After We Break: (a standalone novel) by Katy Regnery

Author:Katy Regnery [Regnery, Katy]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Katharine Gilliam Regnery
Published: 2014-01-07T18:30:00+00:00

CHAPTER 12

Nine years earlier

“I want to write a song called ‘Fall Days’ but with ‘en’ in parentheses after Fall. What do you think?”

As they walked through the quad, Violet glanced up at him, then back down at their laced fingers, marveling at the way their friendship had turned into something more serious over the past three days. But she was also conflicted. Emotionally, she was ecstatic. Realistically, she was worried. She’d been in love with Zach for weeks, but her feelings since Thursday night had basically hitched a ride on a runaway train. Holding onto the words “I love you” was harder every day. She wanted to tell him. She wanted him to know. And mostly, she wanted to hear him say the words back to her. She wanted it to be official, to be real.

Joni Mitchell’s lyrics floated through her head:

Picked up a pencil and wrote “I love you” in my finest hand

Wanted to send it, but I don’t know where I stand

And that was the thing. For all that Zach kissed her and held her hand, for all that she’d slept beside him, making out with him for three glorious nights, he’d said precious little in the way of sharing his feelings or telling her what she meant to him.

She tried to get her head around what felt solid: she felt sure that he admired her writing and viewed her as a creative equal, which flattered and amazed her since he was the most talented musician she’d ever met. She knew that she mattered to him, that he cared about her as a friend. But this weekend, with the advent of a physical relationship, the waters were getting murky between them. She couldn’t get a bead on whether he regarded them as friends with benefits or something more. Friends with benefits simply wouldn’t work for her. She was deeply, irrevocably in love with him. Did he feel that sort of romantic passion for her, or was fooling around just an extension of their friendship?

She cast her eyes down at the gravel path under their feet, remembering his eyes as he’d stared at her this morning—unfathomable gray, as intense as ever, but they betrayed very little about his feelings. She squeezed his fingers, trying to convince herself that he was real, that he was really hers, that they were in love, not just acting on propinquity.

“So basically you want to write a song called ‘Fallen Days’?”

“No. ‘Fall(en) Days.’” He pantomimed the parentheses. “You know, so it has a double meaning.”

“What’s the double meaning?”

Her heart sped up a little, hoping he would say that he had fallen for her, that he—

“Fall like the season. Fallen like days that are over. Fallin’ like soldiers on a battlefield. And the red leaves could be blood. It could work. I have the sound in my head.”

Her shoulders slumped, but she kept her voice light. “You writing the lyrics, Z? Because what you’ve got so far sucks. Not to mention, you just outlined a triple meaning, none of which blew my skirt up.

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