If she watched him long enough, the brief hints of heat were obvious even as he shut them down with ruthless force. For a man who said little, his body was easy to read if she just paid attention. The clenched fists. The tick in his jaw. The heave of his chest. Her body could read his, too. Certain gestures, facial expressions, the tiny half smile, the crinkled eyes, and she went liquid and hot.
“The basis of my argument is this," Maggie laid her hand palm up on his desk, “I’ve never had romantic feelings or attraction for someone I wasn’t friends with. I cannot separate the two. And I think there are other people like that too.”
Mac refused to look at her. He pushed his sleeves up to his elbows and then pulled them back down. He straightened a row of pens on the top of his desk, then opened the top drawer and shoved them inside. His shoulders moved with the telltale heave of his panting breaths.
“For a long time, I thought I was in love with my best friend’s older brother. He took care of me. He was kind to me. I felt special when he was around. I knew I loved him, but it took me a long time to realize I wasn’t in love with him.”
Maggie paused, wanting to plan her words carefully. She needed to lay the foundation and let Mac fill in the cracks all on his own. Maggie looked around Mac’s office, as though all the answers would be hiding among his file cabinets or hanging with the photos on the walls.
“How did you figure it out?” Mac asked, and Maggie jolted in her seat.
She hadn’t expected his question. “Oh,” Maggie said, “I met someone else.”
Before her eyes, Mac shut down. It wasn’t the anger and harsh lines from the last time she’d mis-stepped. This time his body went completely still, as though he was trying to avoid being seen by her. The heaving of his chest stopped. It didn’t look like he was breathing at all, and the color drained from his face. His gaze seemed trained on her face, but his eyes weren’t moving, even as she bobbed slightly from side to side. He was staring right through her.
“It was actually easy to notice the differences once I paid attention. Both men made me feel loved and cared for, but only one turned me on and made me want him. Made me want only him. There was only one man I ached to see and talk to every day.” Maggie tried to catch his eye again, but couldn’t. She had to finish this, though, had to get it out. “It was obvious in my book, too. My original characters were falling flat because I’d based their love and their feelings off my relationship with Dean. I couldn’t figure out why no one was connecting with their romance, but I realized my mistake. The love I was basing my novel on wasn’t real. It wasn’t romantic love. I couldn’t see it because I was so sure that I knew my own heart. But now? Now my characters sizzle on the page, their love is palpable, and I swear it’s because this new man, this love that I didn’t see before, is so real that it’s universal. Even the least romantic person on the planet can see what they have. What I have.”
Mac swallowed, the bobbing of his jaw the only movement of his body. “Does he treat you well?” he asked.
Maggie nodded. “Like I’m the most important person in his life. It took me a while to recognize his love language. He’s an action man, showing his love through what he does. He’s the guy who always puts me first, even if it hurts him. I promised myself I’d take better care of him, too.”
Mac looked like he’d swallowed one of his swords. He’d shifted his gaze down to the top of his desk, fingers slowly tracing a small divot in the wood. There were white lines bracketing the sides of his mouth, a muscle in his jaw popping as he clenched his teeth.
“One time,” Maggie said, trying to keep her voice breezy and light, as though her heart weren’t hammering through the front wall of her chest, “he bribed a teenage Ferris wheel operator to make sure my car would get stuck at the top of the ride. All because I told him I wanted that perfect ending. On my date with someone else.”
The fingers stopped their tracing.
“Another time he spent an exorbitant amount of money on an action figure for a fandom he doesn’t even like, all because I’d refused to sell it to a bigot, and he didn’t want me to get in trouble.”
Mac’s hand clenched into a fist.
“He forfeited his place in a video game tournament just to make sure I knew I wasn't alone. Even though he’d won his round and was headed for the quarterfinals. He walked away like it was nothing, so I wouldn’t feel stuck or stranded in a bar by myself. And when I did end up needing him, he came. No questions asked. And that’s not counting all the gifts. The first aid kit and my umbrella go everywhere I go. The duck sits on my desk and helps me write. And the clip…” Maggie reached a hand up to touch the tiny books holding back her long hair.
“Who told you?” Mac asked.
Maggie smiled. “Is that really what you want to ask?”
“Learning those things that he’d done. That’s when you knew?” Mac let his pinky brush the side of Maggie’s fingers. He lifted his gaze to meet hers.
“No,” Maggie said. “I knew I was in love with him when his brother and my best friend shared those stories with me, and he was the first person I wanted to share it with. I knew I was in love with him when I made the biggest mistake of my life and thought he’d never want to see me again.”
She traced the T on his nameplate one more time before she pulled her hands back to her lap and stood from her chair. “I’m going to go. I’m sure you have actual students to work with.”
Maggie was at the door before Mac could stand up. He was still sitting in his desk chair, eyes on the spot she’d just vacated as she pushed his door open. He was staring straight ahead as she walked out. And he didn’t move when the door slammed shut behind her. Maggie didn’t see what he did after that because she was too busy trying to navigate back to the parking lot while blinded by unshed tears.
Making it to her car before the first tear fell was a tremendous accomplishment. Making it home in one piece, despite the snot and sobs, was a miracle. Maggie pulled into her parking spot. She wanted to curl up under her covers and cry until the memory of Mac, sitting stone-faced and immovable, was completely forgotten under the weight of fresh thoughts and feelings.
Somehow her feet got confused and led her into the Perk-u-Later instead. Thankfully, the café was empty. Gwen stood behind the counter, wiping down the glass tops with a clean blue rag. She took one look at Maggie silhouetted in the doorway, tears stuck to her cheeks like glitter, and dropped everything.
As Gwen enveloped her in a crushing hug, drawing Maggie’s face to her chest, Maggie understood why her feet had overridden her brain. She wholeheartedly approved of the decision when Gwen procured a chocolate muffin and shoved her into a large velvet chair. Instead of heading back behind the counter, Gwen took the seat opposite Maggie and reached across the small table for her hands.
“Heartbreak,” Gwen said, her thumbs gently brushing Maggie’s skin, “is the worst kind of agony, but it’s one of the few losses that you can recover from and be even stronger in the end.”
Maggie sniffled, more tears brewing at the inner corners of her eyes. She didn’t know if it was heartbreak. Not yet. Mac hadn’t outright rejected her, but the release of weeks’ worth of intense feelings was finally catching up to her. Maggie hadn’t realized just how exhausting it was, trying to navigate someone else’s emotions while also exploring her own. Her plan had always involved laying her feelings down for Mac and then letting him sit with them and soak them in. Mac was a planner. He was logical, methodical. Love was complicated and messy and would definitely throw him off his axis. Maggie hadn’t realized how much she’d wanted him to take her into his arms and kiss her until he hadn’t done it.
“I’m okay,” she said when she finally hit a break in her crying. “It wasn’t what I wanted to hear, but it wasn’t a ‘no’ either.” She’d been pushing him long enough. It was time to let Mac figure some things out and take a chance putting his heart on the line, too.
“I was worried you wouldn’t figure it out yourself,” Gwen said. “Give Mac a little time to get there, too.”