Ashes Of You And I (Completed) | ✔️

- 25: I won't touch you -

"Is that the question?" I raised my eyebrows in amusement, trying to lighten the mood again.

"Oh no!" He suddenly turned to sit, facing me on the mat, making me raise my eyebrows in surprise. "Okay so... I- uh... we were supposed to meet under the blossom tree on Christmas Eve, remember?"

I gulped, before nodding slowly, avoiding looking in his eyes.

I'm sure he noticed the sudden hesitation in my demeanor and I felt a warm hand over mine as his thumb rubbed my knuckles in a soothing motion.

"Trust me when I say, I feel really weird asking this, but" he stopped to look down at our hands and then back at me. "It's important to me. Why didn't you come?"

Out of every mess that was created back then, I didn't think much about this one and I think that was one of the biggest mistakes I made.

I never knew how important that meeting was to him but I almost forgot about it under all the depression I drowned in, back then.

"I did." I said, finally looking at him. "I was late, but I did go there, at the blossom tree, and you weren't there."

"I waited for hours." He sighed as a sad smile took over his face.

"I know, I figured, by the way you reacted after that." I said, with a sad smile of my own.

My smile dropped before I looked up at Ryder. "Even though this is no excuse to keep you hanging, and it happened years ago, I think you should know that... I never intended to hurt you."

I covered his hand on mine with my other hand. "I was... in uh... I was in an accident and I cou-"

"In a what?!" He exclaimed with his eyes wide in panic, making me freeze.

I shook my head. "It was a small one and I didn't have any major injuries but well, I couldn't get to you in time."

I looked up at him with a guilty smile, while his jaw was on the floor.

I frowned as he didn't move for a good minute. "Are you-"

I was cut off with arms going around my waist and being thrown into a warm but hard body.

"Oh God, I'm so sorry." He breathed out into my hair while my face was tucked in his neck.

He held me so tight that it was almost hard to breathe as he kept repeating apologies.

"Ryder-" I was cut off again when he suddenly pulled back, just enough to look at my face.

"Wait, so that means" his troubled gaze switched between my orbs. "when you did come to me, you..."

I looked away, biting my lip.

"You were hurt." He breathed out as his grip loosened on my shoulders.

His shoulders sagged as he dropped his head in his hands.

"Hey." I said soothingly.

I had this sudden urge to comfort him, even though I've spent years hating him for whatever happened that day.

I guess, being here in front of him made me remember what kind of a person he really is and that he didn't have anything to do with whatever went wrong.

In fact, he has no idea why things are the way they are, why I left and why I am the way I am now.

"Ryder, listen to me." I used my hands to cup his face and bring it up from his hands, to look at me. "It happened a long time ago. You didn't know..."

"Because I didn't want to know." He winced, as if the memory physically hurt him.

"And I've tried hating you for that, too." I said, tilting my head to the side, with a small smile, making him look up. "But I couldn't."