Page 64 of Petals and Plot Twists
I breathe out a chuckle. It’s a very Sophie observation to make. “We are,” I murmur against her skin. I lean back, palm shifting to Sophie’s cheek. “How are you feeling about that?”
She leans into my touch, eyes falling closed as she smiles softly. “I’m feeling like it’s a really good idea.” She runs her hands up my arms, tucking them under the sleeves of my t-shirt. She curves her fingers around my biceps, making my muscles twitch. “When I left the restaurant tonight, all I wanted was to be with you. All week long, all these other dates, I just kept thinking things would be so much better if I were on a date with you instead. So when you told me to come home, I left. Right then. I paid for dinner, then I pulled off my heels and ran home barefoot.”
She tugs me down, finding my mouth again, and kisses me with a tenderness that eclipses the intensity from moments before. Her touch is a brand on my skin, and I’m not sure I can ever go back to a day when I don’t belong to her. I’m feeling too much, too fast, but we’ve been building to this for so long, I have no idea how to rein in my emotions. I know Sophie well enough to recognize that at some point, even if she isn’t afraid in this precise moment, her fear will catch up with her, but I don’t want her to freak out over this, and I can’t stop worrying that she will.
“How long, Peter?” she asks. “How long have you wanted this?”
“It doesn’t matter,” I say. “It just matters that we’re here now.”
She tugs on my shirt. “Tell me.”
I breathe out a sigh. “Years, Soph. Since high school.”
She closes her eyes, lifting her hands up to cradle my face. She pulls me down for yet another kiss. “Why didn’t you tell me?” she asks when she pulls back, but she doesn’t move her hands away. She holds me close, looking directly into my eyes.
I shrug. “Because I was scared. Or you were seeing someone else. Or we were living apart in college. The timing never really worked out.” I lift my hands and place them over hers, pulling her hand away so I can press a kiss to her palm. “I was going to tell you tonight. I couldn’t bear the thought of watching you go on one more date without saying something.”
She takes a slow, deep breath, then tucks herself against my chest, her head resting on my chest. “Are you still scared?” she asks, voice soft.
“Maybe a little,” I say. “But I trust this. I want this.”
She’s quiet for a long time, but I can feel her body tensing, her body language shifting, like she’s curling in on herself. I breathe steadily. I knew this would happen. That she would eventually panic.
I just have to convince her I’m not going anywhere. That she isn’t going to lose me. That our relationship can still be what it was before. Now, it can just bemoretoo.
“Peter, my relationships don’t work,” Sophie says. “We know this about me.”
“They haven’t worked in the past,” I say gently. “But maybe that’s because you were never with the right guy. I’m in this for life, Soph. We really only needonerelationship to work, right? Why not this one?”
“Because I’ll die if I hurt you. If it doesn’t work out, and I—” Her words cut off as her eyes widen. “Wait. We just need to check.” She leans back, stepping out of my embrace, and grabs my hand. “Come onto the roof with me.”
My heart sinks.
I should have expected the question. Sophie doesn’t want to trust herself. She wants proof we’re meant to be together.
I squeeze her fingers. “Sophie,” I say as gently as I can, “I’m not going onto the roof with you.”
Her brow furrows. “Why not?”
I step away from her, moving back to the bowl of cookie dough. I shift the flour container to the right, then line the brown sugar up beside it, if only to have something to do with my hands. I just need a moment to calm my nerves, to say what I need to say in a way that isn’t going to ruin what’s happening between us.
Finally, when I feel a little more in control, I turn and lean against the counter behind me, arms folded across my chest. “Because I don’t need a flower to tell me how I feel.”
She scoffs. “That’s not what it does.”
“Isn’t it?” I ask. “If we go up there and the flower doesn’t bloom, what will you say about what just happened? That it was a mistake? Crazy hormones taking over?”
“I wouldn’t…” she says, but her words trail off, and I know she’s considering, asking herself if thatiswhat she would do.
“But…Peter, what if thatiswhat happened?” she finally asks. “What if we try this, and six months down the road, we realize we aren’t going to make it? Relationships end all the time. People get hurt all the time. And I don’t want to hurt you. More than anyone else in this world, I don’t want to ever be the person who causes you pain.” She moves toward me, reaching out like she’s going to touch me, but then her arms drop, and she wraps them around her midsection. “If the flower doesn’t bloom, we can acknowledge that this was one amazing make out, but we’ll be better off going back to being friends.”
My jaw tightens. “Please don’t say that,” I say. “Don’t trivialize what just happened by suggesting we could ever go back to only being friends.”
She sucks in a breath, and I realize too late it was the absolute wrong thing to say. In Sophie’s experience, relationshipsdon’twork out. Men leave. She’s seen it with her mom over and over again. And it’s made her live on the defensive, protecting herself, shutting people out before they can ever get close enough to hurt her.
But I snuck in on the sly. Our friendship created an opportunity for us to get close without the threat of our relationship ending. She says she doesn’t want to hurt me, and I believe her. I know she’d never do anything to cause me pain.
But more than that, Sophie doesn’t want to get hurt herself. She doesn’t want to let herself fall, totrust,when she has no idea what it looks like when someonestays.
