Ten Days of Perfect (November Blue #1)(31)

“You know what I mean.”

We sat for a couple of hours, and I was supportive as Monica yelled, cried, laughed, and cried some more about her breakup with Josh. When there were no more tears left I drove her home – she wasn’t in any condition to drive on a number of levels. After she was safely in her apartment, I returned to mine. I ambled up the stairs, reached for my phone, and texted Bo.

Me: I really do miss you I hit send and immediately jumped at a beeping noise at the top of the stairs. What the hell?

As I rounded the corner I gasped at Bo sitting on the top step, just outside my door, elbows planted firmly on his knees, hands clasped in front of him. Sitting on that ‘Welcome’ mat under which my resolve hides, I see.

“What are you doing here?” I could barely contain the ridiculous smile crossing my lips.

“I told you I wished I could see you.” He shrugged, cocked his head to the side and drew a slow smile.

“Well, you made good time, weirdo stalker.” I was quite aware of the roughly 2.5 hour drive time from Concord to Barnstable. I sat next to him on the stairs and leaned my shoulder on his. I was emotionally drained, in all ways good and bad. Bo curled his arm around my shoulders and kissed the top of my head as he drew me in.

“You smell good,” I whispered as I turned my face toward his neck, kissing it softly.

“Mmm, you do too.” He buried his nose in my hair. “Come take a walk with me?”

“A walk? It’s nearly midnight.”

“We’ll drive down to the beach. The moon is huge. Please?” He stood and held his hand out to me.

Oh, what the hell.

*

I was thankful for the unseasonably warm weather as we strolled down the moonlit beach, hand in hand. Bo didn’t speak during our five minute drive, and I didn’t interrupt the silence. The past twenty-four hours were weighing heavy on me.

“Sorry, again, about today. It was all so much - Josh and Monica, my parents last night . . .” I shook my head and gazed at the heaving sea.

“November, stop apologizing. We’ve had a lot thrown at us from all different directions. How was the time with your parents?” His sincerity was palpable.

I wondered if I would smell the sorrow if I didn’t know his parents were dead. I stopped where I was and folded down to the sand, begging my tears to stay at bay. I hadn’t had a lot of time to process what my parents and I had spoken about the night before. Reckless abandon. Raven’s words echoed through my body as I remembered that I need to commit with my heart or my mind.

“They were all raised eyebrows, mouths open; they saw the open guitar case and asked what was going on.”

“What’d you tell them?” Bo sat next to me and gave me a little nudge.

Don’t cry. Don’t cry. Don’t cry.

“Um…”

Don’t cry!

“November,” he lifted my chin with his index finger and turned my face toward his, “what is it?” The pure light from the moon flooded his eyes with concern.

Don’t cry.

Too late.

As soon as I blinked, tears spilled messily down my face. I didn’t try to wipe them away, and I didn’t break my gaze from his. Bo’s forehead creased momentarily as he watched the tears - filled with so many things I wanted to tell him - fall to the sand. He didn’t look away as he brushed the salty confusion from one of my cheeks with his thumb.

“Ember. . .”

“Bo, it’s just . . .” I wiped my eyes, finally, and turned my face back to the ocean. “I’ve never felt like this with anyone. Not just physically either. You’ve burrowed yourself deep in my soul. All the evidence my parents needed was the guitar I’ve never really played, just sitting causally in my living room. You’ve sparked something in me . . .” Out of the corner of my eye I saw him half-smile.

“You’re crying because of how you feel about me?” He kept the grin as he tried to understand.

“It’s not about you, it’s about me. I am not the person that fantasizes about running away with hot, guitar-playing man-gods.” I was able to force a laugh through my tears, “There’s this part of me that’s longed for you for so long, and when you showed up it was like an ice-cold shower shocking me to life. I like structure, predictability, an unbroken heart . . .” I shot a glance in his direction and he seemed to cringe at ‘an unbroken heart’.

Bo moved to a kneeling position in front of me, commanding my attention.

“November, if your heart was mine it would never break.” His hands tightened around mine as he spoke the sweetest words my ears had ever hosted.

“Even in a thousand lifetimes?”

Shit! I dropped Bo’s hands, flew to a standing position as he flinched, again, against my words, and I walked away. I was embarrassed that I let that slip out, and suddenly felt angry that he would tell Josh, and not me. When you feel that strongly about someone, you tell them.

“Josh . . .” he half whispered to the now vacant place I had previously occupied. He stood up and briskly followed my pace down the beach.

“Ember, I shouldn’t have said anything to anyone.” He wisely stayed slightly behind me, seemingly trying to judge my level of anger.

“A thousand lifetimes, Bo!? You feel like you’ve known me for a thousand freaking lifetimes? That’s a bit intense, don’t you think?” I didn’t slow my pace.