"We don't need to talk about this," I say, trying to go around him, a lump stuck in my throat. He steps in my way. "It doesn't make a difference. We're just wasting our breath."
"Maybe it doesn't make a difference," he admits, "but I want you to know I'm sorry. If I had to do it all over again, I would've figured out how to stay with you. You're the best thing that ever happened to me."
The tough me is gone and in her place is an eighteen-year-old girl that's wanted to hear those words all her adult life. I wish for a witty comeback, something to lighten the feeling between us, but there's nothing.
"Do you love me, Ellie?"
"I don't even know you," I whisper. "How could I love you?"
"Did you used to love me?"
"Yes."
His eyes flutter closed, and he holds them there for a long minute. When they open, there's a fire there I haven't seen before. He reaches for me, but I catch his hand mid-air. Something catches my attention.
In between his thumb and forefinger, there's a tiny star tattooed into his skin. It settles in the bend of his hand. It seems like an odd choice and an even stranger location for a tattoo, especially for guy like him.
"What's this all about?" I ask, running my thumb over it.
When I look at him, I see a gentleness in his face that nearly melts me.
"Do you remember the night we climbed into the top of your neighbor's hay loft?" he asks. "And we sat there for hours, talking and laughing and you trying to show me constellations and getting it all messed up?"
"Yes," I whisper. "That was the first night that we . . . Um . . ." I look down.
"The first night that we were together." He puts his finger beneath my chin and lifts it so I'm looking at him. "This tattoo is my reminder of you."
My chest compresses, my breathing gets shallow, as I try to process what he's saying.
"I got it here, in the bend of my right hand, so I see it, and regardless of what I'm doing-eating, writing, firing a weapon-I see you." His cheeks flush. "Well, not really. But I think of you. I'm reminded of you."
"Ford, I don't know what to say to that," I admit, dropping his hand. Flooded with a warmth like the desert in mid-summer, I can't stop looking at the little star.
He blushes. "It was a late night in San Diego and I may have had too much to drink. The guys dragged me to a tattoo parlor and they were all getting something inked and I walked out with this." He looks at the star, a faint smile crossing his lips. "Picking out a tattoo is a lot harder than you think it will be."
"I couldn't get a tattoo. I'm afraid I'd hate what I chose down the road."
"I didn't think I could either." He drops his hand and looks at me. "I knew if there was one thing I wanted, it had to be something that I'd never regret."
My heartbeat quickens as our eyes lock together.
"I may regret some things, or even a lot of things, that have to do with you. But those regrets are all from the way I acted." He takes a step towards me, his chest rising and falling more quickly. "You are the only person in my life that ever just let me be me. I mean, I love my family. You know that. But I always felt so much . . ."
"Pressure."
"Yes," he says, blowing out a breath. "There was, there is, pressure to make good choices, do the right thing, toe the line in some ways that I'm not interested in doing."
"Is your mom still doing all those fancy charities?" I ask with a grin.
"Yes," he laughs. "I understand them more now. It's her way of giving back in the way she understands."
"I still think you could just donate all that money you spend on setting it up to the Shelters for Savannah or the Food Pantry."
"You'd be happy to know," he grins, "that Lincoln and Danielle have started a charity in town. I'm not sure of the ins and outs of it, but I know Dani is passionate about under-privileged kids and they do a lot of charity work with those types of things."
"Really?" I ask. "Maybe we could team up and do a back-to-school drive together or something."
"She'd love that. Mom always wants to help and then it becomes this glamour thing. Dani is more like you."
"Are you saying I'm not glamorous?" I tease.
"Your sneakers with paint splattered over them are so, so glamorous, Ellie."
He laughs, a warm, rich, captivating sound that feels like a balm to so many of my wounds. It doesn't fix anything, obviously, but it does soothe me somehow.