Page 54 of A Me and Him Thing
He doesn’t.
He glances at his phone, then tells me, “I have to take this, it’s important. I’m sorry.” He taps the screen and brings the phone to his ear, his eyes on me, forceful and concentrated. “Yeah.” Silence. “Okay.” Silence. “Is everything all right now?” Silence. “I can be there in ten.”
He puts his phone back in his pocket, his eyes never having left mine.
“You have to go.” I say. A statement, not a question.
“Yes. I’m sorry.”
“I don’t understand what’s happening right now.” I only know that something is very, very wrong. I can feel the tears welling in my eyes. I can’t take another failed relationship.
“We need to talk. I owe you an explanation, but it’ll have to wait until later.” He pauses. “I can explain, Bree. But it won’t be easy for you to hear.”
With that, Ren Chambers walks out my door.
Chapter Fifteen
REN CALLS Afew times over the next week. I don’t pick up, and he doesn’t leave a message. If he doesn’t want our relationship to progress at this time, then I see no point in spending time together. It’s just too much for me. My feelings have grown for him. It’s too painful to spend time with him, knowing nothing more will ever happen.
This situation snuck up on me, and I need to back out now. I must preserve my heart.
Except I miss him. A lot. I can’t stop thinking about him every moment of every day. I yearn for him. I didn’t realize how attached I’d become.
There’s a part of me that wants to yell and scream at him. To cry and beg. To hurt him like he’s hurting me. I keep that person in check. She’s the Hyde to my Jekyll. I won’t allow that person to be unleashed. I’ve killed her. She doesn’t exist anymore.
I don’t understand Ren’s evasive comments about there being a “right time for us,” but now is not it. It makes no sense, and I don’t want to play games.
The thing is, Ren isn’t a man who plays games either. I know he wasn’t stringing me along. This knowledge keeps me from writing him off completely. My heart can’t let go, even though it knows it should. I find myself in love with yet another man who is, for one reason or another, not available.
This is not an experience I’d like to repeat. Again, I’m proud of myself for not acting like a raging lunatic while I lose Ren. I guess I learned something after my huge mistakes with Sawyer. Like how to be a mature adult.
So I spend another week minus Ren. I ache for him, but he’s an indulgence I won’t let myself partake of.
On Sunday morning, I get up early and take myself out to a super-cute breakfast place a coworker recommended. They only serve from six until nine in the morning. Then they don’t open up again until lunch.
It’s only eight in the morning when I’m headed back home with a very full, but very happy stomach. As I pull into the driveway that leads to my housing community, I notice a jogger coming toward me.
It’s Ren. Looking fit and healthy.
I hit my brakes, and he slows to a walk, looking just as surprised as me. He stops and places his hands on top of my car, leaning down to my window.
Guess I should roll it down and not shut him out any longer. Symbolically and literally.
I’m the one who stopped when I didn’t have to. Now I’m blocking his sidewalk, preventing him from moving on.
My window slowly slides to the open position.
“Hi, Bree.”
“Hey, Ren.”
“You’re up early.”
“As are you.”
Now is not the time to mention that, while he was running to be fit, I was stuffing my face. Yes, stress eating. I admit it.
“Tried to call a few times,” he says.
