Note: Based on the Tumblr prompt request: "I don't want your apology."
if we had our time again
"Elizabeth!" Henry shouts. "Elizabeth, stop!"
Elizabeth keeps walking, head down, purse clutched to her side. Shopfronts stream by on her left, cars on her right, but they're no more than a blur of glass and sound, her mind lost to the heat of Henry's lips on hers, the urgency of his hands in her hair, over her waist, moulded to the curve of her spine.
"Elizabeth!"
Footfall thuds behind her.
"Elizabeth, wait!"
Fingers wrap around her wrist, pull her back.
She stops, and spins to face him—shakes her arm free.
He holds his hands up, palms open, as if to assure her he comes in peace, he means her no harm.
But she's ready for war; the harm's already been done.
"Elizabeth, I'm sorry," he says.
She scowls. "I don't want your apology!"
"Please, can we just talk about this?"
"There's nothing to talk about."
…his lips on her lips, his hands—
Warmth floods her cheeks, burning in the winter air.
"I love you," he says.
Three words.
Eight letters.
Too late.
Her grip on the purse straps tightens; her nails cut half-moons into her palms. "I'm with Andrew," she says.
"That may be." His voice is slow, as casual as a shrug and just as irritating. "But you're not happy."
She snorts. "Oh, so you're a mind reader now?"
He eases a step closer, gaze fixed on hers. "If you were happy with him, you wouldn't have kissed me like that."
…his lips on her lips, his hands on her waist…
Her body draws forward.
How easy it would be…
But no.
She pulls herself back.
Swallows, thickly.
"You had your chance," she says. "And you blew it."
With that, she turns and walks away.
This time he doesn't follow.
And she's glad.
…Or she thinks she's glad.
But step by step her anger fades.
When she reaches the playground across the road from their apartment block, she stops.
Children squeal and dart this way and that in a game of tag; sunlight glistens on snow-dusted woodchips, gleams from the jungle gym's silver frame; Andrew and their daughter, the little girl bundled up in a pink snowsuit, catch sight of her, and they wave.
She smiles at them, as broad as she can, and holds one hand aloft, though her chest aches.
How easy it could have been, if only three words had led to four.
I love you.
I love you, too.
And then, later, four more.
Will you marry me?
But, as she and Henry both know, when there's so much to lose, sometimes the easiest thing to do is to walk away.