Because, of course, she did.
I looked to the sky with a laugh and a shake of my head. The universe really wanted to test me.
She scrunched her nose, and I tugged the ties of my robe tighter. A lump of dread hardened in my gut as she narrowed her eyes and looked me up and down.
“It would be really awkward if Pace didn’t come, wouldn’t it?” she asked with faux sympathy.
“I’m not doing this just for him,” I said, barely able to look at her, still searching the crowd for him.
“Sure. You know, there are other ways to get attention.” She looked at me as though something oozed from my nose.
Maybe the cold had shut down parts of my brain, or it was the pure adrenaline, but I looked at her then. Really looked at her. Forced myself to meet her gaze even though it made me so beyond uncomfortable that I had to count the seconds as I did so.
“Do you know how many times I’ve told you off in my head?” I asked. “So many times, I’ve said exactly what I meant to say in the moment. I have had literal stress dreams where I am yelling at you, with my full chest, and refuting every mean thing you’ve ever said with perfect delivery and plenty of receipts.”
“Wow.” She winced. “I don’t really think about you until I see you.”
I nodded, not believing her but knowing where this would go.
“I know, it’s so silly.” I shook my head with a genuine laugh, as a strange energy buzzed through my body. “I have spent so much energy on you. And you are just not worth it.” Her cool demeanor never faltered, even as the words began to pour out of me. And why would it? She probably lived for these moments of pushing someone over the brink and watching them crash out. “I wanted so badly to give you a chance to prove you are more than a sad, mean person. I genuinely couldn’t understand why someone would go out of their way to cause pain. It didn’t make any sense to me that any human with an ounce of empathy could be wired that way. But you’ve shown me time and time again that you will never be more than cruel. It took me all these years to really understand that. I’m not even hurt anymore. I feel so sad for you. You will never be happy. You are cursed to a life of misery and self-loathing because that’s how you are wired. And as you get older and the people you’ve surrounded yourself with start to avoid you and you wonder why, remember it’s because you chose to be nasty when you could have chosen to be kind. That’s an active choice that you make every day, and I imagine it’s rotting your soul. But I’m done giving you energy that you don’t deserve. And maybe you’ll live forever in peaceful bliss, unaware of just how shitty you are, and everyone around you will lie to you. Maybe there really isn’t justice in the world for people who suck. I guess I have to live with that too.”
It was perfect. It came out like a speech in a dream. She stared at me. I felt alive. I felt like I could lift a car off my proverbial baby.
“Pace is way hotter than you,” she said and looked me up and down again, with all the sassy menace.
I blinked at her. She shook her perfect hair out and smiled like she totally got me.
“Okay. Good talk,” I said.
I rolled my eyes and walked away. I stopped, debating whether to go back and punch her.
No. No. I wasn’t that person. I was done giving her energy.
I had been right in thinking that telling Vicky exactly what I wanted to in the moment didn’t change her mind at all. But I had been wrong about one thing. It did make me feel a hell of a lot better. I already felt her shrinking until she took up no more of my mental real estate with every step I took away.
Then there were murmurs as the crowd parted, clearing a path.
“Pace.” I gasped his name.
Even though I’d spent all morning hoping he’d appear, it was a shock for my eyes to see him after weeks of missing him.
He stood tentatively, handsome as ever, hands clasped before him.
“Sophie,” he whispered my name reverently as his gaze moved all over me before staying locked on to mine.
He had a look on his face I couldn’t quite place: part worry, part awe—a lot of confusion.
We stepped toward each other, and time slowed. The sounds around me faded until there was only him. His rapid breaths, his twisting brows. His hands lifted toward me before dropping again. He tugged the winter hat from his head in a gesture of pitiful remorse.
I winced, wondering if he’d heard me. “How much of that did you hear?” I asked, referring to my impassioned but totally wasted speech to Vicky.
“Not a lot, but I could see you, and you looked fierce,” he said and beamed at me. We stepped closer together again.
I wished he’d wrap me in his arms and tell me everything was okay. But he remained restrained, concerned. Where was the gregarious man who swept me up so I never felt like my feet touched the ground?
“It didn’t matter. She’s the worst.”
He nodded. “And probably always will be. But you aren’t,” he said.
