The ache spread until every part of me tingled with the need to comfort him.
He wouldn’t respond well to a hug, but words could be just as, if not more, powerful.
“Don’t pity me, Stella,” he said, tone dry. “I prefer being alone.”
“Maybe, but there’s a difference between being alone and being alone.” The former was the absence of physical company; the latter was the absence of emotional and interpersonal support.
I liked being alone too, but only in the first sense of the word.
“It’s okay to feel sad,” I added softly. “I promise I won’t tell anyone.”
I didn’t ask how his parents died. I could tell we were already stretching the limits of his willingness to share, and I didn’t want to destroy the fragile intimacy of the moment.
Christian stared at me with an imperceptible expression.
“I’ll keep that in mind,” he finally said, his voice a shade rougher than usual.
I expected him to end the conversation there, but to my surprise, he continued without me prompting him.
“My father was the reason I got into computers. He was a software engineer, and my mother was a school administrator. In many ways, they were the quintessential middle-class American family. We lived in a nice suburban house. I played Little League, and every Friday night, we ordered pizza and played board games.”
I held my breath, so entranced by the rare glimpse into his childhood I was afraid to breathe in case it broke the spell.
“The only thing that didn’t fit into this picture,” Christian said, “was their relationship. My parents loved each other. Madly. Deeply. More than anyone else on the planet.”
Of all the things I’d expected him to say, that didn’t even rank in the top thousand, but I swallowed my questions and let him continue.
“I grew up hearing the crazy tales of their courtship. How my father wrote my mother a letter every day while he was studying abroad and trekked two miles to the post office in the mornings because he didn’t trust the university mailing system. How she ran away from home when her parents threatened to cut her off if she didn’t break up with him because they’d wanted her to marry the son of a wealthy local businessman instead. She eventually made up with my grandparents, but instead of throwing a big wedding, my parents eloped and moved to a little town in Northern California. They had me less than a year later.”
The haze of memories darkened Christian’s eyes. “They settled into what outsiders might consider an ordinary life, but they never lost that fire for each other even after I was born.”
Most people dreamed of the kind of love his parents had, but he spoke about it like it’d been a curse, not a blessing.
“Yet you don’t believe in love,” I said.
How was that possible? Most people’s cynicism toward love came from seeing it stripped down to the barest skeleton of what it once was. Ugly divorces, broken promises, tearful fights. But it sounded like his parents had been a shining example of what it could be.
“No.” The caustic cut of Christian’s smile across his face raised goosebumps on my arms. “Because what my parents had wasn’t love. It was ego and destruction disguised as affection. A drug they kept chasing because it gave them a high they couldn’t get anywhere else. It clouded their judgment to the detriment of themselves and everyone around them, and it gave them cover to do all these irrational things because no one questioned them if it was for love.”
He leaned back, his face hard. “It wasn’t just my parents. Look at the world around us. People kill, steal, and lie in the name of this abstract emotion we’re told is supposed to be our ultimate goal. Love conquers all. Love heals all. Etcetera, etcetera.” The curl of his lip told me how much respect he had for such platitudes. “Alex gave up a multibillion-dollar company. Bridget almost lost a country. And Rhys gave up his privacy, which mattered more to him than any amount of cash. It’s completely illogical.”
“Alex got his company back,” I pointed out. “Bridget made it work, and Rhys didn’t give up all his privacy. Sometimes, sacrifices are necessary for happiness.”
“Why?”
I blinked, so startled by the bluntness of his question that it took me a minute to respond.
“Because it’s the way the world works,” I finally said. “We can’t have everything we want without making some compromises. If humans were robots, I’d agree with your assessment, but we’re not. We have feelings, and if it weren’t for love, the human race wouldn’t survive. Procreation, protection, motivation. It all hinges on that one emotion.”
It was the least romantic and therefore the most effective answer I could’ve given.
“Perhaps.” Christian’s shrug expressed the depth of his skepticism more than words could. “But there’s a second issue, which is that people use love so often it’s lost all meaning. They love their dogs, cars, happy hours, and their friend’s new haircut. They say love is this grand, wonderful thing when it’s the opposite. It’s useless at best and dangerous at worst.”
“There are different types of love. The way I love fashion is different from the way I love my friends.”
“Varying degrees of the same disease.” Dark amusement filled his face when I winced at the word disease. “Is this where you’ll try to change my mind? Convince me that love does, in fact, make the world go around?”
“No,” I said truthfully. “You’ve already made up your mind. Nothing I say will change it. The only way you’ll change your mind is through experience, not words.”
Surprise coasted through his eyes before it submerged beneath something heavier, more slumberous.
“And do you think that will happen?” His low drawl condensed the air between us. “That I’ll fall in love and eat my words?”
I shrugged, the casual movement at odds with the rapid beats of my heart. “Maybe. I’m not a fortune teller.”
Secretly, I hoped he would. Not because I had delusions of being the one who could quote-unquote change him, but because everyone deserved to experience true love at least once in their lifetime.
“One of the clauses in our contract,” Christian said, watching me with those all-knowing eyes, “is that I don’t fall in love with you.”
My mouth dried. “Yes.”
“Why did you put in that condition, Stella?”
“Because I don’t want you to fall in love with me.”
He didn’t smile at my quick quip. A long silence passed before he spoke again.
“You and I, we aren’t so different,” he said softly.
A spark ignited and burned up all the oxygen between us. The sound of my pulse faded into a distant whoosh.
Say something, Stella.