Page 15 of Falling Backwards (The Edge of Us #1)

The evening passes in such a strange way. It’s like I’m living in a blur but also like everything is sharp and clear. Makes sense, I guess, though not because I’m drunk—Maggie and I haven’t imbibed as much as our friends. It’s just that this is all so….

I don’t know.

For the most part, I still don’t know what to think about what’s going on.

But one thing I have had a grip on is my determination to do what Maggie needs me to do. Even with most of our conversations being stilted and her proximity to me making me feel shaky deep down—even with our past whispering in the back of my mind—I haven’t felt discomfited. Haven’t felt burdened. I’ve only felt determined to get her through this evening in one piece.

Like, to the point that I was prepared for Kyle to show up at our table, or send her a drink, or step into her path again when she went to the bathroom with her friends. The tension in me silently dared him to make just one more move towards her.

I don’t understand how I can be unsure of how to talk normally to her and at the same time be ready to defend her.

He didn’t bother her again, though. He also didn’t leave until shortly before we all did—he sat back there at his little booth, nursed his own drink, and observed our group in what I guess he thought was a stealthy way.

I’d told Maggie she could relax, and in some ways, she did. She laughed with her friends and enjoyed the birthday situation. She shared pretzel bites with me because no one else wanted to order those, and she even let me dip into the mustard; I didn’t think it’d be good, but it was. She answered when I got the idea to ask what song she listened to most recently (“July”

by Betcha, with which I’m unfamiliar). In turn, she asked what TV show I watched last, and she seemed genuinely interested in The Good Place.

But overall, I could tell she wasn’t truly at ease.

How could she be? She got cornered into spending time with a guy she doesn’t like in order to keep one she’s afraid of at bay.

Really makes me mad that he kept hanging around. I mean, this is a free country and he was a paying customer, but still. He was the reason Maggie felt unsettled, and she didn’t deserve that.

Logically, I know Joy is right about the safe approach to problems like this. The stuff she read online is solid. But man, have my insides agreed with Emma. I snuck a look at the guy once when she said he wasn’t paying attention, and the first thing I thought was, ‘Oh, yeah, I can handle him if I have to.’

I’m still thinking it, honestly. Nevermind that Paxton and I have shared a car with the girls and now seen them all the way to the door to their apartment. Nevermind that Kyle has been nowhere in sight since he left the bar and that Maggie is finally taking deep breaths.

While the others talk amongst themselves, she looks at the hallway wall I’m standing against, and I look at her.

“Thank you again,”

she says.

“I…I know this wasn’t the way you thought your night would go when you and Paxton made your bar plan.”

I wish she’d put her full attention on me. Every time she did over these hours, I felt….

After I’ve pushed that odd desire away, I say.

“It wasn’t, but as long as you feel okay now, that’s what’s important.”

She nods, folding her bottom lip into her mouth.

She did that the other day at the hostess stand, I remember. Didn’t meet my eyes then either, because that was after she was nice to me and she’d been avoiding eye contact for—

“I’m sorry.”

Now her gaze lowers to the floor.

“For imposing on you, I mean. But it did help me, so…I owe you one.”

A peculiar feeling wisps through me.

The bitterness in me want to file her offer away and call on it the next time she gripes at me at work for next to no reason. ‘Remember that time I got you out of a jam? You said you owe me a favor, and I’m cashing in. Do me a favor and quit bossing me around.’

But not all of me is bitter.

What leaves my mouth is.

“No, you don’t owe me.”

Her eyes finally move to mine, hopeful and grateful and shy.

They instantly wreak havoc on me, between my few earlier drinks and the weight of the night and, honestly, everything else to do with her—she’s so pretty and she’s okay because of me and she hasn’t argued with me since the straw thing….

I can’t hold back a new rush of words.

“If anything, we’re even ’cause you stopped Ronald from writing me up at work last weekend. I never thanked you for that, but I should have. I’m sorry I jumped on your ass instead of thanking you.”

She blinks once, twice, before those eyes go wide with surprise.

My contrition sits on the air between us, unnoticed by our laughing and chattering friends.

Hell, I’ve surprised myself. However, I feel good about bringing this up. As stubborn as I’ve been, it’s no secret that she did me a kindness that day.

So, nodding more than I have to, I tell her outright.

“Thank you.”

She’s motionless at first. Then she nods, too, looking like she doesn’t know what to say.

I get it.

Imagine how she would’ve reacted earlier if I’d followed my urge to ask if I could put my arm around her.

In the moments before that, I almost put it around her without asking. Kyle thought he’d caught us in a lie? I was ready to give him a little something to quit perking up about.

But I didn’t want to startle her—or, worse, piss her off—so I just settled for moving closer and trying not to pick another dumb fight.

Her straw-chewing wasn’t actually too irritating to ignore. I just couldn’t keep my eyes from repeatedly drifting to her, and the wad of things I was feeling plus how she was gnawing on the straw proved to be too much for me. I’d never seen her do it before in all our visits to Merritt’s, so it seemed to be out of anxiety; it was easier to ask her to quit than to try to process what her mood was doing to my mood.

I open my mouth to apologize for that, too, but Joy’s raised voice floats over to us.

“Okay, bye! Thanks for everything, Paxton—and Luke! Oh, Luke, thank you so much for sitting by Maggie tonight. My friend feeling safe is the best present you could’ve given me!”

Upon looking that way, I see Emma stepping through their opened door. She lifts a wave-ish hand at me but cuts coy eyes at Paxton.

He backs away with a matching expression even as he cheerfully tells Joy.

“No problem, birthday girl! I’ve had a great time.”

I can’t say I’ve had a great time. I’ve had a bizarre time. Still, when Joy looks at me, I nod and echo Paxton with sincerity.

“No problem. Happy birthday.”

She claps gleefully.

“Goodnight, guys. Careful going home!”

With a swish of gold fabric, she’s inside the apartment too.

Maggie moves to follow her. I watch her go and hear her thank Paxton, who bows and wishes her a relaxing night.

Then, shuffling through the doorway, she slips another look to me.

She still doesn’t say anything, and I still don’t mind.

Paxton is on his way back to the elevator by the time I hear the locks on the shut door securing the girls into their apartment. Only now do I turn and walk away too.

Once I’ve caught up to him, Paxton starts chattering about Emma, but I can’t focus on him. I cross one arm over my chest, pinch the bridge of my nose with my other fingers, listen to the words already in my mind: the ones I was thinking about Joy saying when Kyle saw me and Maggie bickering.

‘He literally perked up like he’d caught you in a lie.’

Again and again, I hear it.

Over and over, I replay how still Maggie went.

And more and more, I notice how weird I feel.

The tension that’s been with me isn’t going away even though the night has ended. It seems like the farther I get from Maggie, the deeper it digs in.

‘Like he’d caught you in a lie.’

Maggie and I may have reined in the attitude after Joy said that, but Kyle still stuck around and snuck looks at her. He didn’t go on his way for hours.

Was he being pathetic…or observant?

Was Maggie right during her babbling to me when she said we couldn’t look convincing enough to truly fend him off?

…Should I have asked to put my arm around her? Would he have left sooner if I—?

The elevator dings me out of my thoughts. The doors open on the lobby of the building.

“You okay?”

I finally catch Paxton saying.

I blink a look to him; I zoned out of that whole ride. Thankfully, he doesn’t seem annoyed about it, but I still give him the best apologetic smile that I can.

Walking through the lobby reveals no unwelcome visitors. With a deep breath, I get ready to check the night outside, too, just in case.

Then, quite honestly, I tell my friend.

“I don’t know.”