Why I came out here, I’m not sure. Maybe it’s because Dean and I’s childhood spot gives me comfort, even after everything came crumbling down again.

It’s cool outside, not yet the nice part of spring where the weather stays mild into the evening. But the last rays of purple sunset are setting, and I’m alone on my bleachers, wrapped in a thick sweater, so I’m okay.

Hours have passed since I left the house, telling my parents I needed to clear my head. They’d looked worried, but hadn’t questioned me. I’d just needed fresh air and silence to think about what my next steps were.

I had enough money now to rent my own place and not starve, so besides getting my residency in New Jersey back, that was the next course of action. I could finish my residency here and then branch out, maybe pick up and move somewhere. I’d never considered that before, and a little flicker of hope lit in my chest. I could start over. Be someone else, somewhere else.

“Kara.”

That voice in the darkness … at first I thought I was hallucinating. But as he moved closer, I made out the tousled dirty blond hair, those electric eyes piercing through the night air. My heart flip-flopped in my chest and I cursed it for being such a traitor. Even after he’d destroyed me so thoroughly, every cell in me knows that he still owns me.

“Get away from me.” I stand to bolt as his first foot hits the bottom bleacher.

“Just let me explain …” He holds his hands up, as if I’m a deer in headlights that’s about to run the wrong way.

“There is nothing further to talk about. We both got what we wanted.” I would not let him see me hurt.

Dean takes two more steps up the bleachers, he’s almost to me, and I can’t move. “Kara, baby, it all got fucked up again. I never … I didn’t want you to leave. Not for one second. You have to believe me.”

I can’t believe my feet won’t move, that I’m standing here listening to this bullshit. “You’re a liar.”

“I love you. I’ve always loved you. Just listen to me. Patrick … I don’t know in God’s name why, but he thought he was protecting me. Thought I wanted you to leave after the charges were dropped. He told you, well I’m not sure exactly how he said it but you must know that he told you I wanted you gone. That I wanted to pay you off to leave and never talk about our contract relationship. Is that right?”

His words made me backtrack, finally hearing him instead of trying to plan an escape route, a way to preserve my heart. “Wait, what?”

“Kara, I didn’t tell him any of that. In fact, I was coming home from Seattle to tell you that I loved you so much, and I wouldn’t go another day without hearing you return those words. I’d planned to trap you in bed for all eternity if that’s what it took. I missed you so much during those four days, that I could barely think when I walked into that conference room. The entire meeting, you having already signed the papers, it completely blindsided me.”

I suck in a breath, my mind scrambling at a mile a minute. “You didn’t want me to leave?”

“No.” Now he’s in front of me, his hands cautiously reaching out, gently forcing me to sit.

“I thought …”

“I know what you thought. And Patrick … I’m going to fucking kill him for it. But it was dead ass wrong.”

Tears clog my throat, but I’m still skeptical and broken, fragile in my heartbreak. “But you signed the papers.”

Dean’s eyes plead with me to believe him as he sits down next to me in our spot. “You did, too. But it doesn’t matter. Fuck the negotiations, the signatures, all of it. It was a stupid move in the first place, when all I really wanted was you. For years, all I’ve thought about is you.”

“How can … I trust this? Dean, we’ve hurt each other so many times.” Finally, I crack, all of the emotions I’ve held inside for the past week clawing their way out of my chest.

“This is me, Kara. You know me. You know us. And you know that everything here is real. We didn’t do this, it was all a big misunderstanding, your leaving.” He points between us, and then tucks the lock of hair that blew in the wind behind my ear.

“Anyways, it doesn’t matter what Patrick thought he was doing, I shouldn’t have let you go in the first place. I thought that by giving you a choice, by begging you not to stay or trying not to influence your decision, that I was being a bigger man. But that was my mistake last time, staying silent. I should have told you all of the ways in which I am completely enamored by you. How you make my soul come alive. Why my life is absolutely nothing without you. I should have said those things, and instead I let you walk out because I was, again, a coward. But I’m done with that. I’m here for you, and I’m not going anywhere.”

Dean pulls out a small velvet box from inside his leather bomber jacket. I grip the metal bleacher, my fingers trying to ground me as my heart lifted as if it were attached to a million colorful balloons.

He didn’t want me to leave. In fact, here he was, fighting for me like he should have done all those years ago. I was a fool for not speaking up, for allowing myself to believe the worst in him yet again, without letting him explain. We’d both made the same mistakes we had seven years ago, but here Dean was, saying it wasn’t too late.

“You left something back in Los Angeles, besides me. And I couldn’t think of a better place to return it, if you still want it.” He laces his fingers through mine, setting the box down in the space between us.

“Kara, my life had become so complicated that I didn’t even know who I was anymore. The last time I remember being sane, being in my own skin, was sitting on these bleachers with you in my arms. After everything happened … my star rose but my heart was broken. I was living a half-life, and it wasn’t whole again until I manipulated you into being with me. When you were under my roof, because a contract had put you there, my heart was finally on fire again. I felt like I could breathe again for the first time in seven years. I know I hurt you, far too many times to count, but Kara … I love you. You’re the only person in my life I’ve ever truly loved, and if I don’t tell you, I’ll regret it for the rest of my days. I know I’ve given you a million reasons not to … but take me back anyway. Because we’re it for each other, and you know it too. Be my fiancée, in the realest way possible. Marry me, complete me?”

Words escape me, and I teeter on the edge of raw bliss and sheer doubt. He’s fighting for us, enough for the both of us. And if he can take the leap over that edge, so can I.

“I love you.” Those three words that have sat in my heart for so long are finally set free, flying over our heads like the most beautiful of birds.

Dean sighs, a noise of relief, as he sinks to one knee on the structure that has held the most important moments of our lives. “That’s not an answer.”

I have to laugh, because as usual his slick charm has won me over. “Yes. The answer is yes.”