Page 241 of The Girlfriend Clause
“I know,” he said. “I missed the fuck out of you while we were apart.”
And I’d thought about him every single day. I just hadn’t known how to cross thedistance.
“I missed you too,” I said, sniffing.
He pulled me closer and hugged me again, tighter this time.
“Andy, I think it’s going to be okay.”
The Wookiee head sat next to us on the bench, its mouth fixed open, looking at the stars.
“So what mistakes have you made?” I asked. “They can’t be as bad as mine.”
He laughed softly. “Oh, come on, Andy, lots of things. I think you know some of them.”
“I’m … not sure.”
“Well, my mum,” he said. “I hurt her, and I only saw her again because of you. I wanted to thank you for that. That… mattered.”
“Oh.” A warmth melted over me. Maybe I wasn’t all bad, after all.
“And then Novexia,” he said. “The restructure. Justifying what I was doing to the company—to people’s lives—by tellingmyself it served some sort of higher purpose.” He shook his head. “Jesus. I look at that now, and it just seems so arrogant.”
“But, Liam, you were trying to do something good with it, I knew that.”
“Yes, but I was seeing things in black and white, like a child,” he said. “There’s almost always a middle ground, and that’s what I was ignoring, because I wanted so badly to make it right, what I’d done, and I didn’t care—”
“I don’t understand, make what right?”
“I was trying to deal with something difficult,” he said. “To make peace with it, pay back my debt, I guess.” He shook his head. “So stupid. It wouldn’t have worked anyway. Some things you just have to live with.”
Whatever he had to live with, whatever this guilt was that seemed to be eating him up, I wished he’d tell me. How could any of it have beenhisfault?
“I’m still sorry I hurt you,” I said.
“It’s okay. I hurt you too.” He pulled me closer and kissed the top of my head. “But… I think peopledohurt each other when they love each other, and it’s something that we—”
We both went very still.Did he just say what I thought?I didn’t want either of us to break the spell with explanations… but I knew what I’d heard.
Did he feel it the way Idid?
“Did I say that out loud?” He nodded and looked down. We both knew he had.
“Say what out loud?”
“Exactl—”
I turned to him and kissed him, one hand sliding into his hair. He almost seemed to take a breath, and then he kissed me back, gently at first, then more urgently, pulling me into him. It felt like all the weeks of being apart, the fear and the notknowing, were disappearing as we fought to find each other again.
For once, I didn’t care whether I’d read it right or not. I loved him, and I didn’t want to pretend anymore.
When we broke apart, we were both shaking.
“Liam,” I said. “Don’t you need to—”
“What?”
I nodded toward the exit. “Your flight?”
