“I do already. I mean, it’s not New York, but it is a beautiful city,” he smiled. The way the conversation sounded would had been normal to anyone overhearing it. Just simply two acquaintances doing a small catch up. To Derek though it couldn’t have felt more off. It wasn’t just the fact of her choosing to ghost him that left him with this dissatisfied feeling it was that him and Layla never talked like this. The freedom he found in his texts and phone calls with her was unlike any other. In the world he lived in filled with conversations being held for reasons of reputation or obligation, when he talked to her everything shallow fell away. He never felt that before, never once with his wife, and not since Layla. Derek was far from being the romantic as the life he had been given didn’t allow for it, but when he talked to Layla that first night, even though just a few silly texts was all it was, he felt this connection that he never experienced before. Standing in front of her now it was there though faint. “This is you,” he repeated almost like he was taking her in for the first time, and in a way he was. Her apology almost stung as she used the busy excuse, a knowing lie to them both. “It happens. Besides you don’t owe me an explanation.” And she didn’t even if he may have wanted it. “I’m doing okay. Work is good. Some go my way, some don’t, but that’s just how it goes.”
Layla forced herself to bit down on the inside of her cheek as if it helped her keep her emotions in check. “I bet nothing compares to New York.” The city was synonymous with Derek, something electric that she barely got a glimpse of but always out of reach. Mostly from her own doing but she had to admit that the bubble that they had created for themselves was popped when she found out about his wife. Maybe if she hadn’t done that, they would have gotten closer and ended it later would have hurt more. It was bearable pain now, something that she could deal with but with each word, it ached more. Her fingers played with the retractable string that attached her scrubs to her ID badge as she looked away from him once again. “I-” She stopped herself, not knowing exactly what to say. Part of her wanted to know how long he tried for and what was the reason he stopped. Did his wife find out? Did he just give up or did he finally realize that they were two very different people? But even now, after ghosting him for so long he was still managing to give her a way out. To make her feel less guilty than she already did. “So are you out here for good or are you still just going back and forth?” She had to prepare herself if this was going to be a daily thing and if she needed to avoid it or not.
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