She still had no clue. She came out of her bedroom in a tiny tank top, no bra, nipples threatening to spear a hole through the thin fabric. Her tattered jeans hung low, leaving a wide slash of stomach and hip exposed. And her hair pulled off her face left her creamy, elegant neck bare, begging to be bitten and sucked. Hell, all of her begged to be bitten and sucked. Or maybe that was me doing the begging.

I took a deep breath and tried to lighten up. Our reunion was only four hours old. My feelings for Anna were powerful, but we had time now, a luxury we'd never had before. We were both settled, and like I said before, I wasn’t going anywhere. No need to rush this.

“So, I know you’re a hairstylist. Tell me something else,” I said.

She slowly chewed her pancake, humming as she thought. “I’ve been taking guitar lessons at the music shop up the street.”

I raised my eyebrows. “No shit? How’s that going?”

She flicked her fork in the air dismissively. “Oh, I’m terrible at it. But it’s fun. As much as I like going to shows and listening to music, I have no discernible talent of my own. But my teacher’s this old guy who toured with the Stones in the sixties as a roadie. He’s so rad.”

“You know you’re going to have to play for me, right?”

She giggled. “As long as you remember that I warned you when your ears start bleeding.” She pushed her plate away, her pancakes demolished, and laid a hand on her stomach. “How could I have been so hungry five minutes ago and now I’m ready to explode?”

“That’s what happens when you eat three pancakes in five minutes!”

She narrowed her eyes. “That sounded very judgy.”

I threw my head back and laughed. “No judgments! Just sayin’...”

She leaned forward and stabbed a piece of my pancake with her fork, then shoved it in her mouth, one eyebrow raised in challenge. I just shook my head and smiled though. It made me too damn happy, sitting on her balcony, watching her stuff herself with the pancakes I’d made for her.

She tossed her fork on her plate with a clatter. “Hey!”

I cocked my head. “Yeah?”

“Do you not do social media at all?”

“I do. But only for my business. Anyone I want to talk to, I have their numbers. I don’t need to see the kids of people from high school or hear about their night at ‘da club.’ Not interested.”

She smoothed her hand over the top of her hair and nodded once. “I did try to find you.”

“I tried to find you too, Annie.”

And I had. Every six months or so I’d search for her name on Facebook or Instagram, never finding her.

“I’m on Insta, but same as you, it’s just my professional stuff. And I keep it locked down tight, so you wouldn’t find me because my name isn’t on there.”

I breathed out a long, ragged breath. “I can’t believe we were both trying to find each other all this time.”

She bit her lip. “Well, I didn’t try as hard as I could have. I was scared you wouldn’t want anything to do with me if I did find you.”

I shook my head. “We really made a mess of things. Damn, Annie, you were my best friend. How’d we get here?”

“You remember how miserable I was back then. And I only let you see a fraction of it. I know most teenagers feel like they don’t have a place in the world, but at the time, I thought I’d never find mine.”

“You would’ve always had me. No matter what. We had plans.”

She stacked our plates together, not meeting my eyes. “And I changed them without telling you. Everything that happened was because I was a coward.”

“I was so in love with you.” My words came out quiet, gruff.

Her eyes shot up to mine. “And I trashed it. I know, Will. I’m sorry.”

Before I could speak, she stood and carried our plates inside. I sat for a moment in the dark of her balcony, trying to catch my breath. The pain I saw in her eyes had knocked it out of me. We’d gone from laughing to the nitty-gritty so fast I hadn’t been able to steel myself for it.

We’d wounded each other back then. She couldn’t love me the way I’d wanted her to, so I’d defended myself with silence. Years and years of silence. I'd turned away from her at probably the worst time in her life.

But we were both older now. I’d gotten a helluva lot stronger and she’d let herself be a helluva lot softer. Maybe this time we could heal those old wounds.

I went inside and Anna was standing at the sink in her postage stamp-sized kitchen, scrubbing our plates. She turned the water off when she saw me, then dried her hands with a towel.

“I’m going to run out to my car and grab my gym bag so I can change. I’m kinda tired of being in this suit,” I said.

Her eyebrows pinched together and she looked more vulnerable than I’d ever seen her. “You’re not leaving?”

I raked my hand through my hair. “Not unless you want me to.”

She shook her head. “I definitely don’t want you to.”

I met her eyes, making sure she really listened to what I said. “I’m not going anywhere, Annie. We have a lot of unfinished business. I’ll be right back, okay?”

She nodded, a small smile curving up the corner of her lips. “Okay. I’ll be here.”