Mostly, it just hurt her to look at him. Last week, she would've thought of him as hers and she would've thought that there was no reason to be jealous of those women because she was the one who got to see that backside in the flesh and she was the one that knew it was just as perfect as his jeans marketed.
Now, she knew better than to think that.
Maddie swallowed. Her exhaustion had been momentarily pushed to the side when she spotted him, but now it crashed back down on her. This was the man who'd broken her heart a couple nights ago. This was the man who'd lumped their entire relationship into the friends with benefits column after she confessed that she loved him.
And it still stung. A lot. His rejection of her. His easy dismissal of her feelings. All he thought was that they were good together and that the sex was pretty fucking fantastic, to quote him word for word.
She knew why he was here. It pissed her off because he couldn't even give her some time to work things out in her head. He'd been perfectly fine avoiding her for the past week, after all.
Maddie stopped walking, letting him quickly stride the rest of the way to her since she saw this meeting as unavoidable.
"We need to talk," Caleb said when he reached her. His hand reached out to grasp her hand, as if he couldn't not touch her and that just irritated her even more.
She pulled free and took a step back, placing a hand on his chest to stop him from invading her space. "I'm tired, Caleb. My feet are throbbing and I just want to go home."
"Let's go home then," he said easily.
"To my mom's home," she snapped back.
In clear frustration, he ran a palm through his hair, eyeing her. "Maddie, this is ridiculous."
"Ridiculous?" she repeated and there went another stab to her gut. "You think that what I told you was ridiculous? Do you think that what I feel is ridiculous?"
He exhaled a sharp breath. "That's not what I meant. Of course, that's not what I meant."
"Enlighten me then. What exactly did you mean by this is ridiculous?" she asked, her eyes narrowed.
A young couple gave them a long glance as they passed by and Caleb glared until they averted their eyes. He looked around them and then jerked his head to the side. "My car's parked over there."
"I'm not going with you," she said, taking a step around him and walking past.
"Okay, then we'll go to your car."
"I took BART in."
"Jesus, Maddie," he cursed, grabbing her arm to stop her. "Will you just give me ten fucking minutes and talk to me? I need to explain some things."
Maddie sighed wearily, squeezing her eyes closed and trying to take deep breaths. Her pulse was rapid and she knew it was due to stress. That couldn't be good for the baby.
"Fine," she snapped. "Ten minutes. Then I'm going home."
"Fine," he said in return, but his voice was softer than hers. He led her to his car, which was parked on the street in front of the museum. He must've gotten there early or he must've been really lucky to get such a good spot. When he unlocked and opened the door for her, she had to hop a little to get into the passenger seat, but the moment she sat down, she felt instant relief. She actually sighed and then kicked off her flats, only realizing afterwards that she might not be able to get them back on.
Caleb looked at her when he got in, watching as she leaned down to massage her calves.
"They do know you're pregnant, right?" he asked, irritation rolling off of him. Maddie knew he didn't like her working this much and she wanted to tell him to stop stressing out because it was only one day a week. But even she was beginning to wonder if she should take it easier, especially since she'd started getting headaches this past week.
"You wanted to talk," she reminded him, glancing out the passenger window.
When she looked over at him, he had both hands draped over the top of the steering wheel, like he needed it to ground him. He was staring straight ahead and then said, "I can't tell you what you want to hear, Maddie. I'm sorry. I just wanted to explain what I meant the other night."
"I understood perfectly, Caleb," she said, confused by the disappointment that filled her anew. She had just naively hoped that perhaps he needed time to figure out what she already knew … that he cared deeply for her too.
For weeks, she'd held herself back. She had bit her tongue every time she wanted to tell him how she felt because she'd been-justly-afraid of how he might react. And it shouldn't be like that. She should've been excited to tell him.