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Her hands still for a moment, then she turns to me, pulls her knees to her chest and wraps her arh few months"

I nod and frown "I miss her too Did she ever tell you that I still came to see her over the years whenever I was in town?"

"No" She shakes her head sadly "She knew that talking about you hurt ht it up"

I blink and watch her beautiful face "I saw her at least once a year I’d make repairs on the house and help her out in any way I could"

"Thank you for that," she whispers "Mark, I’m sorry for the way it ended--"

"Stop" I take her hand in ize for, M It was a long tio"

She nods and bites her lip but then shakes her head and presses on "No, I need to say this It’s important to me" She squares her shoulders and clears her throat and I just lean back ontime, but we never talked after that day, M I didn’t want to break it off I knew that that’s what I was doing, but it killed me I’d been in dance class one day, and I wasn’t concentrating, and the teacher called , and explained that I needed to get et co, and that if dance hat I wanted, I had to go for it"

"I get it, Mer" I push a piece of hair that’s fallen out of her bun behind her ear "We were young Chances are ould have broken up eventually It hurt like crazy at the tiht?"

She nods and releases her legs, crossing them in front of her

"Tellus both, but I realize, I want to know everything about our ti and tell "

"Really? You want to know?"

"Absolutely" I let her hand go and take a sip of hts

"I didn’t want to get on that plane," she begins softly, her eyes off in the distance, watching the lights of the boats on the water I can’t look away from her Fuck, I’m still pulled to her in a way I’ve never been able to explain It was there when I was seventeen da now "It was torture, knowing I was leaving you The first as scary and so ht it would be"

She ss and glances at me, then back at the boats, like she’s nervous, so I scoot next to her and link her fingers with ht away Fro pretty much nonstop I met Jax that first week too" She smiles as she thinks back on that time "He was a couple years older, but also new to the area, so we bonded He has quite the story to tell" She frowns suddenly and then turns those baby blues up to mine "Maybe someday he’ll tell you about it Anyorked pretty , so soet up in the ain"