, but I don’t know. This could potentially be a conversation starter with him.
“Elliot!” I call without thinking. I see him stop walking. He slowly turns around with confusion, maybe even disbelief, on his face. Great, he’s pissed. I know he hates being called by his first name. Good job, Madeline. Way to start this conversation off on the right foot.
“Hey!” I yell as I dart around more people to get to where he’s standing. It takes way longer than it should for me to reach him, but my height mixed with my bumbling incoordination holds me back. I almost trip and spill my coffee at least twice and when I get to him, he looks confused and nervous. “Can I talk to you?”
He nods his head slowly and I motion for him to come with me. He follows me toward the edge of the courtyard. I sit on one of the benches and he hesitantly sits down next to me, keeping about two feet of space between us. Geesh, is he afraid of a little bit of human contact? He wasn’t when he tackled you to the floor last night and covered you with his body. His big and strong body… I snap back to reality, my skin tingling remembering our encounter last night.
I’m an idiot.
He looks at me intensely—no surprise there—and waits for me to say something.
“I think the shock has worn off and I’ve been able to process what happened last night a little bit more. I just wanted to say thank you for quite literally saving my life,” I say earnestly, looking into his dark brown eyes trying not to feel intimidated by them. I smile at him in a way that I hope isn’t going to scare him off.
He remains quiet for what seems like an hour, but it is probably only a few seconds. Still, kind of a long time to keep someone waiting for a simple response. He finally answers in a strained voice, “I’m glad I was there.”
“Yeah, speaking of. Where the heck did you come from? I didn’t even see you,” I ask conversationally. I take a sip of my coffee and his eyes follow my movements.
“I needed to pick up wiper fluid for my truck,” He says uncomfortably. The way he answers makes it feel like he is in pain talking to me. Does he ever have normal conversations with people?
“Oh nice. That’s cool. Important to take care of that, for sure. I should probably check my levels while I’m thinking about it,” I smile at him, but he doesn’t smile back. His brows are drawn together and his eyes shift uncomfortably. “Well, I’m so glad you were there. Thank you, again.” I smile again. He gives me a curt nod and then looks away.
“This is officially the longest we’ve gone without hating each other,” I joke. He snaps his face back to me with his narrowed eyes and my smile falters.
“I’ve never hated you, Madeline,” He says seriously. My cheeks flush and my heartbeat picks up a little at his words and the way he says them.
“Oh…well, you know what I mean. We obviously have this weird frenemy thing going on,” I say awkwardly. He doesn’t answer, just keeps looking straight ahead. I sigh dramatically. “So do you live on campus?”
