Page 71 of The Probability of Us

I don’t want to breathe.

Her hand grabs mine and it grounds me enough to grit out, “He broke up with me.”

“Hewhat?” she screams.

“He called and told me not to get on the plane.”

I’m hyperventilating. There’s too much air but it’s not doing its job. I don’t want it to. I need to breathe. I don’t know what I want. Except him. I want him to call and say he made a mistake.

But he never does.

Twenty-Eight

AUGUST CURRENT DAY (THURSDAY)

Warren walks out of the bathroom and runs a hand through his wet hair on the way to bed. I’m already in one of his old T-shirts, curled up beneath the covers, and the sight of him shirtless sends a thrill through me. This beautiful, sunshine man loves me—stillloves me—and I won’t ever understand why. But who am I to question what’s meant to be?

He crawls under the covers and when he rolls over, so we’re face to face, the corner of his mouth pulls up. “What’s that look for?”

I smile as his hand finds my hip beneath the covers, and my shirt, to pull me closer. “You’re like amanman now,” I say.

His eyes narrow at me like I’m crazy, but a beautiful, bright laugh comes out of his mouth. “What does that even mean?”

“Back then, we were still immature kids, even though we acted like adults. We were still on that short high that comes from finally having the freedom you craved your whole life. We thought we had everything figured out, but looking back, I knew nothing.” He laughs and I reach to trace the wrinkles his scrunched-up face causes. “And don’t get me wrong, you were attractive as hell back then, but now you’re all filled out.” I run my hand down his arm and back up his chest. His body shudders beneath the touch. “Your muscles and jawline are more defined. But more than that, there’s a calmness, a sureness about you that I never felt back then. It’s like something settled in you and that change helped you become the man you are today.”

I expect him to kiss me, to pull me closer, but instead, he takes a deep breath and starts talking about the things we never discussed before.

“On the way to Boston, you were right that there was more about my feelings on my parents’ divorce that I never talked about. I don’t think I ever consciously understood those feelings until recently. But before I met you,” he starts, a small smile on his face even though his eyes have dimmed like the sun on a cloudy day, “nothing about me was settled. I was a mess. I was a different man than I was starting the day I met you. It was like a piece of me had always been missing, I wasn’t balanced, and then you showed up and suddenly everything made sense in my world.”

I shake my head slightly, not believing that I could’ve changed him on day one—that he could’ve been different before the day he met me. He just smiles in return and some of the sun peeks out from behind the clouds. “I know you heard about what caused the divorce. That their marriage was over long before they told me, but they played the part of a loving couple in front of me until I went off to college. Then they couldn’t separate fast enough. But I stopped believing in love for a little bit because of them. If the two people I thought loved each other more than anything could end so quickly, what chance was there for me?”

Even though I’d guessed how he probably felt about it all, the words still cut through me like a knife coming from his mouth.

“In college, anytime a relationship started to get semi-serious, I’d bolt. I didn’t trust it so I left before I could get hurt.” He won’t look at me during this part, and my heart breaks for the shame he still feels. “I never wanted to tell you about it because I feared you’d look at me differently. I always used humor and banter to cover anything real and I hurt so many people, but at the time all I could think was not to let myself get hurt.”

“But then I walked back to my desk that day to find your face twisted in concentration and a warmth ran through me I’d never felt before.” He finally looks up and my eyes widen. In that look I start to understand why he always seems to say my name as if it was holy, or as if I was his savior, because maybe I really did save him, or a part of him at least. “So, of course, I led with humor, but then you played along and shot back with the perfect counter and it almost knocked me off my feet. We only had one conversation, but I couldn’t stop thinking about you. I spent so long avoiding anything serious and then I spoke to you for a few minutes, and I wanted to get on my knees and beg for you to give me a shot, to go out with me, to never leave.”

I laugh and lean in to kiss him, looping my leg with his to help me pull closer. “If it makes you feel better, I totally would’ve given you my number that first day. Then you wouldn’t have had to berate me when you got back from your cousin’s wedding a month later, and it might not have taken you two months to ask me out.”

He chuckles against my lips. “I did come on a little strong after that wedding.GodI was such a mess while I was gone. I should’ve been happy for them, celebrating, but I was more annoyed that I had to be away from you right as I was starting to believe you could be into me too.”

“Then why not ask me out sooner?”

“I was scared you’d change your mind about me,” he says so fast it’s like a bullet to my chest.

“Warren,” I breathe, the word barely there.

“I’d spent so much time running I was worried that, now that I’d found someone to be serious about, they’d run,” he adds. “So, I waited—absolutely too long—but that day I couldn’t take it any longer. I couldn’t wait another day to ask you out. Then you hugged me and said yes, and when you took my hand you officially became the sun in my world. Everything I did, thought, and wanted revolved around you.”

“And then you sang a song about summer love.” I smile, remembering how off-key he was. But that key fit right into my heart.

“It was more about loving Miss Summers.” He kisses my nose. “I know I said I was only falling for you then, but I was so fucking in love with you already.”

“If I hadn’t loved you before you sang for me, that would’ve sealed the deal.” I laugh. “But I didn’t want to scare you off.”

He rolls over so he’s hovering over me, and I let my hands roam his bare upper body. His lips move to my neck and my eyes close. My whole body hums and it feels a lot like the wordmore.

I’m just about to slip my hands under the waistband of his boxers when I turn to stone because he says, “I went to therapy in D.C.”

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