Ximena smiled at his question. He had always been so attentive to her interests and goals. Back when they used to date, she felt like she'd go hours speaking and would often apologize for it just for him to smile at her, tell her that he loved listening to her speak. It was a simple gesture, a simple affection that always melted Ximena's heart. She smiled fondly at the memory before the guilt began to settle once again. She tried to brush it off and stay on topic.
"It's a rendition of the scarlet letter. I'm trying to---" Ximena stopped and instead let out a small sigh. The guilt began to gwan at her once again. He should be upset, furious, questioning why she even came back. He shouldn't be offering to fix her car and listening to her speak. She did not deserve that. Her eyes fell down to her hands as they fidget with the corner of her book. She shook her head, visibly stressed and a little disappointed before she turned to look up at him once again.
"Ben, I'm so sorry... I never wanted to leave you..."
Ben kept driving the car and could tell that she maybe didn't want to talk about the little things, to fill in the silence. When she paused he let her just have the silence she needed for a few seconds. Though it felt like a lifetime.
He missed her, every single day. And part of him wished he had moved on by now, that he had found someone else and that this wasn't stabbing him in the heart right now. Ben shook his head as she started to apologise. He had gone over their break up multiple times, and each time he wished he had done more to make her stay, or to find a way to go with her.
"You don't have to be sorry." He insisted, keeping his eyes on the road for the time being. "You did what you had to do, I couldn't keep you here and that's okay. You deserve to go and chase your dreams, I just wish -- I just felt as though I could go with you. Not yet. You deserve someone who can do that, who can be by your side."
Ximena tried so hard to keep her tears from falling. She crumbled the corner of her book from how hard she was resisting. She hated how kind and soft spoken he was. She hated that their love for one another was still there. It made this all the more difficult to let go. Ximena had tried to date and tried to move on, but it was extremely difficult when Ben had set her standards so high. She eventually stopped looking for companionship when she realized that all she was doing was looking for Ben in another person.
It all just came crumbling down on her. All the stress, the auditions that led to nowhere, the fact that she was all alone, and more so now that Ben had just admitted that he had to let her go pursue her dreams. She shook her head and wiped one tear that rolled down her cheek. Her voice was soft and almost breaking. Her eyes were still stuck on the curled corner of her book.
"I don't want or deserve anyone else. I want you, Ben."
Silence. It went silent for a while, or maybe it just felt like forever for Ximena to hear his reply. Ben had always been her anchor. Which made her confession even harder because despite how much she loved him, she knew she had hurt him when she decided to leave. Even if he said it was okay, Ximena would never forgive herself for hurting him.
