Page 42 of Falling Backwards (The Edge of Us #1)

Once Luke texts me that he’s at home for the night and waiting for Paxton to come over with food, I feel like I can really settle into my own evening. The timing is great; the girls and I have unpacked our bags from being away, ordered pizza, and gotten into pajamas. Luke and I agree to talk to each other later in the night, like we said before he left—I get brave enough to send a heart emoji and he returns it and, God, that makes me happy in the craziest little way.

I realize that happiness is on my face when I set my phone down right as Emma says from the couch.

“All right, Maggie, spill it.”

I curl up here in the cushy chair.

“Spill what?” I ask.

But I know I’m just about grinning, and Emma can see I’m just about grinning, and she sputters into laughter that I get drawn into. Guess my and her chat about when to put the Christmas tree up is over.

“Girl, please!”

She points at me, her pretty face alight with good-hearted accusation.

“You are lit up about him! Spill. It!”

From behind the closed bathroom door, I hear Joy shriek.

“No, wait for me! I have to hear this!”

Well, I already know I’m not going to tell them about my and Luke’s intimacy from this morning—the girls don’t always share their similar experiences, but they’re more likely to than I am—and yet my cheeks are burning as I press my hands to them. I wouldn’t be surprised if that gives me away on its own.

“Your face is so red,”

Emma laughs out now.

“Oh, you sweet thing!”

Joy comes out of the bathroom with an inordinate amount of noise. As she barrels herself into the free space next to Emma on the couch, she wipes her hands on her pajama pants, clearly having rushed through washing her hands so much that she didn’t dry them properly.

She gasps as she gets a good look at me.

“You are blushing like crazy! Okay, okay, tell us how your time with Luke went!”

Maybe they’ll just think simple joy is to blame, which it is, but there’s no way not to also blush about how utterly gorgeous Luke sounded when I made him—

“Did something happen between you two?”

Emma asks in a half-hushed way. She and Joy both lean in my direction.

Joy hunches her shoulders excitedly.

“Yeah, did something happen-happen?”

Oh my God. What do I say?

I buy some time while I fan at my cheeks. I try not to keep thinking about other sexy things; I don’t want to make the blush worse.

Emma tilts her head to Joy and tells her.

“She’s killing me, Joyful.”

Joy groans through her smile, agreeing.

I giggle in diffidence, amusement, and fondness all at once. Then I finally land on what to say.

“You beautiful souls know I’m not one to talk about stuff like—”

They both gasp deeply, then glance at each other with wide eyes, their hands grasping at each other’s. I don’t know if they’re talking to me or each other when their babble starts up.

“That means something did happen!”

“Yes! That’s a modest little way of saying it!”

“I wonder what it was, but—”

“—never gonna tell us, ’cause that’s not how—”

Officially fire-faced despite my fanning, I say over them.

“No, I’m not gonna tell you what it was! But I will tell you that not even counting that, our week together was so good and fun and easy and I wasn’t worried about anything at all. I just felt right.”

Now my friends’ expressions relax. Emma looks at me with settling approval while Joy lets out a half-breathy, “Aw,”

and puts her hands to her heart.

Emma says.

“All my previous excitement for you aside…. He really makes you happy?”

Her eyes drift over me in a way that tells me she’s dipping her toes into the past while she sits here.

“He’s really earned your trust back?”

I know it’s mostly my past, but there’s a second or two where I can see a familiar shift, and I know she’s touching on her past too.

Graham, I think softly. She’s thinking about him.

She doesn’t see me exchange the smallest of looks with Joy, who I can tell has caught what I’ve caught. As usual, we don’t say anything about it.

I just wait for Emma to finish vaguely looking at my hair, I think, and meet my eyes again. Then I answer softly.

“Yeah. After…back then…I never thought it could happen, but it has.”

I say it because it’s my truth and because I hope she will one day find some peace of her own. I’m not sure how likely it is that she’ll ever even see Graham again, let alone give him another chance like I’ve given Luke, but I don’t want her to be stuck with her pain and anger forever. Maybe this can be a tiny bit of proof planted in her mind that things can be better someday despite it feeling for so long like they couldn’t be.

Joy’s voice is gentle.

“I’m happy for you.”

I see her smile and her ever-warm eyes.

“I’m really happy for you, sister. You deserve someone who makes you glow, and if it’s Luke who does that, then I….”

She shrugs.

“Honestly, I’m thankful he isn’t letting anything stand in the way of it.”

That brings a slight prickle to the corners of my eyes.

I smile at her.

“Thank you, sister.”

Emma finally speaks again.

“Yeah, I agree with Joy.”

She holds one hand out to me in her half of a heart.

“I’m happy for you, too, sister.”

I hold out the other half of the heart even though there are several feet of space between us. Then Joy joins in, and she and Emma get their heart connected before Joy tugs at a length of Emma’s hair in what I believe is comfort for the things our girl carries but never talks about.

“I love you, Em,”

I tell her. Then.

“And you, Joyful.”

“We love you,”

they say at the same time.

I go from having my halves of my hand-hearts in the air to gesturing at the girls.

“Okay, who’s gonna talk about their holiday next? I’ve said all there is to say about mine—except, oh, I did meet Luke’s mom and she’s so sweet. And she showed me pictures of Luke from when he was a kid and they were amazing.”

They both let out a laugh, Emma’s more like a guffaw while Joy’s is delighted.

“Were they embarrassing pictures?”

Emma asks.

“Please say yes!”

“No, they were funny and adorable. Old Halloween costumes and whatnot.”

I won’t tell them about the fake-weapons-in-swim-trunks ones. That’s a bit of treasure I’m keeping for myself.

Joy is groaning.

“I love little-kid Halloween costume pictures. Kids are so freaking cute. I can’t wait to have one.”

“So have one,”

Emma says nonchalantly.

“Pff. With whom? My failed blind date?”

“Oh-ho,”

I laugh lowly. I remember that small and unique disaster, but not the guy’s name.

“What was his—?”

“Afton,”

Joy says flatly.

Emma snickers.

“Oh, yeah, that guy. Or, hey, what about Bradley from that dinner?”

Now with a slump, Joy says.

“He turned out to be a sleaze.”

“Oh. Well, bye to him, then.”

I wince and add.

“I’m sorry, Joy.”

She nods.

“So am I, so yeah, he’s a no. And if I asked Afton to have a kid with me, he would probably be like, ‘And have my child be born with pink hair? Never!’”

We all bust out laughing at that.

I ask.

“He would be worried about your dyed-pink hair passing on to your kid, huh?”

Emma interjects.

“Probably! That guy was a fool!”

Joy agrees.

“Yep, he was, so yep, he probably would!”

New laughter takes us and, man, I miss Luke, but I also missed my friends while they were gone.

Joy points at Emma.

“All right, tell us about your Thanksgiving!”

Emma’s eyes go wide as she glances between us. She smacks the couch cushions on either side of her thighs.

“Y’all. My sister was talking wedding plans. She actually is planning carrot cake for her wedding cake.”

Joy and I explode into disbelief that Emma joins right in on.

“Maggie totally called that a long time ago!”

overlaps with.

“Oh my gosh! What if no one else eats it and they wasted their money?”

and with.

“Why the hell do people like vegetables in their cake?”

Although I wouldn’t choose to have carrot cake at my own wedding, I have to grin while Emma goes on talking about Kennedy’s plan. This recap of Thanksgiving with the Haledons is most certainly only just beginning, and I can’t wait to hear it all. Then Joy will be up, and her moms are always entertaining, so I’m looking forward to hearing about them and their holiday too.

I pull the throw blanket off the back of my cushy chair and settle in.

—

While I lie in my bed in the quiet darkness, waiting for Luke to say goodbye to Paxton and then call me, my mind drifts over…well, a lot of things.

How weird it already feels to be in bed alone. How difficult it had been for me to think about work instead of Luke, especially when finding him with my eyes was so damn easy. How much I enjoyed donating necessities to the homeless shelter and food bank. How glad I am that my friends and I all had good holidays and are safe—and, gosh, how surprised and optimistic I still am about Luke pointing out that it’s been almost a full week since anything last happened with Kyle.

I also dwell for a time on how I should’ve brought some of my and Luke’s chocolate cake home with me. It’s so good. We absolutely need to make it again soon. Maybe for Christmas?

That sets me on a train of thought to our future.

I can’t believe how badly I want a future with him.

Can’t believe it in a way, I mean. In all other ways, of course I can. Look at him, at who he is. Look how much warmer and softer he became after we let ourselves take a long enough breather from our bullshit to meet each other all over again instead of hanging on to old hostility. Look how much warmer and softer I have become.

There was a time not that long ago when I wondered if the strain between us could ever change. Then I realized I wanted it to. Then it hit me that I didn’t only want to change, I wanted to let myself fall. Now things have barreled along even farther and I know I don’t just want the fall anymore, I’m in it.

But….

I’m visited by a flicker from yesterday in his kitchen. Something on his phone had visibly upset him, and he wouldn’t say what it was, and the way that made me feel—that hint of a secret, of something he didn’t want to tell me…it wasn’t good. It made me feel nervous. Sad.

Had he been texting someone who said something that bothered him? Was it his aunt again? God, was it his dad?

The thought of his dad makes my stomach clench.

I rush past the old memories I have of Luke talking about him—past what I did with that information.

What if he was upset about his dad yesterday? Can I blame him for being hesitant to talk to me about that these days? I never told him I’m sorry for breaking his trust in high school.

Guilt scrapes at me.

I need to tell him how sorry I am. I want to.

But we said it’s time to put up a wall between then and now, not go back, and it’s been working for us. If I bring up my hurtful actions, his hurtful actions will come back to light too.

Maybe that’s what should happen. Maybe the fight it would lead to is something we need, not something to avoid.

That gives me pause.

But no. The risk of that conversation ruining us is one I don’t want to take.

He may still feel like he can’t forgive me, and I’m not sure—

My phone starts vibrating with a phone call, startling me.

It’s Luke.

Part of me is still clinging to this last minute and the fear and unease it was stirring up, but the rest of me is glad for this interruption.

The past is behind us. We agreed on that for good reason.

I answer with, “Hi.”

“Hey,”

comes the welcome sound of his voice. It instantly warms me.

“Soooo, on a scale of one to ten, how mad would you be if I told you I ate the rest of the chocolate cake we made?”

My mouth falls open with disbelief, but then laughter overtakes me.

It overtakes him, too, and I wish I could see his smile.

“You know what?”

I say.

“Since we can recreate it literally tomorrow, I’m only at a one.”

“I was thinking the same thing! It was easy to make, even the frosting.”

“Yep.”

I think about that fluffy, velvety, chocolatey frosting and groan.

“I’m at a nine as far as missing it goes, though.”

He takes a hissing, sympathetic breath.

“Does it help at all that I thought of you while I finished it off?”

I have to clap my hand over my mouth to keep from laughing so loudly that I disturb my friends in their rooms.

Through his hearty chuckles, he prompts.

“Maybe a little?”

I barely get out.

“Not really, Luke, no!”

For many moments, all we do is crack up.

Then I hear him manage to say.

“Honestly, I—I didn’t think so.”

Briefly, I remember my grayer thoughts from before he called; the way this conversation is already going carries me farther away from them.

I’m not with him in his bed right now, not in the warmth of his arms, not kissing him, but I still want to get lost in him—in the Luke I have today. And he makes that as easy to do now as when we were together in person, in those other moments.

So once again, I tune everything else out and just live right where I am.