Page 126 of Not in My Book

“I missed you today,” I said, kissing the top of her hair. She was stiff in my arms. I pulled back, search in her distant eyes. “Everything okay?”

“Fine” was all she said.

“Okay. Dinner here still sound good?”

She could barely meet my eyes. I had always been good at reading Max. From across conference tables, I could see her eyes light up when she thought something was particularly funny. In our tiny office, I could hear in her voice when a client made her mad, but she refused to be impolite. But I couldn’t read her now.

“This is good.”

Whenever we would get in a fight, I could sense it in my chest. Like the universe would unbalance and my body was preparing for me to quickly construct walls. I could feel the animosity between us and slowly, my defenses built.

I frowned, refusing to let it go. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

“I’m fine,” she said sharply. I peered down at her, trying to read her face. Trying to detect any sign of anger or hurt, but it was impassive. “Hunter, it’s nothing.”

“I know when you’re upset, Max. I know you.”

“Maybe you don’t,” she snapped. “And maybe I don’t know you.”

“What’re you talking about?” I asked, even though I knew. I didn’t have to check my phone to confirm that everything I was dreading was right here, right now.

“Why didn’t you tell me you applied for the promotion?”

Before my parents got divorced, my father spent most of his time at home yelling at us. He’d sling words at my mom and me like they were weapons. He yelled until his voice was raw and our tears were all shed. The older I got, the more I realized how much he’d fed off that fear in our eyes. I’d learned to keep my face still, unreadable, until I knew how to respond. It was my fight or flight response when I feared losing. And I was desperately scared of losing Max.

It was the way she said it that hurt the most. I’d not only broken her trust, but I’d hurt her. I knew I should just apologize, but all I knew how to do was defend until I was blue in the face. I was still learning how to love, slowly taking notes from Max as she did it so fiercely, so carefully. I was new at all of this and fucking it up.

“I don’t know. It didn’t seem relevant,” I said slowly.

“I told you countless times how much I wanted that position. How it could change everything for me. I must’ve brought it up every single day, and you didn’t think to even tell me?”

Her hurt morphed into anger in front of my eyes, her voice sharp like I had never heard before. Like she hadn’t had the time to consider the true impact of them before they fell from her mouth. My first thought was that maybe she’d spent too much time with me.

“Why are you making such a big deal of this?” I narrowed my eyes.

“Because it is a big deal,” she insisted.

“You can’t be upset that I beat you, Max.” My anger was boiling over and while trying to salvage what we had, I knew I was close to destroying it.

“I’m not upset you beat me, Hunter,” she said. I could see the anger and frustration in her eyes and voice. “You should know me better than that. If I had known you were applying, I would’ve cheered you on. Instead you kept a secret like this from me formonths.I thought I could trust you.”

“I neverlied,Max.” I was clawing at scraps. I didn’t want to fight. I wanted to sit with her in the corner of a crowded restaurant and watch her eyes spark up every time she spoke. I wanted to have my hand wrapped around her knee under the table and to roll my eyes when she stole the food off my plate. I didn’t want to stand at the edge of a block and lose all I had. “You’re just mad that I’m going to beat you.”

She jerked back, as if I had hit her. “I’m not worried about that. I don’tcare.I thought we had gone to a place where we could be honest with each other, but you’re hiding from me.”

“It’s not my fault you feel so inferior, Maxine. What, you want me to hand it to you? Give you the easy way out? You’re already doing that by living in your own daydreams.”

The words rose in my throat before I could shove them down. Acid burned the back of my throat at the hurt written across her face as the other shoe finally dropped. The way she was looking at me was destined to haunt for me a lifetime.

She didn’t say anything, just turned around on her heel and walked away.

A foolish man would’ve let her walk away. He would’ve been too scornful and proud to ever try again. He would’ve let weeks pass by without begging for forgiveness or hearing a word from her.

I hadn’t thought love was ever in the cards for me. I watched the people I loved, and the people who were supposed to love me, walk away without a second thought. I settled into a life without love, never looking back, because if I were to fall, I knew it’d be slow and rare. I gave up the worst parts of myself to my words on paper so no one thought I was hiding. So everyone knew precisely what they were getting into with me. And maybe my characters didn’t get their Happily Ever Afters, but they’d survive. They’d walk out limping, but walk out, nevertheless. I couldn’t help but imagine how it could’ve been had maybe I tried a little harder. I didn’t know how to love, but for Maxine, I wanted to learn.

“Maxine, wait.” I jogged down the block after her, pushing past the people. “Max, I’m sorry.”

“It was all a lie.” Tears were pooling in her eyes.

---