Thomas stands at the threshold, his arms propped on the frame on either side. Our eyes clash like a bolt of lightning. At first, my heart stutters at the wealth of emotions brimming in his gaze, and then it pounds. It pounds as I take in the rest of his appearance—wrinkled shirt, messy hair, stubbled jaw.
He looks undone. The strings holding his body together have come apart, unraveled. A shiver wracks his frame. Startled, I whip my gaze back up and find his eyes solely focused on my face—drinking in my features, devouring them. He is eating me up with his magnificent gaze, but I don’t understand why.
“Thomas? What, um, what’s going on?” My voice brings on another bout of shivers, and I notice for the first time how tightly he’s holding on to the door frame. His veins are vibrating from the effort.
“Thomas, you’re scaring me. What’s happening?”
Whatever anger I had at him, whatever self-preservation I had is gone, and I walk closer to him. All I know is that he needs me. That’s all I understand as I uncurl the fingers of his right hand from the frame using both of mine. It’s a struggle, but I manage to unclasp his grip and hold his hand tightly.
Only then does he move his eyes from my face and look at our joined hands. My small pale ones are enclosing his thick, darker one. I feel the undercurrent of energy through his skin. I feel the chaos, the mayhem running through his veins.
“You live in a fucking construction zone,” he mutters.
“I call it my tower.” The tightness in his hand loosens and I take an easy breath. “Why aren’t you in New York?”
“Because I have to tell you something.”
“Wh-What?”
“You’re beautiful, you know that?” he says, instead of answering my question. Somehow his voice shivers too, a rumbly sort of vibration that I feel in my tattoo. He lets go of the door frame and crowds me, forcing me to take a step back.
He brings his other hand to cup my cheek. His fingers tremble over my skin and I put my hand over them to give them stability. “Thomas, please, tell me what’s going on.”
His Adam’s apple jumps up and down. “No, that’s…that’s not right. You’re not beautiful. I think you’re the most exquisite thing I’ve ever seen.” He licks his lips, his eyes flitting back and forth. “No, not a…not a thing. You’re more than that, Layla. You’re…the poem I can never write. Yeah, you’re the piece of poetry I can never hope to finish, no matter how hard I try.”
“Thomas,” I whisper, a fat tear rolling down my cheek. My wounded heart squeezes in my chest. It’s like he’s caressing the walls of it, leaving his fingerprints forever for me to carry. The way he’s stumbling over his words… I can’t bear to see it.
He leans into me, grabbing both my cheeks now, wiping off the tears. “The first time I saw you at the bookstore, you had these crazy headphones on and you were dancing to the music. I saw something pop over your head, a word. I couldn’t place it—not until I saw you in my class. That’s when I realized that you were so bright and loud and shiny like…”
“Like what?”
“Scarlet,” he whispers, his breath misty over my tear-drenched lips.
This time, my laugh is broken and sad and full of resignation. “Yeah, I’m that, right? Like Hester Prynne. I bet it’s clear to everyone.”
The force of his grip increases, flattening my cheeks. “No it’s not, because it’s not true. Do you understand me? It’s not. You’re nothing like her or anyone else. You’re not…”
“A slut?”
He grits his teeth. “Fuck no. You’re not. You’ll never be that. Tell me you know that. Say it, Layla.”
His face is a blurry painting through the lens of my tears, a labyrinth of emotions and expressions I can’t place. The only thing grounding me in this moment is the vivid color of his eyes. They are jarring in their sincerity. They beg me to give him that, to believe him, and when have I ever been able to refuse him?
“I’m not a slut.”
He nods his head, sighing, sending a burst of his chocolatey breath into my lungs. “That’s right. You’re not.”
“I can’t do it anymore,” I blurt out. “I know I promised I wouldn’t regret it but I-I do. I regret all the things we did and the way we did them. It wasn’t right, Thomas. We broke all the rules. I…” A sob wracks my frame.
“Shh… Hey, we’re not. We’re not doing it anymore, okay? It’s over.”
“Okay.” My hands find his shirt and fist the fabric. I sob on his chest, bringing him closer to me when I should let him go. It’s over. All the illicit things we’ve been doing. All the things I’ve been hiding from Emma. All of it is over, but I don’t feel relief. I just feel enormous amounts of pain and hurt and burn.
He rocks me in his arms like a child, and I clutch at him harder. He’s the only thing keeping me together and making me fall apart, and no matter what I said, I don’t want to let go. I don’t regret falling in love; I only regret how it happened.
At some point, I stop crying and simply hold on to him because I don’t want this to end. I breathe him in and he does the same. His arms are shaking around me and I look up at him. I’ve never seen his face so expressive before, like a battered page of an ancient book. There are stains of agony and regret.
He stares down at me with half a smile, a pathetic attempt to appear nonchalant. He looks like he wants to say something but he stops himself. Then, he bends down and places a soft kiss on my forehead, lingering for about two seconds before he takes a step back. It was tender and soft and all the things I’ve always wanted.
He takes me in, one last time, and then turns around and begins walking to the elevator. Astonished, I stand there, immobile. That’s it? Is this how it ends? He never told me why he came here.
A beep sounds, signaling the arrival of the elevator. The steel door whooshes open but before he can get on, I dash to him and cling to his strong body, twining my arms and legs around him. He jerks to a stop, one arm grabbing my wrist on his chest and the other resting on the small of my back.
We both shudder with panting breaths. Then, as if he whispered the words in my ears, I hear them clearly. This is goodbye. He came to say goodbye, like he promised he would. Goodbyes aren’t my forte, but I won’t leave you like a coward either.
It’s enough to send me sobbing again but I remain silent and wrapped around him, simply breathing him in. I won’t make this harder than it has to be.
I won’t. I won’t.
Thomas tries to unwind my arms but despite everything, I hold on to him tighter. “Let me go, Layla. I need to go.”
“I know.” I burrow my nose in his neck, run my teeth over his skin. His flavor explodes over my tongue, making me all drugged up and crazy. “But before you go, could you stay a little while?”
As soon as I say it, I’m filled with shame. I shouldn’t have said that. I made a promise to his child that I wouldn’t break up his family, but my brain is sluggish right now. My body is dying for his.
Even so, I untwine my arms and legs and slide down, feeling the ridges of his back, the patterns of his muscles on the gentle hills and valleys of my front.