Page 96 of The Secret Of Us

“You already are, I don’t expect anything else from you.”

“I know you don’t.” I try my best to smile at her, but I can barely hold it for a second. “But I have to do this.”

Izzy nods, her hand coming up to cover mine and pressing down like she can fuse us together permanently, so we don’t have to be apart.

“I won’t ask you to wait for me,” I continue. “That’s not fair on you. But I want to come back to you, if you’ll let me.”

“I’ll be here,” she tells me, her bottom lip starting to tremble. I pull her into my lap, enveloping her in my arms. I want to hide us away from the world and pretend that everything’s good, just like it always is when I’m in this room.

I don’t want to leave her. I want to stay here with her for the rest of my life. But I’ve been hiding behind Izzy for too long now, using her as a shield to avoid the reality that the rumours did get to me, that the guilt I felt about my parents separation was weighing down on me, that the regret I feel about getting there too late is killing me.

I can’t keep using her like that, wanting to run to her whenever I feel any kind of negative emotion. That’s too much pressure to put on a person. I want to give her everything she’s given me, but I can’t do that if I’m lying to myself and have nothing to give.

She lifts her head from where she buried it in the crook of my neck, her nose brushing against my cheek before she presses her forehead to mine. Her hands move from around my shoulders to cradle my face. Izzy keeps us as close as she can while she speaks.

“I’ll be here whenever you’re ready to come back. Whether that’s next month or next year, it doesn’t matter. I’m with you, Noah.” She tilts my face to the side to look out at the window. “We’ll look at the same moon every night, see the same stars. I’ll be with you, you’ll be with me. It doesn’t matter where we are, as long as we can both see that moon.”

I turn my head to press a kiss to the palm of her hand. This girl has changed my life for the better and she doesn’t even know it. I pull her closer to me again, and when her hands move to curve around my neck, I’m not worried about her feeling my racing heart, because it’s the calmest it’s been in a month.

“I’ll come back to you,” I promise her, my voice the steadiest it’s been because I need her to know that I mean it.

“I know you will. But right now, you’re here. Let’s not waste that.”

She urges me to look at her, and my memory of her was right. Green eyes like the fields by my grandparents’ house, pink lips like the flowers he grew. There’s no wonder I fell for her. She looks like home.

When Izzy kisses me, the world goes quiet. All that exists is the two of us in this moment. The kiss is gentle, a reassurance, an oath.

“Can you stay until I fall asleep?” She asks, our noses brushing. “I can’t say goodbye to you.”

All I can do is nod as she pulls away from me. She takes my hand in hers and stands up, pulling me with her and moving us toward her bed. Izzy lies down, pressing herself against the wall, and I follow without her asking. I’m on the right, she’s on the left, just like I imagined it all those nights. When I’m next to her, she lifts her head on to my chest, and my arms go around her shoulders, holding her close to me.

She traces her fingers over my chest, right above the heart that she owns. I run my hands over her arm, her back, committing the feel of her to memory because I know it’ll be far too long before I get to hold her again like this.

“Tell me about him,” she whispers.

“He was my favourite person in the world,” I start, my chest tightening. “When I was younger, he would always send me to the corner store with ten thousand won, and let me buy whatever I wanted. My parents hated it. I would be bouncing off the walls by the time I got back because of how much sugar I’d eaten.”

Izzy lets out a soft laugh.

“I can’t imagine you like that,” she says. “You’re so calm now.”

“I was a menace when I was younger. He let me get away with everything.” It feels so good to speak about him. “One time, I tore up his carrots before they were ready, but he didn’t get angry with me. Instead, he just thanked me for getting the baby carrots ready for him.”

The memory plays out in my mind as if it just happened. I sat next to him on a stool in the kitchen while he cut them up into small strips. We ate them for dinner that night in bibimbap with some of the other vegetables he’d grown. The happiness of that memory is washed away by the knowledge that I’ll never do anything like that again.

“He sounds amazing. I wish I could have met him.”

“He wanted to meet you,” I say.

Izzy’s hand stills on my chest and I cover it with mine.

“I told him about you a while ago,” I confess. “He said you sounded amazing, and he wanted to meet you.”

“Why did you tell him?” she asks, her curiosity clear.

“I wanted him to know about you. It’s going to sound weird, but I had an image in my head of the two of us going to visit him in Korea.”

It feels like a huge admission, too big of a revelation considering we haven’t even put a name to what our relationship is. But this seems like one of the best ways to tell Izzy how I feel—how I’ve felt for a while now—without saying the words.

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