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Trey shrugged, his grin skeptical as he pulled away leaving her feeling cold with his absence, “You keep telling yourself that, sweetheart.”
Trey opened the book back up and was running through another page when she finally gained her self-control again.
“Trey.” Maybelle began but he didn’t look at her, his full focus was on the journal, “Are we good?” She asked and that got his attention.
Trey’s head cocked sideways, “Why? Whatever do you mean?”
“Don’t play dumb, Turner, I mean since last week, we haven’t really talked, and I wanted to make sure we are good.”
Trey reverently closed the journal and put it back in its place on the desk before turning fully to her, “If we are going to talk about this then I need to say a few things with no interruptions. Can you do that for me?”
Maybelle rolled her eyes but proceeded to nod and wait for Trey to continue.
Satisfied, Trey straightened locking eyes with her, “What you saw last week between Juliette, and I was nothing. It was actually a fucking crime but that is beside the point. If I had the choice Maybelle, I never would have kissed her.”
Trey paused, letting that last part sink in while Maybelle bit down on her questions and retorts allowing him to continue without disruption, which she now regretted agreeing to.
“I also think the friend thing you want between us is bullshit and I have no doubt that you know it too. But I’m willing to play along, for now. You want to be friends; you want to getto know each other more? Fine, but I’m not going to pretend my feelings for you aren’t more than friendship.”
Maybelle went utterly still as she listened; his earnest feelings were palpable.
Trey inhaled a deep breath and exhaled, “I once told you that this, us, was end game for me and I meant it. I want you, May. I have just been waiting for you to be ready. I waited in high school, I waited through your coma, and I am willing to wait til you are ready to accept or remember that you want me too.”
This time, Maybelle didn’t have a rebuttal to bite back. The silence was her only ally in this moment, and she held to it. She had no words for the admission Trey just sacrificed before her and no denial for him assuming her unspoken want for him because he wasn’t wrong.
Except one small tidbit itched at the forefront of her doubts and as much as she wished she could ignore it, she couldn’t.
Maybelle gave the quiet between them a couple more beats before asking, “Can I ask you something?”
Trey nodded and Maybelle heaved a deep breath, “Are you going to the football banquet with Juliette still?”
The silence engulfed them once again except this time it was stifling and overwhelming. Trey’s eyes had widened for a brief moment then fell to a forlorn, guilty sulk.
That’s what she thought.
Maybelle did want Trey, and she had no doubt he wanted her too, but she was a clueless cannon ball that just blew up his reality in the last few weeks and was planning on integrating herself into more of his life when she moved closer.
Maybelle wanted to get to know Trey more, create a real foundation for a relationship that she could build off of despite the memory loss. But more than anything she wanted to learnmore about herself, apart from her forgotten past without fear of losing her only support system as she did so, and Trey obviously needed to figure out how exactly she fit into his event-filled life.
Trey offered a much-needed subject change as he reached for Maybelle’s hand, tracing the lines of her still healing palm, “I do have one request for when you move out there.”
“And that is?” Maybelle asked, weary of the way Trey studied the fading scrapes and bruises in her skin.
“No more walking or trying to run by yourself, please.”Maybelle snorted and made to pull her hand away, but Trey held tighter, “Calm down, I’m not asking you to stop, May. I’m just asking that you stop going out alone. I will walk with you every day, morning, night, rain or shine I will be there. Just please don’t go out alone anymore.”
“Hmm.” Maybelle hummed, “That is a very friendly offer, Mr. Turner.”
Trey shrugged, “What can I say, I watch out for my friends.” The tension in the room left as Maybelle laced her fingers with Trey’s.
“Deal.”
27 Moving Day
“I can’t do it, Penn. I’m not strong enough.”
“You got this Bells; I believe in you.”
“Your faith is misplaced; I am a weak weak woman.”
