“I’m actually really busy,” I told him.
“Ten minutes.” He lowered his voice. “It’s important.”
I glanced across the office where, sure enough, both Margo and my mother were watching us. “Five. And not here.”
He nodded, then followed me as I dropped my pile back in the conference room and walked out to the front porch of the office. Once the door swung shut behind us, I hopped up on a newspaper box. “All right,” I said, crossing my arms. “Talk.”
Luke glanced away, at the traffic passing, then back at me. “Look, so, this morning . . . it didn’t go they way I planned. None of this has. I made a mistake.”
“When?” I said. “Meeting that girl at Tallyho? Or dumping me this morning?”
Instead of answering, he ran a hand over his face again, something he always did when he was stressed out. I knew this, like so many of his tells, as well as I did my own. “I didn’t dump you,” he said. “I said we might need a break.”
“So why are you here?” I asked.
“Because,” he replied, “because ever since I walked out of the diner away from you, I’ve felt sick. Like something’s really wrong and I need to fix it.”
I bit my lip, not saying anything.
“I’m not saying things have been perfect between us for the last few months,” he continued. “But I want to be with you.”
“You didn’t feel that way when you decided to go to Tallyho.”
“Are you ever going to stop with the Tallyho thing? I was trying to be honest with you!” he replied, his voice rising. “I told you the truth. That I was tempted, and acted on it, but not in a way you thought. Now I’m telling you I regret everything. You’ve got to give me something for that.”
“Like what?”
Instead of answering, he stepped forward to stand between my open knees, sliding his hands up my neck in that way that was familiar and thrilling, all at once. As he put his lips on mine, I turned my face up and just a bit to the right, so we fit perfectly, a skill honed from a million kisses over the years. When he finally drew back, he moved his mouth to my ear. “I love you, Emaline.”
My head was swimming. All I wanted, all I ever wanted in moments like this, was to keep kissing him. But somehow, I managed to put my hands on his chest and pushed him back. “I . . . I can’t.”
“Why not?” he asked.
“Things have changed,” I said.
“I told you I was sorry, I made a mistake.” He moved in closer, again. “I’ll fix it. And the other problems we’ve had, we’ll work on them, too.”
I shook my head, looking down at my hands. “It’s not just about all that.”
“Then what?”
I didn’t say anything. All I could think about was toasters.
“Something you did?” he asked. Long, awkward pause. Where was that waitress to interrupt when I really needed her? “Emaline, I just saw you, like, four hours ago. What could possibly have happened since then?”
It’s always very pure, that last moment before an ugly, unsettling truth hits someone. The most stark of before-and-afters. I sat there and watched Luke’s face change, right before me. “Oh my God,” he said, stepping back. “It’s that guy, isn’t it? Theo. Did you—”
“Luke,” I said quietly.
“What the hell? You went running to him the minute you left the diner?”
“Hey.” I pointed a finger at him. “You walked out on me, remember? As far as I knew, you were gone for good.”
“Which must have been so convenient,” he shot back. “You could finally jump into bed with Girl Jeans without even having to feel bad about it.”
“I didn’t jump into bed with anyone,” I replied. “God. What are you even saying?”
“What are you saying?” he replied. “The minute our three-year relationship hit a rough patch, you hooked up with someone else?”
“At least I waited until it was over.”
The look on his face as he heard this—hurt, surprised, vulnerable—made me feel sick. I tried to reach out for him, to blunt it somehow, but he stepped farther away, leaving me flailing.
For a moment, we just stood there, this huge space between us. “You said it yourself,” I said finally. “Things haven’t been great in a while. If they had been, neither one of us would have done anything. It means something was wrong.”
Judging by the pained look on his face, though, it was easier to say this than to hear it. “I just can’t . . .” He trailed off. “I can’t believe this.”
“I know,” I said. “Me neither.”
We were both silent for a minute, the only sound cars passing on the road. I thought again of what I’d said to Daisy: nothing changes for three years, and then suddenly everything does, all at once. Maybe those other people’s summers I’d envied weren’t all fun either. You never really know anything until it’s happening to you.
“Well,” he said finally. “I guess . . . that’s that.”
Breaking up earlier had been hard enough. Doing it again, and this time because of me, was like torture. “I didn’t plan any of this,” I said softly. “It just happened.”
“Yeah. Well.” He couldn’t even look at me. “I should . . . I’m leaving.”