31
ELEANOR
My face is warm, my brain buzzing, and my body is like gelatin in the best way possible. I know I might be paying for it in the morning, but for now, I’m enjoying the lighter than air feeling.
I lean on the door frame and watch as Luke finagles my keys into the lock. He’s so handsome. That golden hair, those blue eyes, his long and lanky frame.
Mmmm . . .
I never thought a guy like him would go for a girl like me. I know I’m pretty, but he’s just the conventionally pretty type, and I’m the . . . well, I thought I was the unconventionally pretty type. Maybe I should start reevaluating that.
As soon as he opens the door, he pushes it open for me. “After you.”
Instead of going through the door, I swoon into his arms, trapping him in a messy kiss. Luke balks. “What are you doing?” he asks though my lips muffle his.
I grab at his suspenders. So grabbable. And I answer him with another kiss, yanking him into my apartment.
Luke trips after me. “Eleanor—”
“These suspenders are so damn sexy,” I say into his mouth, then I snatch another kiss. I taste beer, but I don’t know if that’s his mouth or mine. Though the apartment is silent, I still hear the twanging guitar in the background, revving me up and setting the scene.
I grip the bottom half of his shirt and untuck it, kissing and kissing and kissing him. I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of his mouth.
Luke’s hands drop to my shoulders. Prodding. Away? Pushing? “Eleanor, slow down, I—”
“I know we’ve been drinking, but I’m consenting. I’m totally consenting,” I reassure him, then plant sloppy kisses on his jaw. “Okay? It’s fine.”
“That’s not—"
I don’t give him a chance to finish his sentence. I shove him down onto my couch and plop down onto his lap.
“ Eleanor .” His insistence eggs me on. The syllables of my name on his tongue with his accent— fuck.
I’ve never felt this way for a man before. In every part of my life. It’s cosmic. It’s destined. It’s perfect .
Maybe because we started as friends, started with our minds, though our hearts were all tangled up from the very beginning, too. It’s only gotten better; every moment I have with Luke paints a bigger, more beautiful picture of us together. Like I can take a snapshot of the future—it’s glorious.
This is what people mean when they say when it happens, you’ll know.
Because I know.
I run my fingers through his hair, moving my hips against him.
Luke places his hands softly on my hips. Not grabbing. His hips aren’t moving against me.
In fact, he’s not even hard.
That’s fine. Whiskey dick. Maybe. That happens. Doesn’t mean we can’t kiss and have a little fun. Penetration isn’t everything .
I pull his suspenders over his shoulders and lower my mouth to his neck. “You’re so sexy when you’re working,” I say.
“Eleanor, stop.”
That gets my attention. Oh my god, was that what he was trying to say this whole time? Trying to ask me to stop? And I just kept going. I lift my head and cover my mouth.
“I’m so sorry,” I mutter. I push myself up from the couch, stumbling back a bit, but thankfully catching myself. “I’m so sorry, did I hurt you?”
Luke pulls his suspenders back up. “No, Nor, no. Not—”
I fist my hands and bounce them against my forehead. “I’m so sorry, oh my god.”
“It’s fine, it’s not—”
“The last thing I want to do is push your boundaries or make you feel like I’m taking advantage of you, oh my god, was I taking advantage of you?” I clutch my chest. Is this a panic attack?
“ Eleanor! ”
The room snaps with . . . is that anger? Is he mad at me?
I look back at him. Luke’s eyes seem to be sizing up a task he thinks might be insurmountable, his jaw tight and mouth pursed.
“Just stop for a second,” he says, spreading his hands up.
Oh, I’m stopped alright. Frozen in place. Waiting to know what the hell he’s thinking. Or what I did wrong.
Fuck, did I screw everything up?
Luke puts his hands on his thighs and rubs them up and down. “Could you sit?”
“What’s going on?”
“Eleanor, just sit. Over there.” He nods toward the armchair across from the couch.
I sit in the wingback chair. The back is too straight for how I’m feeling. I’d like to slouch and curl my legs up under me to protect myself like a hermit crab.
“I need to tell you something,” he says.
He has another girlfriend. He’s married. He has kids. Oh my god, he’s going to die. He’s leaving Austin. He thinks this has all been a mistake.
My mind rushes through possibilities all at once, not able to land on anything except bad.
This is bad.
“Okay,” I squeak.
Luke’s tense expression softens. He leans toward me, elbows on his knees. “I want to preface and say that the last thing I’ve ever wanted to do is hurt you.”
He’s totally married.
“I never wanted to do anything to hurt you.”
I am now incredibly sober. Viciously sober. I could walk a straight line, touch my nose, and say the date with flying colors. “Luke, what’s going on?”
Luke gnashes on his lower lip and his eyes shift. Fear. “Stay with me, okay?”
Does he mean in this moment? Or in the broader sense?
“I knew Diane.”
The words rest over us and float downward. The closer they get, the more I understand. “You knew Diane?”
Luke nods.
I narrow my eyes. “What does that mean?”
“I mean that I knew her. I mean I . . .” He swallows and his eyes fall from mine. “I recognized her. In the picture.”
I frown. “So, I showed you the picture and you knew who she was?”
Luke nods.
I laugh. It’s unexpected. “Is this a weird joke?”
He shakes his head.
I’m not sure how I’m feeling. The web is still too tangled. “So, I showed you the picture and you already knew. So . . . you lied?”
“Yeah, that’s what I’m getting at.”
Fuck the chair. I pull my legs up under me and let my shoulders slump. “How did you know her?” That’s not the first question most people would likely ask. “Why?” should have been the first. But maybe I’m holding out hope that if I understand the what, then I’ll get to the why. And he won’t have to grovel. And I won’t feel this hollowness in my chest.
“She was friends with my parents. Kind of like a part of the family. We called her Aunt Diane.”
I wince. Aunt . That’s closer than close.
“I have a lot of awesome memories from my childhood with her around. She’d bring her guitar around, and we’d have singalongs out in the backyard, and . . . then she just disappeared. I never knew what happened to her.”
“But she was here the whole time.”
“Apparently. My parents never gave me a straight answer. My dad—” Luke stops short, then shakes his head, throwing his golden locks out of place. “I never got an answer.”
I stare at him, waiting for more.
The silence is vast. And it extends for a while. Luke scratches his cheek and leans back on the couch. His eyes are flicking back and forth trying to figure out the next thing to say.
“Why didn’t you just tell me?” It’s not fair that I have to prompt him, but I can’t sit here on pins and needles any longer.
“The date,” he croaks. If he cries, that won’t be fair to me. I won’t be comforting him. I’m the one who deserves a cry right now. “The date was after the last time I saw her. I think. I can’t be too sure, but I—”
“You should have just told me.”
Luke sighs. “I know. You’re right. It took me off-guard. I didn’t know what to say about it. We were strangers.”
I scoff. “So, you decided to lie to a stranger instead? It’s not like you didn’t have plenty of opportunities to tell the truth, Luke. You could have told me after we met, it would have been less weird than this.”
Weird is an understatement, but it’s the only word that comes to mind at the moment.
“I know. I know I should have just—but then it was too late, and then—”
“I’ve known you for months, Luke! I’ve—I thought—” There are worse things he could have said. So many worse. But I feel like a whole part of our history has been betrayed. “Why didn’t you just—”
“I wanted to keep seeing you,” he says. “And I had already lied the first time, so it just felt easier to follow the trail with you. And to be fair, I didn’t know what Diane had been up to. I didn’t know that after—”
“You knew her name! We went to bars and houses and made phone calls to people to figure out who she was!”
Luke shuts his eyes tight. “I know, I know. I just didn’t think you’d want to keep seeing me afterward. You barely wanted me to get involved at first. I thought if I let you go before you understood who I really was, you know, not just some playboy because I know that’s what you thought. I know it was, then I would—”
“I feel like a fucking child who was taken on a scavenger hunt. Oh my god.” I cover my face. “Oh my god , I feel so stupid.”
“You couldn’t have known.”
I snap. “Obviously!”
Luke is smaller than he’s ever been before me. As he fucking should be. “You tried to push me away at every turn. You tried to—”
“So instead, you controlled my reactions. You manipulated me into thinking—”
“I didn’t manipulate you!”
“Yes, you did !”
Luke’s face darkens. “I wish I regretted it, but I don’t think I can. I don’t think we would have gotten here if I hadn’t lied to you.”
Maybe he’s right. Maybe I wouldn’t have let myself be enjoyed by him. I probably would have gotten in my own way.
“You would never have seen Austin, and you’d never have fallen in love with it. With me.”
I let out a shaky breath.
“And you love me, Eleanor,” he says, desperation creeping into his voice. “You love me, right? Because I love you. I love you so much. And I’m telling you now because . . . because . . .”
“Of course, I love you. That’s why I’m so fucking angry at you.”
The corner of Luke’s mouth perks up and I understand why.
I have not felt this hollowness since I walked in on my ex fucking another woman in our home. This wrong shouldn’t feel comparable, and yet it does. “You know why cheating hurts?” I ask.
“ Nor , I would never—”
“Listen to me.”
Luke’s nostrils flare, but he clamps his mouth shut.
“You’d think it’s because you don’t feel like you’re enough. Your partner needed something else from someone else. You’d think that would be the worst part of it.” My lower lip trembles. I’m not going to cry. Not over this. Not again. “But it’s not. The worst part is having to look back at the past however much time, and having to reconcile that the safety and security you thought you had, wasn’t there at all. That they had an entirely alternate history in the making that they tried to hide from you.”
We stare at each other.
I lick my lower lip. “This. What you’ve done. It’s not that different.”
Luke’s head drops forward. “Fuck,” he says. Then his body jerks up straight. “Fuck!”
The violence in the word hurts my ears. “You should go,” I say.
Luke, in his cute suspenders, pushes himself up from the couch, clinging to the arm of it like he might collapse if he lets go. “So, what does this mean? For us?”
“I don’t know. I just need to be alone right now, okay?”
I want to look away, but his gaze is on me, bidding me to look toward him. And when I do, the tears begin to lay siege on my eyes.
He hangs off his own body—a broken man in adorable suspenders. Screw him for still looking so good, even when he’s bereft. “Please, just don’t—” His voice catches, and he touches his chest. “Please don’t decide we’re done. Not yet.”
“Luke . . .” If I say anything else, I’ll start to sob.
“Just don’t decide right now,” he says, backing away to the door. “Okay?”
I can’t take looking at him anymore. I drop my head, trying to pull my legs up closer to my chest.
“I love you,” he says.
He doesn’t wait for me to say it back.
Once the door is shut, I cry.
Though he’s gone, I’m haunted by him the entire night.