Chapter Six.

Chapter Six.

Olivia's POV

By the time the clock hit 7:43 p.m., the office was so quiet I could hear the hum of the espresso machine settling in the breakroom.

The city vibrated below us, glowing, like the world kept going without us—and for once, I didn’t mind being left behind.

My computer screen glowed in front of me, an unreasonable number of tabs open. I was trying to write a recap email of a meeting I had only half absorbed, but my thoughts kept drifting. To deadlines. To missed opportunities. To the way Fabian had looked at me this morning when I had dropped my pen.

He had stared.

Not glared. Not looked.

Stared, like he was reading the lines of a contract he thought he had lost.

I sat back, pinching the bridge of my nose, when I smelled it, basil, warm dough and melted cheese. My stomach growled in disapproval. I had not eaten since noon. I stood slowly, stretching, the kind of stretch that feels like you will lose all sanity the next minute.

The smell was stronger when I opened the glass door into the conference room.

Pizza.

Fabian stood at the head of the long table, sleeves rolled up to his elbows, a pizza box opened like a casual invitation. The scent wrapped around the space like nostalgia.

“You ordered pizza?” I asked, unable to believe my own eyes.

He didn’t look up from the box. Just said, “Extra cheese. Pepper flakes on the side. Just the way you used to like it.”

My breath caught.

It took everything in me not to crumble.

And I swear, in the spot. The room blurred slightly before I blinked hard. I stepped closer slowly, carefully, like the pizza was some sort of booby trap.

He looked up then. Eyes unreadable. Voice quiet.

“Come on, Liv. You’re not really going to make me eat this alone, are you?” he asked, an eyebrow raised.

The sound of my name on his tongue made my knees weak.

I sat.

Not because I had to.

Because I wanted to.

He slid the box towards me and handed me a plate. There were two cans of soda already set out. Mine was the brand I used to steal from his parents' fridge back when I babysat him. 

The memory made me breathless for some unknown reason.

“You really remember” I said. He didn’t smile. Just said, “Of course I did.”

We ate in silence for a few minutes, the kind that was surprisingly comfortable. Every now and then, I caught him watching me like he couldn’t help it. And when he caught me catching him, he didn’t look away.

“You remember those nights?” he asked after a while.

I took a sip of soda. “You mean the nights you insisted on staying up past bedtime and demanded bedtime stories that were just Batman fanfiction?”

I could have sworn I saw a smile touch his lips, but he masked it quickly. “You always had the best stories.”

I stared at my plate. “You were a weird kid.” I said.

He leaned forward, elbows on the table. “And you were the only one who treated me like I wasn’t.”

Something in my chest turned and twisted.

I tried to laugh it off, “I was nineteen. I thought everything was romantic. Even babysitting for rich brats.”

He said nothing.

Then, quietly, “You were my everything back then.”

His words were like an arrow to the chest, hitting me directly.

I looked up, heart thudding. “Fabian...”

His gaze didn’t waver. “You were. You brought me cookies when I had nightmares. You listened. You told me stories until I forgot my house was cold. I remember the smell of your shampoo more clearly than my mother’s voice.”

I swallowed hard, the words sticking in my throat. “That was more than a decade ago.”

He leaned closer. “Maybe. But some things don’t change. Some things just... evolve.”

I tried to find a response. Something rational, or a retort. Something that didn’t involve the way his words made my heart feel like it was going to jump out of my chest any moment.

Instead, I looked down at the pizza.

He added gently, “I didn’t say it to make you uncomfortable. I just thought you should know.”

“Why now?” I asked.

“Because you keep pretending that you’re invisible,” he said. “Like you’re some mess I have to manage. And I need you to understand that to me, you were never a mess. You were the reason I survived that house.”

Silence, then it stretched between us.

For some unknown reason, I could tell he was saying the truth, because I could feel it in my bones.

I looked at him then, like really looked.

The boy was gone.

In his place was a man with gray and black suits and razor sharp edges. But his eyes... they were still that soft green.

Still holding on.

To me.

To something we never got the chance to name.

I pushed the plate away.

“I should get back to work.”

He didn’t stop me. But his voice followed me to the door.

“You can run, Liv. But I’ll still be here.”

My hand shook on the doorknob.

Because a part of me didn’t want to run anymore.

And that terrified me more than anything.

¤¤¤

Later that night, I lay in bed with my laptop open and a halfwritten email on the screen. I couldn’t stop thinking about the words he had said and the way he had said it.

You were my everything back then.

What did it even mean now?

Oh God.

I called Blair.

“You sound like you saw a ghost,” she said.

“Worse,” I whispered. “He ordered pizza. Like, our pizza.”

“Your... babysitting pizza?”

“Extra cheese, pepper flakes, stupid soda I haven’t seen in years. He remembered all of it.”

“And?”

I closed the lid of my laptop. “He told me I was everything to him. Back then.”

“Jesus,” she breathed. “What did you say?”

“Nothing. I froze. What do you say to that?” I asked.

Blair was quiet for a long time.

“You say, ‘I’m sorry I didn’t know.’ Or maybe, ‘I missed you too.’ Unless you didn’t. In which case, maybe you say nothing. But you don’t lie to yourself about how that made you feel.”

I sighed, curling into myself.

“I don’t know what I feel. Everything's twisted and confusing.”

“That sounds about right for your life lately,” she said softly. “But you deserve to feel loved, Olivia. Even if it’s complicated. Especially if it’s complicated.”

With that, we hung up.

I fell asleep with that sentence playing in my head.

I dreamt of lopsided hearts drawn in crayon, pizza crumbs on the floor, and green eyes watching me like I was the only light left in the world.