Page 3 of Promise Me This

The memory of our last night together plays on repeat in my mind, the light of it somewhat dimmed by the knowledge of what came after. It feels impossible that it’s been twelve years since I stood on this street, surrounded by a green so lush it has to be fake. But it isn’t, and neither is the quaint cottage situated on the end of a quiet road with fog-shrouded mountains looming in the distance beyond.

There was a time when I thought I’d never see it again. I never imagined the sensation of coming home could feel so like breaking in two.

White, gauzy curtains hang in the windows, blocking my view of the inside. Unlike the manor near the city where we lived that summer, this house has no imposing stone wall keeping people out. If I wanted, I could tiptoe around to the hip-high garden gate and see the hydrangeas his mother planted when she was a child. I could lose myself in their heady scent, their vibrant hues.

Not a good first impression if he thinks you’re stalking him, Leona.

Aren’t I, though? I remembered the name of the town where their family vacation home was back then. But the exact location of the cottage—the one he always swore he’d move to when he was older—escaped me. After taking a train to Killarney, and then a bus to Cahersiveen where I off-loaded my bags at the local bed-and-breakfast, I paid a visit to the post office. Or rather, the post counter in the local petrol station. One chatty mail carrier later and I had a general location, which the taxi driver understood well enough to get me here.

If that’s not stalking, I’m not sure what is. But I push the thought away. I’m nervous enough as it is without worrying over which laws I’ve broken.

Fall is slowly creeping in, with tendrils of cold weaving themselves into the gaps of my knit cardigan. Gravel crunches under my steps as I approach the house. I try to hone in on the sound over the loud thrumming of my anxious heart. Over the internal monologue telling me this is the biggest mistake I’ve made in a decade. It doesn’t take long before every cataloged failure of mine runs like a trailer for the world’s worst movie across the screen of my mind.

So one of the biggest, then.

I don’t recognize my own trembling hand rapping softly against the wooden door. I’m above my body, watching the horror movie play out. Maybe I’ve died from fear, and this is what the afterlife will be for me. The closest thing to a smile I can manage stretches my lips at the thought. Ireland would be the perfect heaven if it weren’t for the inevitable come-to-Jesus waiting for me on the other side of the door.

Footsteps reach my ears, growing louder with every thump. The blood drains from my face in one swift rush. Suddenly the possibility that a stranger is about to open the door flits through my mind, and I’m tempted to turn tail and run. I have to force my feet to remain planted against the ground. The delicate amulet hanging from my neck is clenched in my fist, and I do my best to draw strength from it.

“You can do this,” I whisper to myself.

The words stall on my lips when the door swings open, revealing a memory so real I feel the need to pinch myself. It’s not like he looks the same, per se, but enhanced. Time has done him nothing but favors, as though it is fonder of him than anyone else. Callum is wearing wire-rimmed glasses instead of his contacts, something I always loved but he refused to do because glasses weren’t cool enough for him back then. His once-unruly curls are tamed into a close cut on top of his head, held in place by a gel that makes them look slightly damp. Or maybe he’s just gotten out of the shower.

The thoughts that follow, and the mental image that comes with them, are entirely involuntary. I shake my head, reminding myself those aren’t mine to imagine anymore.

His eyes go wide when they land on me. The fire of betrayal, of hurt catches in their evergreen depths. Even after he schools the rest of his features into cool indifference, it remains there. Simmering.

“Leo.” His voice is intentionally mechanical, and his jaw ticks as though saying my name is a crime committed against his better judgment.

But it’s still his voice, and it strikes me right in the center of my chest.

A sigh of relief, equally as involuntary as the shower thoughts, escapes me. Somewhere deep inside, I was sure he’d forgotten me. But no, if the scalding anger in his eyes tells me anything, it’s that he knows exactly who I am.

The realization puts a little steel back into my spine.

“Cal.”

He leans into the doorframe, crossing his arms and looking down at me. Every possible bodily cue that shows someone’s not wanted, he’s giving me. “You know I hate being called Cal.”

I stand up straighter. “You know I hate being called Leo.” Leo is the name of hundred-year-old painters and celebrities who only date models half their age. Leona is beautiful, elegant, a gift passed down from my grandmother, who immigrated from France.

As if he can hear the spiel going through my head, he narrows his eyes. “Don’t show up on my doorstep after a decade and insult me with a lie.”

His tone freezes me in place, chilling me to the bone. I tug at the edges of my cardigan, wrapping them tightly around my middle. My stomach is rolling, and I have to draw a deep breath to take the edge off the nausea that threatens to overwhelm me.

It wasn’t entirely a lie, after all. Leo is a boy’s name, and I do hate it when people call me that. But the memory of the first time we had this conversation—back before he hated me—stands in stark contrast to the hostility rolling off him in this moment.

I can almost feel his hand, broad and gentle, lacing itself into my brunette waves. Cradling me close. In my memory, he nips the bridge of my nose where it’s crinkled in disgust. The bite forces me to relax my expression because now I’m giggling, and his face flickers from broad smile to serious stare in the blink of an eye.

“Why do you insist on calling me that ugly name?”

“Because,” he whispers, studying my face as if I really were painted by some old guy a hundred years ago. A work of art. Something worth revering. “The shorter your name is, the more times I can say it in one breath.”

And then he’d said it, over and over, the hallowed syllables that make up a prayer.

He’s watching me remember; I can see it in his eyes that are nearly as green as the grass in the rolling hills beyond the cottage. For a moment he softens, before the reality of the years that lie between that moment and today fall swiftly into place, dividing who we are now from the two twenty-somethings who loved each other more than life itself.

“Why are you here?” Despite his stern expression, the words are purposely flat and lifeless. None of the heat flooding his defined cheekbones finds its way into his question. He seems tired all of a sudden, like this sorry excuse for a conversation has aged him in a matter of seconds.

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