My lips parted and my eyebrows shot to my hairline when I saw Nick at the helm of the other cart. My eyes moved over his faded maroon t-shirt and low-slung jeans. In one second, I noted his hair that was just slightly too long and the thicker beard that roughened his jaw. I could close my eyes and picture this man perfectly naked. When he appeared out of nowhere, I saw the differences in him without trying. “What are you doing here?” The words fell out of my mouth before I could tame my reaction.
His lips twitched with an almost smile. “I think you forget that I’m still alive. It’s like you don’t expect me to keep on existing now that I’m not in your life every day.”
His words were only barely playful. Mostly they held a sharp edge of bitterness.
“That’s ridiculous,” I countered immediately. Even though, maybe he was a little right. “You’ve just surprised me. Twice.”
He leaned forward as if telling me a secret, “You’re ridiculously easy to surprise.”
The shock of seeing him here receded and I pressed my lips together when I felt laughter bubble up inside me. “Whatever.” Memories of our relationship tumbled around in my head, but I suppressed them. I was already an emotional wreck. I didn’t need him to witness my most recent damage.
Nick tugged at his earlobe, his nervous tell. “So, uh, really, you surprised me too. I didn’t expect to see you here. On a Friday night.”
“Ice cream,” I suddenly decided. It was so much better than the truth. “I need ice cream.”
He raised one eyebrow, a look I used to love on him. “Bad week?”
“Week from hell.”
“Yeah, me too.” His words were a forlorn mumble and I had the immediate urge to ask why.
Instead, I forced my lips to stay shut. We stared awkwardly at each other, neither of us knowing how to navigate our fragile peace treaty from last week. Long seconds ticked by while people moved around us and bad pop music drifted through the store.
“So, what are you in the mood for?” His gaze swung toward the frosted freezer doors, where cartons of ice cream sat hidden behind cloudy glass.
The million-dollar question. “I should probably get the staples first, right? If I pick out ice cream now it will melt by the time I get to the car.”
“Yeah, me too.”
I looked back at Nick and found him watching me. His fingers flexed and stretched while his palms rested on the metal bar. He was trying not to reach for his earlobe.
“What do you need to get?” I asked quietly.
It was weird talking to him. Even if it was just over groceries. Our relationship had always revolved around conversation, even if we were screaming at each other. But he’d been mostly out of my life over the last five months. We had nothing to fight about at the moment, but we couldn’t exactly bare our souls in the middle of Meijer either.
We had never been good at small talk. Not even in the beginning.
What do you want most in life? That had been the first question he asked me on our fateful second date.
I remembered staring at him for longer than was comfortable. I remembered wanting to fidget, but wanting to figure him out more.
When I answered him, I hadn’t known what I was going to say or if it would even be true. I want a life, a real one. I want to know each day meant something profound and at the end of it, I want to know it was worth the journey.
That doesn’t sound easy, he’d said. His lips had tilted on one side with a crooked half-smile that had made butterflies take flight in my entire body.
I didn’t say I wanted easy. I want beautiful.
He had met my eyes and I noticed for the first time how blue his were. They were electric with intensity, searing with focus. He had leaned forward and whispered, “You are beautiful.”
I cleared my throat and tried to erase the memory of our past. It was one of my favorites. It was the one that promised I would fall in love with him, the one that buried him beneath my skin and wrapped him around my heart.
“I don’t know how to do this,” he murmured.