It took him three more days to get up the nerve to talk to Shauna. Even after he had made the decision, it was several hours before he even knew how to start the conversation. Then, just as he picked up the phone to call, it rang in his hand.

Shauna, read the Caller ID display.

"Well, here we go." He pushed the appropriate button and placed the phone against his ear. "Delko."

"Eric!" she replied, the relief evident in her voice. "Are you okay?"

She's really concerned. "I guess that depends on how you define 'okay'," he hedged. "Physically, yeah, I'm fine. I've just, uh…um…"

"…been having a bad week?" she supplied.

"Yeah, you could say that."

Her voice was soft when she responded. "Anything I can do?"

You made your decision, now stick to it. "Actually, yeah," he told her. "I think we need to talk, but not over the phone. Can you meet me somewhere?"

She checked her watch and estimated the length of time it would take her to finish up with the last football player on her treatment table. "It'll be about an hour before I can get out of work," she gauged, her voice noticeably flatter.

"How about someplace on campus, then?" he asked. "I'll come to you."

Someplace where we can have some privacy, she thought, going over the campus terrain in her mind. "There's Lake Osceola," she suggested.

"Perfect," he agreed. "Meet me by the baseball field?"

"You got it."

She hung up the phone and grabbed the supplies she needed for her patient, wondering what Eric wanted to say to her. Never in the history of the English language has anything good ever followed the words "we need to talk". And he won't do it over the phone…after not calling me for almost a week. It's not going to be good.

ooo

He was waiting for her on the bank of the small lake when she approached, his eyes trained out on the water as though he was deep in thought. Her heart skipped a beat at the sight of him, and she realized just how much she had grown to care about him in such a short amount of time.

I really do hope he's okay, she thought, pausing a moment to watch him. And I hope he's not about to break my heart.

Taking in a deep breath, she resumed her walk toward him. "Hey Eric."

He turned and smiled when he saw her, but noted that she didn't touch him at all when she halted beside him. She was so open with her affection for me before. But then again, I'd be unhappy in her shoes, too. Shaking his head a little to clear it, he inhaled slowly and decided to jump right in. "I owe you an apology."

"Yeah, you do," she replied simply. "This time, you do."

"I screwed up, I know," he acknowledged, turning with her to walk along the shoreline.

"Why didn't you call me back?" she asked, her voice effectively concealing her emotions.

He sighed. "Well, there's the short answer, then there's the long, involved answer," he told her. "Which do you want?"

"Both."

"Alright," he acquiesced. "The short answer is I didn't call you back because I went out to a club last week..." He took in another breath and exhaled slowly as he continued, "And hooked up with another girl."

"Hooked up?" she asked quietly. "As in—"

"—a girl I didn't know, in the parking lot," he finished for her, the embarrassment clear in his downcast eyes.

Shauna let his words sink in. "Oh."

She tried to brush it off, he could see, but her fallen face betrayed the hurt she felt, and the "bad" feeling Eric had tried to describe to Dr. Jamison manifested itself in the pit of his stomach. "I wasn't thinking about you when I did it," he stumbled on.

"Obviously."

"No…I wasn't thinking about anything," he clarified, shifting his gaze back to her. "Not anything that made any sense, anyway. All I could think of was how much better I would feel after I'd been with someone…"

She frowned, meeting his eyes. "I guess I wasn't enough of a twelve-step program for you, then."

"No, no, no, this has nothing to do with you, Shauna," he insisted. "This is all me."

"You've made that pretty clear," she returned coolly.

He pressed his lips together, the "bad" feeling in his stomach growing. "That isn't what I meant," he tried again. "I can't—I don't know how to explain it, but I never meant to hurt you."

She shook her head. "No, it's okay. We never made any promises to each other. You don't owe me anything."

"But you're upset…"

"That's my own fault," she told him. "I got excited when I met you, got my hopes up." Her eyes drifted out over the water. "It just didn't work out."

The pain in her voice at that moment hit him with an intensity he'd never felt before from another person, and he realized just how badly he had hurt her, however unintentionally. He stopped walking and reached out for her, clasping her hand in his. "This is not your fault, it's mine," he stated firmly. "We had a great time at the club, and I really, really liked the softball game and the beach…talking to you on the phone. I…I had such a good time that I think I freaked out…thought we were getting too close…"

She studied him as he spoke, watched him thrash out words for her that he needed to hear himself, and decided not to interrupt. I think he needs to give a full explanation as much as I need to hear it.

"I've never been Mr. Commitment," he persisted. "I'm not the kind of guy that dates just one girl at a time—my friends will all tell you that. But this toothing thing, that's not me either, and they'll tell you that, too. I don't know what's wrong with me…it's like I'm possessed by someone else who doesn't give a damn about anyone."

"You told me at the club that you recently lost a friend," she said, her anger beginning to dissipate as she put the pieces together.

He nodded mutely.

"And this is related to that."

He nodded again, gesturing with his free hand. "This, the toothing, the irritability, the pulling away from people I'm close to, the closing myself off from any sort of bond with another person…yeah. I didn't think so at first—I didn't even know I was doing most of it—but now I'm pretty sure it does."

"And that's why you went looking for a woman," she replied. "Your body, your mind starts to crave contact—"

"—but I was too scared and…and too sad to go to my friends," he finished, noting that she hadn't pulled her hand from his grasp. "And that includes you. We were getting close, and it was great, but then—"

"—you freaked out," she repeated his phrase, nodding in understanding.

He turned to her and took her other hand, squeezing both of them meaningfully. "I never, ever, meant to hurt you," he maintained. "I thought that if I didn't return your calls you'd just forget about me, and then you wouldn't have to find out what I did, or deal with what I've turned into."

"You figured I'd fade into the sunset," she concurred, "and just write you off as a jerk."

His eyes shifted to a spot over her shoulder. "I thought it would be easier that way."

"Was it?"

Her question surprised him. "No," he admitted. "I feel awful. I treated you like you were some self-absorbed club girl that I could just ignore, when you're so much more than that. I…I let you down."

She stepped closer to him, squeezing his hands affectionately in return. "You did let me down when you didn't call me back—I thought you were different from other guys when we met. Then I started to think that I read you all wrong, that you were just looking for a quick good time after all. But this—talking out here by the lake—this tells me I was right the first time."

"You're not angry with me?"

She sighed and waited for his eyes to find hers. "I am angry," she told him. "I'm still angry that you didn't call me back, because that hurt and I was really worried about you. But it makes sense to me now," she added. "I understand why you did it. And I believe you when you say you didn't mean to hurt me."

"Think you can forgive me?" he asked quietly.

She nodded, her mouth curving into a small smile. "Yes." She released one of his hands and reached up to stroke his cheek. "I want you to remember something, too," she requested gently.

"What?"

Her expression softened as her fingertips skimmed across his skin. "That you can talk to me." She lowered her hand and clasped his again, squeezing one more time to emphasize her words. "I know we haven't known each other that long, but if you need someone to talk to you can call me…even in the middle of the night. You don't have to go through this alone."

A lot of people have told me that. He looked down into her blue eyes, searching them for sincerity. What he saw was an unmistakable concern and affection, coupled with an authenticity he had found in few people in his life. Just like Speed. His reply carried that same authenticity in return. "Thanks. I, uh…I might take you up on that."

She slipped her arms around his neck and drew him close in a tender embrace. "Anything I can do to help," she murmured in his ear. "Because I've gotten to be pretty fond of you, you know."

Sliding his arms around her in response, he flew through a range of emotions: relief that she had forgiven him, amazement that she understood him and what he was going through, happiness that she felt about him the way he felt about her, absolute terror that he would hurt her in some way again, strong enough to give their relationship everything he had, and utter contentment at being in her arms. He buried his face in her shoulder and held her tighter, praying he wouldn't let her down again. "I'm pretty fond of you, too."