grab a dishcloth, but not before I caught what I could have sworn was the glimmer of tears in his eyes. “Please, just go.”
“What’s wrong?” I walked over to the table. “Because it’s obvious that something is, and somehow I don’t think this is really about the ice cream.”
“Just leave it.”
“Not until you tell me what’s wrong.”
“I don’t want to tell you what’s wrong. I want you to leave.”
“Why?”
“Because I’m about two seconds from breaking down and crying over literal spilled milk and I would really prefer you not to see that.”
“But I could—”
“Just stop, Connor. Just stop. You being nice to me right now, only to go back to being an asshole in thirty minutes or thirty hours or whenever you get tired of it, is not something I can handle.”
“I’m not trying to be an asshole. I just don’t like seeing you upset, and not knowing why.”
I don’t like seeing you upset because I never got over you, whispered a voice in the back of my mind. I don’t like seeing you upset when all I want to do is hold you.
I shoved the voice away. Going down that road would only lead to pain. But I couldn’t bring myself to just leave Julian like this.
“Oh, I get it. It’s not the ‘upset’ part that bothers you.” Julian’s voice was scathing. “You’re fine and dandy with upsetting me when you’re the cause. You just don’t like it when something else might be gunning to take your place as most-fucking-frustrating thing in my life. Not that you’re in my life, of course, as you keep reminding me. So I will say again, as kindly as I can before I freaking lose it, that you are absolutely free to leave at any time now.”
“I don’t want to leave.” I put my hand on his arm. “I want to know what’s wrong. Maybe I can help.”
“Save it.” He shrugged my hand off. “Save the, ‘But I care about you,’ act. You obviously don’t, and as soon as this guilty-conscience spasm that you’re having passes, you’re going to go right back to being an asshole. And honestly, if that’s how you feel, I’m not going to try and change it. But I do care, as much as I’ve tried not to, so having you standing around, rubbing it in really isn’t helping matters.”
Tell him the truth. The voice in the back of my mind had given up on whispering and moved into full-on shouting. Just tell him the truth, and you can make it better.
But I couldn’t. Because it might make Julian feel better in the short run, but in the long run? In the long run, I knew it would just make him feel worse. Julian couldn’t give me what I wanted, and I knew him well enough to know he’d punish himself for that. Julian was an Olympic gold medalist in blaming himself.
But at the same time, my attempts to stay away from him were failing. Not just because of work. Because of me. I’d tried to keep my distance to protect my heart, but that stupid muscle—and okay, maybe some other parts of my anatomy, too—kept drawing me closer.
Maybe it was just time to accept the inevitable. And the pain that came with it.
“I’m sorry.” I forced the words out. “I shouldn’t have acted like that. I do care about you. And I’d like to be…friends. But I’m only staying for another month, and I was afraid if we got too close…”
“That I’d get attached again,” Julian finished for me.
I winced. I hadn’t known how to finish that sentence without lying. But, as predicted, Julian had found a way to assume it was his fault.
Worse, I was letting him.
“It’s not that I don’t care, though,” I continued. “I do. And it was shitty of me to pretend like what we had didn’t mean anything. I just thought it would be easier for both of us if I were an asshole.”
At least that part was true.
“I do have some self-respect, you know,” Julian said. “I’m not going to throw myself at someone who’s not interested in what I want.”
It’s not you I’m worried about, yelled the little voice in my head.
“I know. I was just…”
“Being a dick?”
“Kind of my thing, really.”
Julian barked a laugh. “At least that much hasn’t changed.”
I rolled my eyes. He had no idea how right he was.
“Anyway, now that we’ve established that I’m still a terrible human being, will you please tell me what’s wrong?”