Minami laughed, relieved. “Okay. Well, then . . .” She shrugged and reached for the driver’s door, but stopped mid-motion, as though a crucial piece of information had occurred to her. “I have no idea what is going on between you two. And I only know you very superficially, so I might be off the mark. But if what prompted you to break it off with Eli is not lack of interest, and what you’re worried about is more somewhere in the realm of . . .” She gestured inchoately, like a very enthusiastic painter. “You not being good enough for him, or not being sure that what you can offer him is worthwhile, or just being afraid that navigating a relationship with him might be too complicated, you might want to give him a call. We all have our baggage, and Eli’s not the type to hold anyone’s against them. Although, on my end, it would be better if it didn’t work out between you two.”
I blinked. “It would?”
“I love the name Rue. Big Hunger Games fan here.” She pointed at her abdomen. “If she’s a girl, and she is a girl, I’m seriously considering it.”
I glanced down at Minami’s belly. Was she . . . ?
“But if you end up in Eli’s life, it might just be too confusing, so . . .” Minami gave me a bright smile and got into her car, muttering, “Boy, am I selfless.” I watched her leave, waving weakly as she drove past me, and allowed her words to ring in my ears long into the night.
39
MEANT TO BE, OR SOME SHIT
ELI
The first thing he thought when he stepped inside the faintly lit, empty rink was: Fuck.
Because the rink was, in fact, not empty. Which meant that the trip had been a waste.
He sighed and stopped in the hallway, hanging his skates on his shoulder and checking the text Dave had sent earlier that day.
No practice today. Alec and I are out, but feel free to stop by the rink and let yourself in if you like.
Except that the lights under the ice were clearly on. The metallic scrape of blades against the ice was clearly audible. And then, once the hallway ended, he could clearly see her.
Her.
Gliding smoothly with the kind of ethereal elegance only people who’d lived half their lives on the ice could achieve. Circling the rink in a swooping loop. Coming to a fluid stop the second she spotted him and then just looking, eyes dark in the gentle light, soft curves turned into sharp angles by the vertical shadows, pitch-black clothes a dramatic contrast with her pale face.
Eli could recognize a setup when he saw one, just like he knew the value of a strategic retreat. And yet he closed the distance between them until all that separated them was a thin plexiglass barrier. And the million things he needed from her that she might never be willing to give.
“What is this?” he asked. He hadn’t heard from her in over a week, and her silence following their last conversation had been answer enough. It wasn’t her fault if she didn’t want what he wanted—in fact, it was part of what he’d fallen for, the messiness, the unflinching honesty. But he did need some space to come to terms with what the rest of his life would look like.
“Rue,” he asked again, a touch impatient. “What’s going on?”
“Would you like to skate?”
His eyebrow rose, but her expression remained sphinxlike. “Did Dave put you up to this?”
“No. But I did ask him to text you.”
“Why?”
“Please, Eli. Will you put those on”—she pointed at his skates—“and join me?” She looked calm, but it was the fastest he’d ever heard her speak.
“I thought we agreed that skating together is not what our relationship is about?”
“Please,” she said softly. Because everything, everything about her was soft, even her hard shell, and instead of what his response should have been—Rue, I’ll do whatever you ask, but please take pity on me because I don’t know if I can take more of this—he peeled off his shoes and tied his skates, stepping into the rink without bothering to hide the tension in his muscles.
He was on the ice, his first home. Standing across from the woman he loved, whose response to him declaring his love to her had been—nothing. Nothing at all. As much as he wanted to hope that she’d lured him here to announce that she could possibly see a future in which she loved him back, it was more likely—
Oh, shit. He knew the reason she’d wanted him here. She was going to spend the next twenty minutes dutifully spelling out her gratitude toward him for helping her fix her patent situation.
If she offered him a thank-you blow job, he was going to wail like a fucking baby.
“You’re welcome,” he preempted.
Rue’s glance was confused in the jagged silence.
“That’s why we’re here? So you can thank me for the patent.”
She bit into her lower lip, and Eli would have drained his bank account to buy the right to pull it from her teeth with his thumb. “I suppose I should do that, yeah. Can we . . . ?” She gestured at the ice.
Sure. Why not. If they skated side by side, he wouldn’t have to look at her while she told him how much she appreciated his helpful assistance.
“I should have texted you. I didn’t mean to ambush you.” They were already moving in unison. Like they were meant to be, or some shit. “But you wanted to skate together, and I . . . I thought you might appreciate a grand gesture.”
“Yeah?” He shook his head. “Not sure you and I are grand gesture types, Rue.”
“And yet you’ve done so many for me.”
“Have I?”
“Over and over.” She laughed, silent. “You pretty much stole all my options. I don’t know how to do something that is even remotely like returning your most prized possession to you. You’ve set me up for failure.”
This was nice. Lovely, even. But gratitude was the last thing Eli wanted from her. “I appreciate this, Rue. Really. But I didn’t do this to hear how thankful you are—”
“Well, it’s a lot. But since you already know, we can skip that part and move on to the next topic.”
Thank fuck. “Which would be?”
“An apology.” Her voice was limpid. She surprised him by flipping around and skating backward in front of him, as if eye contact with him was crucial for what she was about to say. “You asked me to trust you, and I treated you like you were the kind of person who’d screw me over, even when you’ve been nothing but truthful with me. My behavior never reflected that. So, I’m sorry, Eli.”
The apology was, if possible, more depressing than the gratitude. “Rue, you had just found out about Florence. I think some temporary lack of faith in humankind is to be expected.” He smiled reassuringly and stopped with a precise movement. So did she, just a handful of feet ahead. “If you don’t mind, I’m going to head home—”
“I do.”