What He Never Knew (What He Doesn't Know, #3)(89)

But I didn’t want her to leave like this.

“Why do I feel like no matter what I say to that, there’s no right way to respond?”

Sarah rolled her eyes. “Why don’t you go talk it out with Charlie? I’m sure she can help you sort through your thoughts.”

“She’s not the one I want to talk to.”

Sarah ignored me, slapping the wet rag into the bin before balancing it on her hip again and shoving past me toward the kitchen. “You know, I shouldn’t have been shocked to see you with her when I came out here for the first time tonight,” she said, stopping long enough to pin me with her gaze. “It was just too predictable, I didn’t want to believe it. But it looks like nothing has changed.”

“You don’t mean that,” I said quickly, before she could turn away. “You don’t believe what your anxiety is trying to convince you is real.”

“You don’t know anything about my anxiety,” she spat. “Or me.”

“I know everything about you,” I argued, stepping into her space.

Her breath stilled, eyes falling to my lips before she ripped them away, meeting my gaze once more.

“I know nothing makes you happier than a good peanut butter and jelly sandwich and a shady day in the park. I know you thought your love of reading had died, but it was only reading happy endings that you’d lost passion for. You finished Fight Club in three days, and you’ve had a new book in your bag every week since, because escaping into someone else’s reality is easier than facing your own.”

Sarah’s lips parted, her eyes softening as they searched mine.

“I know you wrap your fingers around that crystal that hangs from your neck because it brings you peace, because it makes you think of your dad, of your mom, of everything that keeps you breathing. I know your favorite composer used to be Beethoven, but somewhere along the way, you started favoring Debussy. My bet is because his music makes you believe in love, however impossible it may seem to have faith that it exists.”

She adjusted the bin on her hip, brows tugging together. She seemed torn between the choice to turn and walk away from me forever, or to jump into my arms.

So I kept talking, hoping I could steer her toward the latter.

“I know nothing in this world means more to you than the piano,” I said, a long sigh leaving my chest. “But that you’ve felt lost over the past year because for the first time in your life, that relationship that came so easy turned complicated. You were injured. Then, you were taken advantage of. You were hurt, Sarah, and you got angry — just as you should have. You turned your back on the piano, on loving it, on letting it love you and started treating it like a means to an end, instead. You thought if you could accomplish all the checks on your list, that you’d feel better, you’d find success. And along the way, you only found more loneliness.” I swallowed. “Until you met me.”

She wasn’t leaving, though I knew if I reached for her, if the spell I had her under was broken for even a moment — she’d be gone in an instant.

Still, I couldn’t help it.

I had to be near her. I had to touch her, to let her feel me when I said the next words. My hand reached forward, and my pinky laced with hers under the shadows of the bar where no one could see.

“I know that you are the strongest, most resilient woman to ever walk the face of this Earth. I know that even though you don’t see it or believe it, you will move mountains in the piano industry, and it will be you who future students look up to. I know that you will soar.” I curled my pinky around hers tighter. “And I know you love me, Sarah. Just like I know I love you.”

She gasped, eyes shooting from where they’d been staring at my chest to meet my gaze. Her pupils dilated, eyes flicking between mine as she opened her mouth, closed it, opened it again, closed it. She was utterly speechless, her wide eyes and trembling lip not betraying any of her thoughts.

I had lied.

Because I didn’t know if she loved me, too.

But I hoped.

“I’ll quit my job,” I said, and I’d never meant anything more in my life. “I’ll leave Westchester, I’ll leave this town. I’ll go to the city with you, and be whatever wind I can be beneath your outstretched wings if you’ll let me. But you have to let me, Sarah. You have to choose me, too.”

The moment stretched between us as I waited for her response, for her to say she did love me — for her to say anything at all. That energy that always buzzed to life around us was an entire universe in that moment, and it was just for us. I begged whatever god existed to help me, to let her feel my sincerity, my care, my love. I prayed for relief, for her to throw herself in my arms and assure me that what I felt wasn’t one-sided. That it was real. That whatever or whoever tried to step between us would never win.

And for that long pause in time, I believed — in God, in His plan for me, for her, for us. I believed she would see it, too. I believed we would make it. I believed there was no other way, no other possible outcome.

Until the moment she pulled away.

Her eyes fell to the floor between us at the same time she withdrew her hand from mine, tucking it around the edge of the bin against her hip instead. “I have to go,” she whispered.

And she disappeared back into the kitchen without another word.