14. Emma
14
Emma
Sitting at the breakfast bar, I gaze out of the window and watch the soft, light flakes of snow float down from the gray-streaked sky. But with my hands wrapped around a hot cup of coffee, I’m not really thinking about the snow. In fact, I’m hopelessly wishing the coffee will do something in the way of soothing the strange mix of nerves and warmth that has managed to settle itself in my chest.
The past few days with Ryan have chipped away at the barriers I’d carefully constructed. Not just the walls I built before I got myself into this contract, but old walls, with chipped bricks that have been there for years. A protection I put in place after it felt like my heart had been ripped from my chest in my teenage years.
But I shouldn’t be feeling anything. I mean, this arrangement was meant to be safe, right? An agreement with no expectations. In fact, it was me who drew up the contract stating that very thing.
But a few days ago, something changed for me. That moment on the ice, with my laughter fading and the gaze we shared after he had grabbed me and saved me from seriously hurting myself on the ice, was pivotal.
I could deny that anything happened, but I would only be lying to myself. And I definitely can’t deny this feeling that’s sitting in the pit of my stomach. Besides, what would be the point? The truth is that the dormant ache that has been quiet for so many years has returned, prickling at the edges of my carefully laid plans.
“Penny for your thoughts?”
Swiftly pulled from my trancelike daydreaming, I nearly jump out of my skin. My heart thumps in my chest, and my head spins around to find Sharon standing at my kitchen doorway.
Sharon gives me a surprised look. “Did you forget I was coming?”
“What time is it?” I gasp, feeling like I’ve been woken with a start as my heart thumps against my chest.
“Nearly eleven,” she replies slowly, her frown now dancing.
Every fourth Saturday of the month, Sharon, Debs, and I go out for a girly afternoon of shopping and drinks. Most of the time, we don’t even buy anything, but it’s a chance for us to get out together, as well as head out of Maple Springs.
Littlefield is a place three towns over. Not only does it have a far bigger population than Maple Springs, but it’s also home to a fabulous mall. It’s there where we while hours away, gazing through windows and wondering whether $800 vases would look out of place in our living rooms.
Sharon looks more concerned as the seconds pass. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” I lie, still trying to gather myself while forcing a small smile. “I just lost track of time. Lost in my own little world. Just sitting here relaxing.”
“Uh huh,” Sharon says knowingly.
Yes. You probably should have stopped at being “fine.”
As wonderful a friend as Sharon is, I instinctively feel a guard going up. I mean, how am I supposed to tell her what I’m feeling? After the show I put on when Ryan Steele walked through the doors of the clinic on that first day, I’m now going to look like a complete hypocrite.
She walks further into the kitchen and pulls a bar stool out from under the breakfast bar. Sitting down opposite me, she gives me a long look.
“Right,” she says, her voice soft but teasing. “You look about as relaxed as a cat in a bathtub. Anything to do with a certain charming gentleman we both know?”
How she’s come to such a conclusion, I don’t know. Maybe I don’t have the poker face I imagine I have, or maybe it’s just because she’s one of my oldest friends and knows me far too well.
Even so, as I roll my eyes, I can’t help the heat that rises to my cheeks.
“It’s not—” I begin, but at the sight of Sharon’s raised eyebrow, I sigh and shake my head. I might as well just surrender. I’m not going to win this battle, am I?
“Okay, maybe it’s a little bit about him.”
“About who?” Debs’s voice carries down the hallway, her person soon following. She walks into the kitchen, her face full of intrigue. “Who are we talking about?”
I’m used to these guys just walking into my house. Apart from the fact that I don’t have the door locked during the day—crime is nearly non-existent in Maple Springs—they both have a key.
Sharon waves Debs to silence and then turns back to me, clearly scared that Debs’s arrival and interruption might break the moment and that I might clam up like a shell.
“Go on,” Sharon encourages, her expression softening. “We’re listening.”
I take a deep breath, feeling the words bubbling up, too tangled and insistent to hold back.
“I don’t know. It’s like, we started this whole thing with an agreement, right? Just a practical arrangement. No feelings, no complications. But now…” I trail off, looking out the window, scared of the words that might leave my mouth. Scared that once they are said, they can’t be unsaid.
“And I keep thinking about the past, about what he did. About how he completely humiliated me and destroyed the little confidence I had. But now… it’s different. He’s different. He’s changed.”
“He’s grown up,” Debs says softly. “Like we all tend to do.”
Sharon and Debs are gazing at me with gentle expressions, and my worry about what I should or shouldn’t say dissipates. These are my friends. They love me no matter what. I’m safe when I’m with them.
“Has he, though?” I say. “He doesn’t have a bad boy reputation for no reason. I mean, let’s face it, he always has.”
“Let’s put the reputations aside for a minute,” Debs says carefully. “You’ve spent the last few weeks with him. What does your gut tell you?”
I heave a sigh and shrug. “I don’t know.”
Sharon looks at Debs. “Maybe we need to forget about Ryan and concentrate on Emma.” Turning to me, she says, “You liked him all those years ago. Before that thing happened. Are you worried those feelings might be coming back?”
I let out a soft, humorless laugh. “Something like that. We’ve been spending all this time together, and it’s… well, it’s confusing. Part of me is terrified because I remember how it felt back then and how badly it hurt. But the other part of me…” I stop, unsure of how to explain the quiet happiness I’ve felt in his presence, the sense of ease that was becoming more dangerous than anything else.
Sharon nods slowly. “It sounds like maybe that ‘other part’ of you wants to see where this could go.”
I shake my head violently. “Oh, no. I can’t think like that. Not with Ryan. It’s not… safe. We agreed that this was just business, that we wouldn’t get attached.”
Sharon has an eyebrow raised, and leaning forward slightly, she says. “Emma, sweetie, if there’s one thing I know about you, it’s that you don’t do things halfway. Maybe you’re already more attached than you’d like to admit.”
Behind her, Debs is nodding slowly.
The words hit me harder than I expect, a gentle reminder of the truth I’ve been avoiding these last few days. I don’t want to be attached; I don’t want to feel that easiness when he makes me laugh, or that flutter of excitement when he looks at me with a particular smile.
I moved past all that years ago.
No. You dug a six-foot hole and buried your feelings in a dark pit, hoping they would never see the light of day again.
Sure; that, too.
But as Sharon’s words settle in, I wonder if I haven’t underestimated my heart.
“Maybe you’re right,” I murmur, running a hand over my face. “I just… I don’t know what I feel. Or when I do feel, I don’t know what to do about those feelings.”
Sharon reaches out and gives my hand a squeeze. “You don’t have to do anything. Just let yourself feel what you feel. You can’t control it, Emma.”
“Yes. And that’s the problem,” I reply.
“Because you can’t control it?” Debs asks.
“You know, my life was far less complicated three weeks ago. I guess I’m just afraid. If I let myself feel this way again, if I let these feelings run free, what happens when it ends?”
Sharon smiles sympathetically, her gaze soft. “Well, that’s the risk with anything real, isn’t it?”
“But how do I know if this is real?” I cry. “And more to the point, do I want it to be?”
“Look at it this way,” Debs says. “Right now, does it matter?”
I frown at her question because, in my head, why wouldn’t it matter? She gives me one of her looks. It’s a look Sharon and I are well used to. It’s a look that means she’s about to explain something from a perspective that’s completely alien to us.
“At this moment on your timeline, you have a job to do. You’re in the perfect place, at the perfect time, doing the perfect thing. Nothing else matters. Whether you like it or not, you’ve attracted this situation to you, and it’s going to play out exactly the way it should.”
I’ve heard Debs’s metaphysical explanations before. Sometimes, she makes complete sense; sometimes, she loses me entirely. Like right now.
“So, my feelings are irrelevant,” I say.
She screws up her face, her expression telling me that I’m half right. “It’s not that your feelings are irrelevant, Emma. It’s the idea that whatever is going to happen is going to happen for your benefit.”
I stare at her a little glazy-eyed for a minute, and then I say, “I don’t get it.”
“I think what she’s trying to say,” Sharon jumps in, “is that the Universe has your back.”
That might be so, but it doesn’t really help me in this situation.
“Okay, let me explain it differently,” Debs says, clearly seeing that I’m struggling. “Pretend you’re a colander.”
“What?” I gawk.
Sharon lets out a giggle.
“No, hear me out,” Debs continues, her face all serious. “If you have your colander in the sink, right? And you turn the water on, the water runs through it.”
“Okay,” I say.
“Well, that’s how you need to be with your feelings. You need to let them run through you.”
“And how is that going to help?” I press.
“Because you’re not holding on to them. You’re still experiencing them, but unlike a bowl with no holes, they’re not going to fill you up and overwhelm you.”
As her words sink in, this strange calm passes through my body. I can’t explain it, but clearly, she has.
“Oh,” Sharon gasps, feeling the same comprehension I am. “Wow. That’s…”
“Yes. It is,” Debs says, smiling now that we’ve gotten her point.
“I don’t need to have it all figured out right now,” I say. “I can just take it one step at a time.”
“Exactly.” Debs nods.
Sharon throws her a look. “How the heck did you get to be so smart?”
“It’s called reading,” Debs quips back with a deadpan face.
The three of us then burst into laughter.