Totally and Completely Fine(97)

Apparently, there were places to scream in small towns.

He raced to follow, his arms braced by my sides, hips pounding against mine.

“Fuck,” he groaned.

His chest was sweaty, his hair damp. His arms were bracketed around me. He pressed his forehead against mine, before tilting his head down and rubbing my nose with his.

I felt my heart shatter into a thousand pieces.

* * *

—

Ben stopped in front of the house. Lena’s light wasn’t on, so I figured she’d probably gone to sleep. I swung my leg over the bike and dismounted, feeling even less steady on my feet than I’d been a few hours ago.

Ben took off his helmet, and I handed him mine.

He looked so gorgeous, sitting there on his bike, hair messy, eyes gleaming.

It seemed impossible that I’d fallen so fast, but here I was.

I didn’t want to say goodnight. I didn’t want to say goodbye.

“Come to dinner tomorrow night,” I blurted out.

Ben looked up, toward Lena’s window.

“Is that a good idea?” he asked, clearly worried about her.

“It will be fine,” I said. “And you deserve a good meal before you head off to Australia. I hear they put eggs on their burgers.”

“Don’t knock it till you’ve tried it,” he said.

“Dinner?”

“Dinner,” he said.

“Tomorrow at seven?”

“Can’t wait,” he said.

I knew it was risky—that I was standing in front of my house, in my neighborhood, in my town, out in the open—but I hooked my finger into the neckline of Ben’s shirt, catching both his necklaces as I did, and pulled his mouth to mine.

It felt like a goodbye kiss.

When we broke apart, I couldn’t look at him. I knew I’d start to cry, and I didn’t want that.

“Tomorrow,” he said.

It wasn’t until he’d driven off, and I was standing in my entryway, that I remembered that he wasn’t the only person I’d invited over for dinner tomorrow.

Fuck.

Chapter 52

Now

Gabe hadn’t been happy about the dinner mix-up, but he decided to come anyway.

“Might as well make it a proper send-off,” he said. “Invite Ollie as well.”

“I don’t want any bloodshed,” I told him.

“There won’t be,” Gabe promised, and then paused. “But maybe you should invite Mom just in case.”

I ended up needing to get the extra leaf from the closet so the table would be big enough.

“Can you set the table?” I asked Lena.

She had been sulking around the house all day, but I hadn’t said anything. Broken hearts were painful at any age—maybe even more so now, when everything was so new and unknown.

And it wasn’t as if I could give her advice on how to repair what had shattered.

She put each plate down with the sigh of someone who was certain they’d never love again. I wanted to wrap my arms around her and tell her that this wouldn’t last. That nothing ever lasted. For good and for bad.

I needed to remind myself that.

Chani and Gabe were the first to arrive.

“Everything smells amazing,” Chani said.

“Lena helped with the dessert,” I said.

I’d made a pavlova.

“Barely,” Lena muttered, before escaping back into the dining room.

“How’s she doing?” Chani asked. “Did she tell you what’s going on?”

I nodded but didn’t feel it was my place to say.

“She’ll get through it,” I said.

“Who will get through what?” Gabe asked, mouth full.

“That is for dinner,” I said, pulling the half-eaten roll out of his hand.

“I’m hungry,” he said.

I pushed the roll back at him because what was I going to do? Put it back in the basket?

“What’s wrong with Lena?” Gabe asked.

“Nothing,” I said.

Ollie was the next to arrive.

“I heard the news,” I told him. “I’m sorry about the show.”

“It will be fine,” he said. “Thankfully I know the part. We’ll have to adjust our schedule—and I’ll need you to make changes to the costumes—but I think we’ll pull it off.”

“You might even have a bigger audience,” I said.

Ollie shrugged. “You know what’s ironic?” he asked.

“What?”

“This is the second time James Bond has thrown my life into chaos.”

Mom was the next to arrive, and she spent several minutes poking her head into every pot I had going on the stove.

Ben was the last, and the tension in the house rose palpably when he entered.

“Thanks for letting me crash your dinner,” he said.

There was silence, and I saw Lena look away. Ben noticed and his face fell. Thankfully, Chani stepped forward and gave him a hug.

“Congrats on the big news,” she said.

“Thanks,” he said.

That seemed to break the ice.

“You’ll be great,” Gabe said.

“They’re lucky to have you,” Ollie said.