Page 96 of Trying Sophie

On a sob, she admitted, “I miss being loved.”

“Oh Sophie,” I replied, gathering her up in my arms as she broke down against my shoulder.

The anguish she harbored over that doomed relationship hurt me because it hurt her, but I also thought that if she let me, I could heal her broken heart.

I didn’t exactly know how I planned on doing that when I had no idea how this relationship was going to play out in the long term, but holding her in my arms as she cried over her lost love, I silently promised her she’d never have a reason to hurt that way again.

* * *

“Haveyou ever been in love?” she asked, her hands fidgeting with my light dusting of chest hair.

My first instinct was to say no. I almost did, but then my mind flashed to a little, awkward blonde girl who’d hated me to my very core and all the stupid things I’d done to try and change that. To all the times I’d silently begged her to look at me with something other than fury in her beautiful green eyes. To the day she’d left Ballycurra and how I might have cried myself to sleep that night.

I wrapped my larger hand around her smaller one and moved it to her lap so that it wasn’t anywhere near my heart. The same heart that was beating as fast as it did after 80 minutes of play.

“Yeah,” I admitted quietly. “I think maybe I have.”

She looked up in surprise. “Really? I wouldn’t have guessed. What happened?”

I shrugged and smiled, tried to make a joke of it so she wouldn’t guess what I’d really been thinking. “Simple really. I was a dick.”

She laughed. “No, really. What happened? Come on, I told you my story.”

I pretended to consider her request to buy some time. I wondered how much I could divulge without her guessing at the truth.

And so, changing names and dates and all other pertinent facts, I told her about how I’d treated a wonderful person like shit because I hadn’t been prepared to deal with my emotions.

“Kind of like now,” I said, looking down at our entwined hands. “I’m sorry about earlier.”

“I know,” she replied. “Me too.”

“Yeah, I know.”

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