Page 34 of The Long Way Home
I make the call, and we wait. The afternoon fades into golden hour. The sun is dipping low now, casting a warm glow that softens the edges of everything around us.
When the knock comes, I am halfway through breaking down another box. I wipe my hands on my jeans and head for the door.
“Don’t forget the tip this time,” Rachel calls.
I look back, smirking. “Come on, Sunny, it was one time, seven years ago. When are you going to let that go?”
She yells over her shoulder with a clever ass grin, “Never.”
The delivery guy hands off the pizza and drinks, and I nudge the door shut with my knee. When I turn around, she is now sitting cross-legged on the floor, surrounded by half-open boxes and packing paper.
I set the food down on the coffee table, clearing enough space for the box.
“Still hot,” I warn, handing her a slice.
“Thanks,” she offers, leaning her back against the couch.
I drop down beside her and grab a slice of my own, taking a big bite, making sure to secretly remove any mushrooms. I take a peek over at Sunny, and she looks content. And that’s enough for me.
“Look at us. We’re officially grown-ups, Rhett. We’ve hit peak domestic-ability.”
I give her a sideways glance. “First off, that is definitely not a real word. And secondly, speak for yourself. I’m currently sitting on a rug my old roommate left behind when he moved out. I don’t even know where it came from. This might be my rock bottom.” I nudge her leg with mine and continue. “You’re lucky I even let you sit on it. This thing has seen some things.”
“Impossible. You can’t be at rock bottom while you’re sitting next to me. The two can not coexist.” She smirks and nudges my leg back.
I watch as she eats her slice the same way she always has—removing all the toppings first, then folding the bare crust in half like it’s some kind of delicacy. It’s beyond weird. Normally, I’d tease her for it, make some sarcastic comment about her being a serial killer in disguise. But tonight, I don’t say anything.
Because the truth is, I missed this. I missed that specific, ridiculous way she eats pizza. It is one of those things I forgot I remembered, tucked away somewhere in my brain. Watching her do it now hits in a way I’m not totally prepared for. For reasons I can’t explain, it brings me a kind of comfort I didn’t know I needed.
After a few bites, she wipes her hands on a napkin and leans back against the couch. “You know, I don’t hate this.”
I grab another slice, keeping my tone casual even though my stomach drops. “Were you expecting to hate this?”
“I mean… I didn’t expect to be here. Hanging out with you. Eating pizza. As if the last four years didn’t happen. I had a very detailed plan to only talk to you for a max of thirty minutes.” She shrugs. “I was definitely anxious when I got your text.”
She takes a drink, staring at the beer label like it might feed her the right words. “I mean, we barely talked over the last four years, Rhett. Maybe not at all this last year. And then out of the blue, you’re here.”
I tilt my head in agreement, setting my slice down. The crust feels like too much to chew.
“Yeah. That part’s on me.”
Rachel looks over. Her face is unreadable, but she doesn’t disagree.
“I didn’t know how to talk to you,” I admit. “Not in a way that wouldn’t make everything worse.”
She pulls her bottom lip between her teeth. “I didn’t know how to handle it either. But it felt like you just disappeared on me. I was abandoned all over again.”
The guilt lands sharply in my chest. As someone who has felt that level of abandonment, I can’t believe I made her feel that way. It is the exact reason why a guy like me doesn’t deserve a woman like her. I force myself to look away. I don’t need her to feel guilty for being honest with me. I want her to always be honest with me.
“I tried to reach out. More times than I can count. I’d pull up your name, start typing a text, and I even thought about calling. But nothing ever felt like it was good enough. It always felt like too little, too late. I knew I already lost my place in your life.”
She stares down at her beer, peeling at the label until half of it’s gone. She takes another sip. “Yeah. I guess we both let it go quiet.”
“I didn’t want to,” I say quickly. “I just dug myself into a hole, and I couldn’t figure out how to climb back out. But none of that was your fault, Sunny. I had to leave. There were things I had to do because we lost Josh.” I force myself to meet her eyes. “You didn’t do anything wrong. This mess? It’s mine.”
We sit in silence for a couple of minutes. But this silence doesn’t feel like the others. It doesn’t feel like avoidance. It feels like wiggle room. Maybe room for something to grow back. God, I just want her to give me another chance to be her friend.
“Look, we don’t have to talk about it,” she says at last, her voice cautious. “It was a hard time for both of us.” She sounds like she wants to continue, but I let the conversation die because I’m not ready to revisit all the reasons I left. I can’t be truthful with her right now, and I’m not willing to lose the little ground I made up for tonight.
