Breaking Walls (19 page)

“Looking for you.”

“Oh.” Not the answer I’d expected. “Why were you looking for me? How did you know I was—”

“I was informed not to share the source of that information.”

“Bailey,” I rolled my eyes, and he nodded.

“Are you mad?”

“No,” I said, trying to smile as earnestly as I could. I was still trying to adjust to the whole idea of his friendship with my sister, but I knew it was something I had to accept. Sometimes we didn’t get to choose who we were drawn to—romantically or not. “Did you need something?” I looked down to my watch. “It’s awful late for you to just stop by to track me down.”

“I never left town after the meeting today. I visited with Lashell for a while, and then stopped by to see
. . . someone. ” His brow creased.

“You can just say Bailey.”

“Okay, yeah,” he said. “Anyway, she said you were at the diner, so I headed over, but you were concentrating pretty hard on something. I didn’t want to bother you. I grabbed a cup of coffee and waited for you to take a break, but you just kept at it.”

“You could’ve come over. It was just RI stuff,” I said, thinking of my notebook full of scribbles. I was ready to mention it. I was
as prepared as I was ever going to be. Maybe I should just tell him now and get it out of the way.

“So
. . . ” Gabe blew a long breath of air through his lips. We kept standing there, halted firmly in the place where he’d stopped me outside the diner. “Will you walk with me?”

“Will I walk with you?”

“Yeah,” he nodded.

“Is that your go-to seduction move or something?” I asked, glancing up at him. If I counted correctly, this was the third time he’d asked me to go for a walk in a matter of weeks, and no one else I knew had ever asked me once. I couldn’t help poking fun at that. Besides, after the anger I’d seen in his eyes earlier at school, all I really wanted was to make him smile.

“
Seduction
?” The faintest grin pulled at the edge of his lip. “How did you come up with that?”

“Oh, you know?” I shrugged. “You see a girl in distress, and you think
ah, here’s an opportunity
. So you take her for a walk, talk her through her problems, make her feel comfortable, get her guard down. And then you strike. Bam!”

“
Geesh, Mandy,” he rubbed the back of his neck. Even in the dark, I could see his cheeks flush the faintest shade of pink. “I just wanted to take a walk. No hidden agenda.”

“Ah, well, a girl can still dream.” His blue eyes widened, and his mouth hung open. I let him stare at me that way for a moment, deliberately taking my time before I said, “Oh, I’m kidding. Come on, let’s go.”

And so we started walking, stirring up the memories of the night we’d first walked the streets of Sugar Creek. It had been a wonderful and terrifying night, all wrapped into one. He’d shown up at the bakery to check on me after a huge fight with Dad, and I somehow ended up dumping a lifetime of heartache and pain onto his shoulders.

I hoped tonight wouldn’t be the same. So far we were off to a good  start, but I hoped that whatever it was that had brought him to track me down, whatever it was that he had to say
, wouldn’t lead to something awful and horrible. I didn’t want to argue with him. Not again. Not after Friday night.

“
You know what
?” he asked, and the way he said it, he might as well have said
to hell with it!
“It has
nothing
to do with seduction.”

“Oh, Gabe, lighten up. It was just a joke.”

“I know,” he said. “But still.
I like taking walks
. I’m fortunate enough to have two working legs, aren’t I? So why not use them as often as I can?”

“Well, well…Gabriel Raddick,” I said, throwing him a sideways glance. “You might’ve just told me more about yourself in those few sentences than you have in the
past four weeks.” When he didn’t say anything, I turned to him and asked, “What else do you like? Outside of RI, what makes you happiest?”

The question seemed harmless enough, and I assumed he wouldn’t answer if he didn’t want to. At some point, he’d get to the reason he’d hunted me down. But for now, and until then, I was going to milk this time for all it was worth. I could at least hope he’d share something, but I didn’t count on it, not after—

“I like waking up before sunrise and eating cold pizza for breakfast,” he said, and then I stumbled over my feet and nearly lost my balance. While I would normally cringe at the thought of doing either of the things, I was still too shocked to respond. I was trying to find my center and put one foot in front of the other. In a matter of seconds, I learned two things—two tiny, minuscule things about him, and I already felt like I knew him better. I couldn’t believe how easily he’d given that up, and I didn’t even have to badger him. “I love the smell of popcorn, but I hate the taste.”

“I’m the same with coffee.”

“
Oh!
All day, every day, coffee’s a must.”

“Yeah, that one’s no secret.”

“And I like books,” he said proudly. “Old, dusty, first editions of just about anything.”

“Wait. Do you like reading them or collecting them?”

“Both,” he said. “You know that musty, vanilla smell old books have?”

“Yeah?”

“I love that.”

“
Alrighty then,” I said, trying to hide my smirk.

“You’re laughing at me now?”

“Only a little,” I promised. “I’ve just…I’ve never met a man who was comfortable admitting that he loves the smell of books.”

“
Old
books.” He eyed me for a second, and even though I couldn’t see his expression, I sensed he was gearing up to ask, “What about you? Outside of school and work, writing, and RI, what makes you happiest?”

“My friends,” I said without pause. “Georgia, Jones, Fletcher…they’re my only shred of sanity right now. All thanks to you.”

“Thanks to
me
?”

“I would’ve never opened up to them,” I said. “Not before I met you. That’s one thing I’ll always be thankful for. I hope you know that.”

And after a faint smile, he asked, “Anything else?”

“Let’s see,” I said, doing my best not to say the most obvious thing:
you, Gabe, you make me happiest.
“I thoroughly enjoy waking up
after
sunrise, only eating
hot
pizza at
dinnertime
, and movies are only good if you’re stuffing your face with popcorn while you watch them.”

“Are you trying to scare me off?”

“No,” I shook my head. “No, I’ve found that I have a natural talent for doing that even when I don’t try.”

He half-laughed.
We knew it was true. I had this incredible ability to say the wrong things at the wrong times, either pushing him back or scaring him away.

“So let me ask, are you in distress?”

“Meaning . . . ”

“You wanted to know if that was some kind of move back there— seeing a girl in distress and asking her to take a walk,” he said. “Naturally I assume that means you’re
— ”

“No,” I said. “No, I’m okay.”

“Why do you do that?”

“Do what?”

“Lie to me?”

“Careful,” I said, staring up at him. “I could accuse you of doing the same thing.”

“That wouldn’t be fair, though, would it?” he asked. “I’ve never been anything but honest with you, Mandy.”
Right
. “Listen, before this turns into another argument, let me get one thing out of the way; I only came by tonight because I wanted to ask you for a favor.”

“You want a favor?”

“Yes,” he said, and then he stopped walking. I did, too, and then I turned to face him.

“What?”

“I want you to give your sister a break,” he said. “Cut her some slack. I shouldn’t have told her the things I did, and she didn’t deserve to hear it, let alone be burdened by the secrecy. She was in the wrong place at the wrong time, and I dropped a lot of unnecessary stuff on her shoulders.”

“Oh.”

“She mentioned you’re not talking to her, that you haven’t spoken a word to her in a week.” True. “Mandy, listen,” he said, grabbing both of my arms and giving them a gentle squeeze. My skin tingled under his hold, even beneath my jacket and sweater. He leaned down to my eye level and held my stare. “I’m on the receiving end of a six-year silent treatment from my mom. And let me tell you something: there is nothing in this world worse than having someone you love turn a blind eye to your advances or refuse to speak to you. It’s heartbreaking. It’s devastating knowing that you hurt them, and yet they get some kind of sick humor out of watching you beg, hope, and plead.” My stomach knotted. I’d gotten my share of kicks out of torturing Dad and Bailey, and I’d never felt truly guilty until that moment. “Silent treatments are an effective weapon, I’ll promise you that. They could almost kill a person.” His hands slowly fell down my arms and away from my body. His arms hung loose at his sides as he slowly closed his eyes. One deep breath in, and one long exhale out. That’s all it took before he continued, “Mandy, I know you’re hurt, and I’m sorry. But don’t be angry with Bailey for something I did. If you’re going to be mad, be mad at me. It was my fault.”

“That’s very noble of you to fall on the sword and take the blame, Gabe,” I said, looking down to our feet. “But you’re a little too late.”

“I am?”

“I’m not mad at my sister.”

“Are you sure? Because she seems to think— ”

“I’m not mad at my sister,” I said again, and this time I met his eyes. “She just…doesn’t know it yet.
I
didn’t know it until a couple of days ago, and I just…I haven’t found the right moment to talk to her yet.”

“Oh,” he said, nodding. “Yeah, okay.”

“And I’m not mad at you, either, for what it’s worth,” I said. “I shouldn’t have expected—”

“It’s okay, really—”

“No, it’s not okay. I know firsthand how excruciating it is living under a microscope. I’ve been doing it ever since the park re-opening. Everyone’s picking at me and judging me and making wild assumptions. And while the repercussions of what I did have been especially difficult for
me
, I never thought about how hard it must be for you. I kinda dumped this whole thing in your lap, and then I was stupid enough to accuse you for running away for other reasons.”

“Yeah, but you weren’t entirely wrong,” he said. “I did run. And for someone with a busted leg and very little momentum, I ran a lot faster and
farther than I ever thought I could.”

We both smiled.

I didn’t know what he wanted me to say. I wasn’t going to stand there and plead with him to stop running away from me, so I prayed that’s not what he was after. After how much Georgia, Bailey, and Carla had stressed my selfishness, there was no way in the world I was going to stand there and expect anything more from Gabe. It was up to him now.

“Well, favor granted,” I said, trying to steer us away from the serious stuff. “I’m going to fix things with Bailey, so you can head back to Desden now, cleansed of your guilt.”

“I’m not ready to go home just yet,” he said, shaking his head. “I want to stay or walk you home. Can I at least do that much?”

“You don’t have to do that. Your car is all the way back at the diner,” I said, looking down the block. “You’d have to walk back to get it.”

“You know, I really don’t mind,” he said, and then he reached over and took my hand, threading my fingers with his. “I mean, if it’s okay with you?”

I knew his question meant more than it was supposed to seem. He wasn’t asking if continuing the walk was okay, he wanted to make sure he hadn’t crossed a line just then by taking my hand. I looked down to our threaded fingers and then back up to Gabe, watching his softened stare. So many things had left me dazed and confused over the weeks, and I felt as though I didn’t really know much about anything anymore. But at least I knew one thing for sure
. In that moment, as long as he was holding my hand like that, I was really okay with anything.

“Are you sure there’s nothing you want to talk about?” he asked as we started walking again and crossed the single intersection in the center of town. “It seems you have a lot on your mind.”

The house was a straight-shot from the light, two blocks down. Our walk home wouldn’t last long, and I didn’t want to waste a single second of our time talking about my problems. Slowly but surely, I was working them out all on my own.

“You know what? I’m all talked-out for the day, but thanks,” I said.

“You’re sure?” he asked, giving my hand a gentle squeeze. “I have two ears.”

Two beautiful ears and one perfect heart.
I didn’t need reminding. The one thing that was incredibly unclear, though, was why he was being so nice to me after the way I treated him on Friday night. Why wasn’t he mad at me?
I
would be mad at me.