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We start walking toward my building, hand in hand. I try to tell myself that my suspicions are wrong. She is here. She wants to be with me. She wants the same things I do. But my stomach continues to be in knots, and I am not getting any relief.
“I should give you a key,” I tell her as I unlock my door. “That way you don’t have to wait for me outside anymore.”
“Uh-huh,” she mumbles, and it’s not the reaction one would have when their boyfriend offered to give them the key to their apartment.
Normally, as soon as we’re inside, we are all over each other. Not today, it seems. Neither one of us makes the move.
I drop my briefcase, which contains my work laptop, by the door, then head toward the kitchen where I dig for a couple of bottles of water. When I turn around, I notice that Hunter hasn’t followed me in. Not that my apartment is that big, but she’s normally right at my heels.
“What’s going on, Hunter?” I finally get the balls to ask. I watch as the fake smile drops from her face, and her eyes get sad. I open my bottle of water and start drinking, waiting her out. I am impatient as fuck but still give her the time she needs to get off her chest whatever is bothering her.
“Zach,” she starts, her hands wringing together in front of her. Well, this is not good. Not good at all. “I… I was thinking that…” She stops talking and just stares at me.
I pull out a kitchen chair and drop in it so that she doesn’t have to look up when she talks. She is looking even smaller now in her distress. Her shoulders are hunched over and her head is down. To be perfectly honest, she looks pitiful, and I’d feel bad for her if I didn’t think that she’s gearing up to break my heart.
“I’m going back to school next week,” she finally blurts after which she slaps both hands over her mouth like she said something she shouldn’t.
I let out a sigh of relief. If this is all that’s been bothering her, it is nothing like the scenarios I have been creating in my head.
“That’s great, baby, I am proud of you.” I stand up and take the two necessary steps to reach her. I place my hands on her hips to pull her into my body, but she resists the pressure I’m applying, so I let go. “Hunter?”
“I’m not coming back.” Her voice is so shaky when she says the words, I wonder if I heard her right.
“What do you mean you’re not coming back?”
“I mean that…” Tears are now forming, ready to spill. “I was talking with my mom, and I got this job lined up in New York. She just thought that… that I should stay there.”
I’ve never met Hunter’s mother, but I was under the impression that she was very supportive of anything that would make her daughter happy.
“Hunter,” I reach for her hands, and she lets me, albeit reluctantly. “We can make this work. I am willing to travel. I’ll come to New York to see you every chance I get. My dad has…”
“It won’t work like that, Zach,” she snaps at me and takes a step back. I don’t recognize the person staring back at me. She is upset about this but determined to see it through. I don’t come into the equation in any way, shape or form.
“Hunter,” I try again, but now she’s just looking angry.
“No, Zach. I said no,” she almost yells into my face. “I got my whole life ahead of me. A career I worked so hard for, and I don’t want to throw it all away for…”
I am getting angry now, too. “For what, Hunter? For love?” Her breath hitches, and she is looking scared. “Yeah, I love you. I had plans to tell you this weekend,” I soften my voice a bit, hoping to reach her, change her mind.
“Zach.” The tears I didn’t want to see are now flowing freely down her cheeks. “My mom said that…” She hiccups and my heart breaks for her now. “They paid a lot of money for me to go to school there, to have a career. And I can’t throw it all away like this.”
“We’ll make it work, baby,” I promise her again. “Hell, I can move to New York if you want me to. The company is based here, but I can make it work from anywhere, really.”
“Zach, I can’t ask that of you…” She can’t even look me in the eyes when she says that. Her heart is not in it.
“I’ll pay your parents back whatever they paid for you to go to school. I’m good for it, I swear.” The incredulous look she gives me proves that she doesn’t believe me, especially when she takes in our surroundings, my modest apartment not giving her any confidence in my statement.
“Zach, it’s not going to work out,” she is crying harder now, and her face is getting blotchy.
“I love you,” I grab her face in my hands, palming her soft cheeks and running my thumbs underneath her eyes. “I have never felt this way for anyone else in my entire life. I don’t want to feel it for anyone else either. I just want you.”
“Zach, I…”
“Do you love me?” I shake her a bit, my desperation obvious. “Do you?” I ask again when she doesn’t answer fast enough.
“I love you,” she sobs, and that’s all I need to hear. My lips slam onto hers, hoping to talk her out of whatever crazy idea she’s got in her head. “I love you so much,” she breathes into my mouth when I allow her to take a breath.
I walk us down the short hallway leading to my bedroom and make quick work of getting us both naked. We fall on the bed as one, with me on top of Hunter, savoring every second that I have with her body.
