“I always knew? How? How would I know that, Sean?” My mouth gaped as I tried to order my thoughts into something that made sense. “You never…you never made a move. You never asked me out. You never acted like you wanted more. And now—now—you’re telling me this? Now? When my husband died and I’m pregnant and—”
“I thought you knew!” Panic took over his features. “It never crossed my mind that you had missed the fact that I adored you.”
“I have to—” I stood up and headed toward my room. “I can’t. I’m sorry. I can’t.”
“Libby,” he called after me.
But I went to my room and shut him out. I couldn’t stay out there. I couldn’t stand and look at him knowing that my perception of our relationship had been so wrong.
Was I that clueless? That unobservant? And how could he think that I knew the whole time? When he had never said anything? I flipped back through my memories, searching for anything he might have done, anything he might have said, anything I might have not heard, or missed, or ignored because I thought he was joking. We’d said “I love you” to each other plenty over the years, but that had always been a platonic, best-friend “I love you.” And yes, there had been several times when he had joked about us getting married later, or about him doing anything I asked because he was a slave to his love for me. But it had all been in jest. Hadn’t it?!
I paced and worried and rubbed at my belly until he knocked on my door and quietly called, “Libby?”
I stalked over to the door, like I’d been expecting the knock, just waiting for the opportunity. I threw the door open. “You never said anything!” I shouted.
“I did,” he insisted as he stood with both hands leaning into my door frame.
“No.” I cut him off with a swipe of my pointer finger. “You joked and you mocked and you made it all seem very funny, this silly idea of us being together. If you had really wanted me to know then you would have found the ten seconds required to say the words and make me hear them.”
He let out a puff of breath. “Maybe I didn’t want you to know.”
“Because?”
“Because I knew you didn’t feel that way.”
“So you knew I had no idea,” I threw back at him. “And just now you spouted off because—”
“Of course not! I really did think you knew. Even if I was never explicit, even if I never said the exact words in the exact tone. It never occurred to me that after all these years, you hadn’t guessed. It’s not like I’m a good actor, Libby.” He stared at me with an intensity that made me rock back on one foot. “You think I would have chosen to tell you like this? Right now? You have way too much going on for you to worry about me and my stupid hang-ups. I thought you knew and that you were fine with it and it was all just no big deal.”
I took several shallow breaths as his words settled into the cracks in my brain. “You’re speaking in present tense.”
His chin pulled back. “What?”
“You didn’t say the hang-ups you used to have.”
He sucked in a breath and cast his eyes to the ceiling. “Libby, we really don’t have to do this right now.”
“Do what? Talk about the fact that our friendship isn’t what I thought it was?”
“Why did you ask?”
“Ask what?” I demanded, derailed by this change of topic.
“Why did you ask why I kissed you if you didn’t want to know the answer?”
“I—” Why had I asked? “Because…I’ve never understood it. It was the one anomaly in our relationship. And…and…”
“This doesn’t change anything,” Sean interrupted, clearly taking pity on me. “You’re still you and I’m still me. Nothing is changing. I know you don’t feel the same way.”
His assumption irked me even more. “And how would you know that?”
“Because…” He trailed off as he studied my face.
“Did you ever ask?”
Several beats of silence followed as his eyebrows twitched in confusion. “Am I wrong?” he asked quietly.
“Of course not! I don’t…” My mind stumbled and lurched over the idea. “I don’t…” Did I? I loved Jonas. I was desperately in love with my dead husband. I knew that. That was true.
But.
The possibility of having bigger feelings for Sean was…it was…
“Libby?” Sean asked, his face vulnerable and begging for an answer.