Gypsy

Chapter 42

·Zara·

We don't go home right away, electing instead to have breakfast first. Well, lunch I guess, since it is almost twelve thirty. As I sit at the diner table across from Adam, I can't help but to stare at him from time to time. My mind is still reeling from last night, so much so that I really don't have much of an appetite. There can't be much room in your stomach when it's already full of butterflies.

I just can't stop asking myself: Why me?

I watch him eat, while I mostly just poke at my own food with my fork, and I feel that familiar old feeling growing inside me, the feeling that I need to get away to think. It's been dormant for a little while, but it's never far away. It's engrained in my DNA, like a tamed wolf's longing to run through an open forest must be.

I glance up at Adam to find he's watching me intently. He is frowning too, as if he's trying to read my mind.

"What's wrong?" he asks.

He always assumes something's wrong, and I can't really blame him for that. He doesn't actually know me as well as I know he would like, and I can't imagine how that must feel for him. I know him well enough, better than I've known most people in my life.

"Nothing. Just thinking." Or trying to. I let out a slow breath then lay my fork down on my plate.

He looks at it, my barely touched meal, and then up at me. He reaches out and gently takes my hand as he speaks. "If something's bothering you, I want you to tell me. We're in this together now, you know?"

"Yeah, I know. I guess that's kind of what's bothering me."

His hand tightens just a little on mine and I see the worry when it forms in his eyes. After a moment, he gets up then joins me on my side of the table. He lets go of my hand, slips his arm around me, then pulls me gently against his side.

"Talk to me, please. If something's wrong, I want to help you fix it."

I laugh lightly at that and shake my head. "Nothing's broken, Adam, except maybe me. I was just trying to figure out …"

My words trail off. This is a new thing for me, talking about my feelings. I don't know the right words. I can whip up a ballad or throw out an insult, but I can't seem to talk about what's going on inside my own head. Adam waits patiently, his thumb drawing light circles against my side.

"I'm trying to figure out why you'd want to marry someone like me, a common street rat from Southside."

My words are soft, but he hears them. He turns to me then lifts my head with his free hand. I lift my gaze to his and see something very close to sadness in his eyes.

"I wish you could see yourself the way I do. Nothing about you is common, and you're no street rat. So far as Southside goes, why would that even matter? I would have loved you, no matter where you came from."

I smile at that and look away. I wonder if that would have been the same for me? I look at the ring on my hand--my egagement ring, I remind myself--and I think it would have been. There's just something about him that feels right, even if I don't fully understand it.

"I think I need to go for a walk," I finally say. "I need to clear my head, straighten out my thoughts."

"Where are we going?"

I shake my head slowly then look up at him. "I need to take a walk alone. I just need a little space to think right now."

His expression changes immediately. There is a touch of panic in his eyes, and I know what he's thinking, but I can't suppress my own needs just because he's worried. I try to give him a reassuring smile, but it doesn't work.