Army of One

12

Cassidy disagreed with the way Emma had treated Ethan, calling her a hypocrite. After screaming at him two weeks ago at the track for having disregarded her feelings in the past, she should have thought to take his into consideration when "all the man wants is to spend some time with you before he goes away."

Fine, point noted and yes, she felt a bit guilty, but he'd taken her by surprise showing up at her work the way he did. She assumed he'd given up and gone away when she hadn't seen him in two weeks so when he popped up out of the blue, it was a case of her mouth going on auto-pilot; it was the only way she knew how to deal with him.

Oh, she'd certainly done some thinking over the last couple weeks, it couldn't be helped. She could tell Grayson wasn't trying to push her into giving Ethan a chance, all he'd done was provide some missing information to help her better understand the experiences that shaped the man she knew today. And though Ethan's past didn't excuse his behavior, at least now she understood, really understood where he was coming from. Inevitably her mind kept going back over the argument she'd had with him at the track as well. Actually, it wasn't even an argument. He hadn't disagreed with her once, except to say that he never thought of her as a whore or a conquest. Come to think of it, he'd always denied it, or at least tried to at the mall when she accused him but then kept cutting him off.

As for giving him a chance, was she ready for that? Was he truly ready for that? Could she see herself 'with' him? It was difficult to imagine him playing the role of the caring boyfriend but it wasn't like he was incapable, right? Could they get along, could they get past, well, 'the past'? And if they did, this wasn't just his heart on the line, she'd be putting herself out there too, taking just as much of a chance as he was. Was it possible to start over with him, on the right foot this time? Was that what he was trying to do when he came by, talking about going to dinner? Did she want to try and start over?

Knowing what she knew now and remembering the way he looked that day at the track had her irritated with herself. It would be too easy to give into the stray puppy syndrome, the one where she wanted to take him home and make him better. Would it really be so bad to at least try? And if he did wind up being the love of her life and she hadn't given him that chance, could she live with always wondering 'what if'?

There were more questions than answers and truthfully she didn't feel it was fair to make any decisions without hearing him out. To do that would not only require spending time with him but also to give him the benefit of the doubt. But damn he'd made her so nervous this afternoon, showing up like that and acting the way he had. The only typical Ethan-like rude thing he'd done was to ignore her when she said no to dinner. It was unnerving. Him. Acting so, so unlike himself that at the time she'd brushed it off, thinking he couldn't be serious in suggesting they go to dinner... until now.

"Soooooo, care to tell a guy why you're not dressed?"

She was stretched out on her bed in baggy sweats, watching TV with a bowl of popcorn by her side. "What the hell are doing in my room? CASSIDY!?" She sat up straight and looked over at her smiling roommate. She should have known Ethan would be resourceful enough to figure out which room was hers and that Cassidy would let him in.

"Catchya later, Em." She winked at Ethan, grabbed her jacket and left.

She watched him walk over and sit on Cassidy's bed across from hers. Damn he looked good. Underneath his well-fitting black dress jacket she could see he wore faded blue jeans with black converse sneakers, a plain white v-neck t-shirt, really bringing out the bronzed tan in his skin, and his dog tags resting proudly against his chest. Turning back to the television, she tried to get a grip on her nerves. She didn't know how to deal with him and-and... damn he looks good.