“I guess I deserve that,” Luke said. “I said some things that weren’t that nice.”
“That nice?”
“Okay, maybe they were more than just not nice. But you have to remember that I also said you were smart and kind and beautiful…and you are all of those.”
He flashed me a smile. That smile that had always worked so effectively in the past.
“Look, Soph, I know what I did was wrong and that the way I did it, the timing, well, it was even more wrong.”
“And I’d like to make it up to you. I’d like to change that.” He paused and took a deep breath. “I was just thinking…this is hard to say. I’ve been so impressed, so amazed, by all the things you did this summer. Do you think…that maybe you and I could, well…?”
I was almost too stunned to complete his sentence. He couldn’t really mean that, could he?
He shrugged his shoulders and turned the smile up another notch.
“You want us to get back together?” I asked.
In my head I ran through all the things I’d thought about saying to him over the past few months. I thought about the clever “ad-lib” lines I’d practiced. None of them fit, because I hadn’t expected this.
“Well, Sophie, what do you think?” Luke asked.
And then I knew exactly what to say. “I’ve already done this,” I said, gesturing toward him. “I’m going to do something different.”
I turned and walked away to take the first step in my next different.