“I’m sorry. I’m going to leave. I was going to leave before y—”

“Stop,” he said angrily. “Stop. Just stop, okay? I’ve been trying to let this go, I’ve been trying not to push you to explain yourself, but I can’t take it anymore. I can’t. You have to tell me what’s happening, Shadi, because you’re starting to scare the shit out of me. Every single time I see you lately you’re crying or injured or completely out of your mind and I ca—”

“I’ve never been out of my mind.”

His eyebrows flew up. “You ran into the middle of a car accident! Tried to pull someone out of a damaged vehicle!”

“Oh.” I’d forgotten about that.

“Yeah. Did you forget?” He smiled, but his eyes were angry. “Did you also forget when you nearly broke your skull? Is that why you never mentioned it again? You got that phone call about your mom and I drove you to the hospital and I didn’t even ask you to explain—but I did think that, maybe, considering the fact that I had to get four stitches in my arm after catching your head on the pavement—”

“You had to get stitches? I didn’t—”

“Yes, I had to get stitches, and I lied for you, lied to my parents and told them I’d ripped my arm open playing soccer because I didn’t think you wanted people to know what was happening, but I thought you might at least tell me why your mom was in the hospital or why you fainted, but you never did, and still I let it go, told myself it was none of my business. And then, the next day, after you’re done pretending to be a paramedic—”

“Ali—I’m sorry, I’m so sorry about your arm—”

“—you tell me everything is great, that your mom is waiting for you at home, and I knew you were lying—I knew it, I could just tell, it was written all over your face—but I told myself to let it go, told myself not to pry—”

“Ali. Please.”

“And then,” he said, breathing hard, dragging both hands down his face. “And then, God, and then—last night. Fucking last night, Shadi.”

“Ali—”

“Stop saying my name like that. Don’t—”

“Ali—”

“You’re killing me,” he said, his voice breaking. “What is happening? What are you doing to me? I used to have a life, I swear, three days ago I had a good life, Shadi, I’d moved on, I’d finally moved on after you tore my heart out of my fucking chest and now, now I’m— I don’t know what I am.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Stop,” he said desperately. “Stop saying you’re sorry. Stop standing there looking at me like that. I can’t take it, okay? I can’t—”

“Ali, just let me say something— I just want t—”

The words died in my throat.

He’d walked away without warning, sat down heavily on Zahra’s bed. “Please,” he said, gesturing at me. “By all means, say something. For the love of God, say something.”

I stared at him then, lost my nerve. Words jammed in my chest, inside my mouth. My excuses vanished, the day’s events momentarily forgotten. I studied the tension in his shoulders; caught the tremble in his fingers before he curled them into fists.

I looked into his dark eyes and thought only one thing.

“I’m sorry.”

“Jesus.” He dropped his head in his hands. “Why do you keep apologizing?”

“Because,” I said. “Because I never did.”

Ali’s head lifted slowly, his spine straightened slowly. He unfurled before my eyes, turning toward me not unlike a bloom in search of the sun.

“I never wanted to hurt you,” I whispered. “I’m so sorry I hurt you.”

He went deathly still.

He stared at me now with a strange terror, stared at me like I might be about to kill him. “What are you talking about?”

“Us,” I said. “You.” I shook my head, felt close to tears. “I thought I was doing the right thing. I need you to know I thought I was doing the right thing. But I was sorry the moment I said it. I’ve been sorry every day since.”

Ali got to his feet.

He became larger than life then, tall and stunning and real and he walked right up to me, was now standing right in front of me and I stepped back, felt my shoulders nudge open Zahra’s bathroom door.

Ali was breathing hard. “What does that mean?”

I looked up at him, felt my world collapse.

We were now standing in Zahra’s bathroom—we were standing in Zahra’s bathroom—and there wasn’t enough space between our bodies to lift a finger. My head was filling with steam, my thoughts evaporating.

“Ali, I don’t— You’re too close. I can’t talk to you when you’re this close to me. I can’t even breathe when y—”

I gasped when he leaned in, pressed his forehead to mine. His hands were at my waist now, reeling me in, and I sank against his body with a sound, a kind of surrender.

He said nothing for what seemed like an eternity.

I listened to our hearts race, felt my skin heat. I felt desperate for something I could not articulate, for a need I could not fathom. We were standing this close and still light-years from where I wanted to be.

Ali closed his eyes.

My hands were on his chest. They’d landed there and I’d left them there and I loved the feel of him, his heat, this racing heartbeat under my hands that proved he was real, that this moment was real. Slowly, I dragged my hands down his chest, down the hard lines of his torso. I heard his sharp intake of breath, felt a tremor move through him, through me.

We both went suddenly still.

I was staring at his throat, the soft line of his neck, the hint of his collarbone. I watched him swallow. His hands tightened around my waist.

I looked up.

He said nothing but my name before he kissed me.

It was heat, a blistering sun, a pleasure so potent it felt closer to pain. I didn’t know how but my back was suddenly against a wall, my bones trembling under the weight of him, his body pressed so hard against mine I thought it might leave an impression. He touched me desperately, dragged his hands up my body, braced my face as he broke me open. His lips were so soft against mine, against my cheeks, the tender skin beneath my jaw. I tried to hold on—pushing myself up on tiptoe, twining my arms around his neck—but he froze, suddenly, when my body moved against his, our jagged edges catching, tectonic plates striking. He stilled and seemed to stop breathing, our bodies fusing together.

Tentatively, I pushed my fingers through his hair. He thawed by degrees, his eyes closing, his breathing ragged as I drew my hands away from his head, trailed my fingers down his neck, pressed closer. Gently, I kissed the column of his throat, tasting salt and heat over and over until he made a sound, something desperate, something that shot pleasure through my body even as he tore away, took a step back. He dropped his face into trembling hands, let them fall to his sides. He looked into my eyes with a depth of emotion that nearly split me in half.

I felt like I might sink into the ground.

Two sharp knocks at Zahra’s door and I straightened, we both stiffened. The real world came hurtling back into focus with stunning, sobering speed and I didn’t even think, I just ran past him, closed the bathroom door behind me, locked him inside.