I lingered near the entrance, waiting for Mark to show up. A couple of minutes later, the elevator doors opened, and he walked into the lobby.
I stood there, watching as he scanned the lobby, trying to figure out who had paged him. He didn't look much different from the last time I'd seen him. He'd put on a few pounds, probably because he wasn't involved with sports anymore after graduating college. He had a touch of maturity about him that I didn't recognize. Though I supposed that if I looked back at myself from four years ago, I would have seen the same changes in how I looked.
His eyes roamed the room until they finally fell on me. He looked past me for a moment, almost not registering that it was me, probably because I was the last person he expected to see. When his gaze focused on me, he immediately frowned.
Mark stalked across the room towards me, his fists clenched at his sides. He stopped a few feet from me. “Cam, what are you doing here?”
“I came to see you,” I said. “How’ve you been? It’s been a long time.”
“What the fuck, dude,” Mark said. “How did you even know I was here? What are you doing here? You can’t just drop by after four years like everything is all right.”
I held my palms out to ward off Mark’s retorts. I knew he was right, but I was trying to stop an argument. The last thing I wanted was to fight with the guy who used to be my best friend.
“Look, can we just talk? I know this is out of the blue, but I need to talk to you. It’s important.”
Mark rolled his eyes. He glanced around the room at the other guests in the lobby. A few of them were starting to stare. “Fine,” he said, turning back to me. “But not here.”
We walked outside, moving across the parking lot. We stood on a little patch of grass between the hotel’s parking lot and the restaurant next door. Mark glared at me like he wanted to bite my head off.
“So what is it?” he asked. “What do you want? Hell, dude, I can’t believe you tracked me down at my fucking hotel.”
“I know, I know.” I held up a hand to try to calm him down. “Just let me explain.”
“So explain, then.”
I took a deep breath. “It’s about Ami.”
Mark’s expression darkened. He raised a hand, balling a fist. For a moment, I thought he might hit me. “Cameron, you stay the hell away from my sister.”
“It’s not like that, Mark.” I took a step back. I wasn’t afraid of Mark--we’d tussled a bit as teenagers, and I knew I could take him in a fight if it came to that--but I didn’t want this to end in blows. Beating up Ami’s brother wouldn’t solve anything.
“God, I can’t believe you.” Mark threw his hands up in the air. “Didn’t you hurt my sister enough already? After what you did to her? You didn’t see how much she cried, Cam. You didn’t see how broken up she was.”
I hung my head. I knew Mark had a point. But at the same time, he didn’t have the full picture. “That’s not fair, Mark. I tried to talk to Ami. You wouldn’t let me.”
“Because I was protecting her from you!” He shoved me back, slamming his palms against my chest. I stumbled back a few steps before regaining my balance. “I was keeping her from having her heart broken all over again.”
I made a fist, then forced myself to relax. It was hard to stand there and be attacked like this without striking back, but I had to keep my cool. “It wasn’t like that, Mark. Ami told me, she missed me. We wanted to be together. I’m not taking advantage of her.”
“You don’t--” Mark paused, his face scrunching up. “Wait, what are you talking about? You mean that night in college, right?”
“No,” I said, looking him in the eye. “I’m talking about now.”
Mark advanced on me again, his face turning red. “Now? What have you done, Cam? Did you do something to my sister?”
“No, nothing. Mark, calm down!” I put a hand on his shoulder, trying to get him to settle down.
He smacked my hand away. “If you hurt Ami, Cam, I swear to God…”
“Ami is fine, Mark. She just wasn’t sure how to talk to you about it, so I thought I could.”
“What do you mean?” Mark asked. “What did you do to my sister?”
“I didn’t ‘do’ anything to her. We’re together now, like we were always meant to be.”
“Together?” Mark shook his head, almost laughing, no doubt incredulous over what I was saying. “What do you mean, ‘together’?”
“We’re living together. She just moved in.”
“And how the fuck did that happen?”