North’s mouth was agape. “We would save up?”
“You. I meant you.” Marigold felt flustered. “But yeah. So my apartment has a second bedroom, and I need someone to split my rent, because I’m broke. We’d be helping each other out, you see?”
His jaw grew wry with understanding. “Ah. You want me to help pay your rent.”
But he didn’t understand, not at all. “If I didn’t care who my roommate was, I wouldn’t be here. I’d be on Craigslist!” Marigold threw her arms above her head. “I want you to be my roommate.”
North stared at her until she stopped pacing.
“What?” Her voice trembled.
“You want me … to be your roommate.”
“Yes.”
He swallowed and shook his head. “Marigold. I can’t do that.”
“Because of this job?”
“Because of you.”
“Oh.” His shirt dangled limply at her side. Marigold glanced down the trail, fighting the tears from welling up again. “Okay. Yeah, I guess it would be weird for you to move in with your ex-girlfriend. Someone you’d dumped.”
North looked strangely stung. He stumbled to his feet. “No.”
“No? What do you mean, no?”
“I didn’t dump you.”
“North, I was there. You broke up with me.”
“Because you were leaving and I couldn’t go with you! I didn’t want to.”
Marigold shook her head in confusion. “You didn’t want to leave?”
“I didn’t want to break up with you.”
“But … but you did.”
His shoulders drooped miserably. “I know.”
“Oh.” It was a whisper.
North crossed his arms to protect his last shred of dignity. “I stopped texting you because it sucked, all right? It sucked hearing about your new life and your new job, and I knew any day you’d tell me about a new boyfriend, too.”
“But we were friends. You could’ve told me this. You left me in the dark.”
“You always wanted me to talk to Noelle, but I was so angry with her. It wasn’t until after you left that I finally reached out to her, so when she returned … it felt worse than if she hadn’t. Because it was already too late.”
Everything was wrong inside Marigold’s chest. Her heart was cracking, thumping, splitting, swelling. All at once.
North extracted his shirt from her death grip, put his arms through the holes, and buttoned it back up. “I’m telling you that I can’t move to Atlanta because I don’t want to be your roommate. Or your friend. I never liked you like that. I mean, I did, of course I did, but…” He snatched up his hat from the rock. “It was always more complicated for me than it was for you. My feelings were stronger.”
Marigold was frozen. She’d never seen him look so vexed. Or so forlorn.
He tugged the hat onto his head. “Do you understand what I’m saying?”
She could only nod.
“I’m going back to work.” North leaned over and kissed her cheek, lightly. “You should take the other car down.”
* * *
Marigold held a hand to her cheek as she watched him disappear into the forest. He never looked back. His kiss had been the first time their skin had made contact in three months.
Her fingertips still smelled like him. It didn’t make her feel good. The kiss hadn’t felt good, either. Something was whipping circles inside of her, dizzying and nauseating, a realization as huge and terrifying and destructive as a tornado.
To have the strength to move away, Marigold had channeled all her energy into helping her mother, finding a job, finding an apartment, packing up everything she’d ever owned, and saying goodbye to the only hometown she’d ever had. Leaving required determination, so everything else had been placed on hold. From her first encounter with North, there’d been an expiration date on their relationship. It hadn’t seemed smart to acknowledge the possibility of something else. Or to admit anything out loud.
Marigold thought she’d been here to rescue him, but the act had been selfish.
She wanted North to move in with her not because she wanted to see him succeed (although she did), and not because she needed help with her rent (although she also did), but because she couldn’t bear to be away from him for another day.
It was obvious. It was so stupidly obvious.
Marigold was in pain because she was heart-crushingly, soul-achingly, bone marrow–deep in love with North Drummond. How was it possible that she hadn’t known until this moment?
North loved her. He loved her.
Marigold cried aloud—a strange, strangled sound—as the information washed over her again. That is what he was trying to say, right? Marigold shook her head, dislodging this last seed of doubt. She grabbed her purse and bolted down the trail, over the stones and logs. The world grew louder. Talking, playing, laughing, shouting. She ran onto the main pathway, pulse in her throat. She came around the final bend—
Just as his green car slipped out of view down the mountain.
* * *
The funicular closed at six. It meant that North would arrive for his final load of passengers in another ninety minutes.
She’d waited all day. She could wait a bit longer.
Marigold headed toward the buildings for warmth. According to the thermometer beside the concessions stand, it was fifty-seven degrees. She rubbed her arms vigorously, unsure how much of her shivering was from the temperature and how much of it was from her fear of what was still to come. It didn’t help when she realized the seat of her shorts was muddy and wet. She took her time in the restroom, trying to get the fabric as clean and dry as possible with paper towels while praying that North hadn’t seen the damage when she was pacing in front of him.
North. North.
As the clock ticked, second after agonizing second, his name soared through her like a ballad. They felt the same way about each other. It wasn’t too late. It couldn’t be.
It was the longest ninety minutes of her life.
At six o’clock, Marigold was still freezing, but the sky was blue and bright. The summer sun was still a few hours away from setting. The rangers had done a good job of shepherding people down from the summit, because the waiting area was full when the Maria arrived. North flumped onto the platform. He looked exhausted. He ushered the passengers aboard wordlessly as Marigold hid at the end of the line, unable to resist one final surprise. Her stomach twisted with hope and butterflies.
When the tall man ahead of her stepped onto the car, North’s eyes locked upon hers. His expression briefly lit up before sinking back into something that was even more dejected. It reshaped itself again into anger. North held up a hand to stop her. “Oh my God,” he said. “You’re a worse listener than I thought.”
He still cared. He still felt strongly about her. His reaction made her feel brave.
Marigold smiled sweetly, knowing how to play this final game. “Please let me board.”
“Do you or do you not see this official government hand stopping you?”
“Volunteer government hand. And it’s your job to let me board.”
“You’re killing me today.” But he dropped it, shaking his head and stepping aside. “And now you’re doing it on purpose.”
Marigold grinned as she swept past him. “I am.”
There was an inhalation behind her, preparation for a retort, but then … nothing. As if he was suddenly bewildered. Marigold took a seat on the bench closest to his control panel. He shut the door. She glanced over her shoulder and gave him another coy smile.
North’s brow furrowed, but his eyes were alight as he reached for the intercom. “Ladies and gentlemen, girls and boys. Appreciated guests and persistent interlopers.”
The other passengers laughed.
Marigold placed an elbow over the back of her bench and stared up at him. She was only a foot away. She batted her eyes.