He motions towards the couch. "I was glad you called." He smiles thinly.
I don't reciprocate. I don't want to leave here without some solid answers. I'm tired of him pushing the truth aside. I want to know his true intentions. "I just need some clarification," I whisper dryly. "It's all been a lot for me to absorb."
He nods. I expect him to sit down next to me but he doesn't. My eyes follow him as he moves towards a desk and pulls a large book from it. As he nears the couch I realize it's a leather bound photo album.
"Hunter," I say his name not knowing what to say next. He must sense my trepidation. He has to know this is hard for me.
"Let me talk." His tone is reassuring and gentle. "I've been an asshole. I've handled all of this in the worst possible way."
I smile slightly at his words. He's right. He has been an asshole. He has been lying to me since we met.
He sits down next to me. I don't move when I feel his thigh resting against mine. I vowed that I wouldn't get too close to him but I don't want to recoil and risk losing his vulnerability. I feel as though he's ready to finally confess to me what's really going on.
He opens the photo album slowly and I'm greeted with the vibrant face of
a young redheaded girl. It's Coral. She can't be more than six or seven-years-old in the photograph.
"Coral's mother gave me this after she died." His hands are trembling as he speaks. "I don't look at it anymore. I keep it close to remember her though."
I watch in silence as he turns the page and my breath catches. There beneath the hazy page protector is the letter. The letter I'd written to my donor family so many years ago. I hesitantly reach for the album. "May I see?"
He hands it to me and I rest it in my lap. I pull my head down to study the paper. The handwriting is so clean and perfect. I remember sitting at the desk in my room for hours working with tireless care to get it to look flawless. I must have rewritten it more than fifty times. I start to read the words and my emotions flood to the surface. I watch as a single tear falls onto the page. Before I can wipe it away, Hunter's large hand scoops it up.
"Her mom gave me the letter." He pulls the album back so it's resting on his knees. "I cherish that letter."
My gaze moves to his face. His eyes are moist too. It's the most exposed I've ever seen him. "I wrote it so long ago," I whisper.
"I didn't know I'd feel what I feel for you." He snaps the book shut sharply. "It's not about Coral."
I glare at the book. I want to see more. I want to know more about her. I need to know who she was. What her life was like.
"It is about her." I sigh heavily. "You wouldn't have come to look for me if I didn't have her heart."
"That part is true." He acknowledges with a quick nod. "Everything else is about you. What I feel now has nothing to do with Coral."
"What do you feel?" I snap. "I need to know."
"Like you're my destiny."
Chapter 6
They're the words that fairy tales are made of. I'm his destiny. He said it. I heard it leave his lips. I see it in his eyes.
"I can't explain it." He reaches to cover my hand with his. "I've never felt like this before."
"You did with Coral," I shoot back. I know that he must have loved her. If he didn't, he wouldn’t be cradling that book of memories so carefully in his lap.
"Coral was great." His face brightens as he says her name. "We were kids though. It was a crush."
"I think it was more than that," I counter. "She's obviously still a big part of your life." I nod towards the album.
He reaches forward to place it on the coffee table. "It's very complicated."
"Explain it." I challenge.
"We were in a lot of the same classes at school." He lifts his head to look directly at me. "She had this mess of red hair. She was cocky and brutally honest and I was a teenage boy."
I smile at the thought of Hunter as a teenager. I wonder if he was as beautifully reckless then as he is now. If he took what he wanted with the same virile force that he does today.