Change of Heart
Chapter 10: Love, Hate or Indifference?
The rain hadn't let up since he'd left the bar.
The trudge to his truck had been miserable but the drive trumped it tenfold.
Between the weather and traffic, it was almost 11 pm by the time he pulled up in front of her building.
He gazed up at her apartment, her light was still on.
Flack pushed a hand through his gray flecked dark hair. He'd come here to talk to her but it wasn't until this moment that he realized he didn't know what to say.
"Screw it. Gotta start somewhere." He muttered as he pushed himself out of the vehicle and hurried across the sidewalk to her apartment.
He pushed the intercom button for her apartment and waited.
"Hello?" Came her tentative, tired voice.
"Linds, it's Don." He told her.
A long pause followed. "It's late Don." She finally replied, her voice sounding even more exhausted then before.
"Please Linds. I just wanna talk. I'm soaking wet, it's cold, I don't even have to come up. Just let me in the lobby." He suggested, shivering as more of the icy cold rain drops smacked him in the face.
She showed her agreement in the form of the door buzzing loudly. He grabbed the door handle and stepped in.
After shaking out his rain coat, he stepped to the inside intercom and resumed his earlier mission, get Lindsay to forgive him.
"Listen, Linds. Don't talk, OK? Just let me say this." He requested.
He was greeted by silence.
Satisfied, he scrubbed both hands down his face before placing his left index finger on the intercom button.
"I… Linds, I'm… God I'm so sorry. I messed up. I made a bad call. I know a good thing when I see it and I let it slip through my fingers the moment Messer walked in on us… You deserve better than that. I shouldn't have let Messer dictate the nature of our relationship. And, god, Linds, if it were any other woman on the other end of this intercom, I don't even think I'd be here, ya know? But you, I don't know… You, you get me and you get TO me. I have done everything I could do to get you off my mind but you're there… You were there before and now I can't make you go away. And honestly, I'm tired of trying, I'm not gettin' anywhere. I just… I'm sorry. I'm rambling. I just wanted to say I'm sorry." He finished lamely, feeling like a huge ass for standing in her lobby dripping wet, apologizing to a metal intercom plate.
"You're dripping on my newspaper."
He whirled around to find her standing on the stairs, decked out in pajamas and slippers.
He gazed at her for a long moment, looking for some sign that she'd accepted his apology, or if she'd even heard it for that matter.
Her face remained passive.
At last, he glanced down at the table below him and saw he was indeed, dripping on her paper.
Flack took a step forward, dug through the small basket, found one that wasn't wet and strode over to her.
He held the paper out to her, and a moment later, she took it.
She said nothing. His blue eyes examined her face once more before he turned and headed for the door. His hand was on the handle when she spoke.
"I haven't stopped thinking about you either."
He turned but kept his mouth shut, knowing it was her turn to speak.
"I hated how easy it seemed to be for you to drop me because of Danny. We had something going on that was… That was real. And I thought it counted for something. So when you just… Let it go… I was crushed, it was like I broke in two. I couldn't even look at you, every time I did, it felt like it was happening all over again. But you want to know the craziest part? The really screwed up part? I never hated you. I tried to, god I tried to, but I couldn't. Don't get me wrong, I hated what you did. But I never hated you."
Her arms were folded over her chest and she was leaning against the wall next to the stairs.
Flack considered her words before speaking. He took a couple of steps closer, not enough to invade her personal space, but close enough to show his desire to be near her.
"You know, they say the opposite of love isn't hate. It's indifference. And I for one, don't hate you either… So I guess… I guess I'm asking if you're indifferent? Cause I'm definitely not. But…You….You say you don't hate me… So… do you indifferent me?"
Her heart leaped into her throat. Suddenly, this conversation had just taken quite a serious tone.
She wanted to speak, to answer him, but she couldn't push the words out. Her mouth went dry, her thoughts were scattered all over her brain. She wanted to badly to form a coherent thought.
But before she could put together a cohesive response, he mistook her silence as her answer.
"I get it… I'm sorry I put you on the spot. Just forget I stopped by." He told her softly as he turned to the door once again.
This time, when her heart leapt into her throat, she pulled herself together.
"Do you love me?" She asked, her cheeks heating up the moment after she realized what she just asked.
He froze in place.
She pushed on. "Cause you just told me the opposite of love isn't hate… And since you aren't indifferent and you don't hate me… Does that mean you love me?"
His head dropped and his eyes fluttered closed. His back turned to her, he responded with a simple nod of his head.
He swallowed in a big gulp of air and sighed. He'd done it, he'd put it all on the line, answered her ridiculously revealing question and was not being met with silence.
"I love you too."
His eyes flew open and there she was, standing in front of him, her brown eyes shining with tears.
"Angel, you better mean that, cause if you don't, I-"
She cut him off with her lips. Her hands had planted themselves on the sides of his place and she'd hauled him to her level and kissed him like her life depended on it.
"I do."
THAT'S ALL FOLKS