Page 19 of Exes That Puck
“It wasn’t about proving anything.”
“You wanted to know if I’d fight for you. If I’d come after you. Well, here I am.” I spread my arms wide. “I’m fighting for you.”
“I never asked you to—”
“You didn’t have to ask. I’d do anything for you. Anything, Kare.”
The words hang between us in the cool night air. Cars pass on the street beyond the parking lot, their headlights casting moving shadows across her face. She looks smaller suddenly,younger. Like the girl I fell for a year ago who laughed at my stupid jokes and let me hold her hand in the quad.
“It’s not––” she says quietly. “We don’t work.”
“And Saturday night?” I ask.
“Payton showed up and reminded me why I left in the first place.”
“What did she say?”
Kara shakes her head. “It doesn’t matter what she said. She was right.”
“About what?”
“About us. About this cycle we’re stuck in. About how I always come back no matter how many times you hurt me.”
The accusation hits like a physical blow. “I never mean to hurt you.”
“But you did. Over and over.” Her voice cracks slightly. “And I let you because I thought that’s what love was supposed to feel like. Intense and messy and painful.”
“It doesn’t have to be painful.”
“With us it always is.”
I want to argue, want to list all the good times we’ve had. The nights we stayed up talking until sunrise. The way she laughed when I brought her coffee before her early classes. The morning she wore my jersey to my game and cheered louder than anyone in the stands.
But the truth is, she’s not entirely wrong. We’ve hurt each other. I’ve hurt her. More times than I want to count.
“I can change,” I say.
“You shouldn’t have to change. And neither should I.” She looks down at her hands. “We bring out the worst in each other, Zeke.The jealousy, the possessiveness, the need to control. That’s not love. We’re terrible together.”
“What about the good parts? What about how we make each other feel alive?”
“That’s not enough anymore.”
The finality in her voice makes my chest tighten. This isn’t like our other breakups, where she storms off angry and I know she’ll cool down eventually. This feels different. Final.
“Kara.” I step closer, close enough to smell her vanilla perfume mixed with the paper scent that always clings to her after work. “Please.”
She doesn’t step back, but I can see her fighting the urge. “Please what?”
“Don’t do this.”
“I already broke up with you. We’re done. Like done, done.”
“If you were done, you wouldn’t have kissed me Saturday night. You wouldn’t be standing here talking to me now.” I reach out slowly, carefully, until my fingers brush her wrist. She doesn’t pull away. “You’d have walked out the other door.”
Her pulse jumps under my touch. “Zeke—”
“I miss you,” I whisper, stepping closer until there’s barely any space between us. “I miss everything about you. The way you hum when you’re reading. How you steal my hoodies and pretend you forgot to give them back. The little sounds you make when I—”
