Chapter 15:
"Mel..." Taylor's voice was but a whisper as he gaped at her in utter disbelief. "What are you doing here?"
His eyes washed over his ex-wife before he could stop himself. There was something about her that would always appeal to him, no matter how long or for whatever reasons they were apart. Her blue eyes shimmered in the sunlight filtering through the trees and her long, brown hair cascaded down her back in waves, shorter tendrils curling around her face. Her striking beauty was impossible to ignore, yet he noticed that his heart didn't melt at the mere sight of her as it once had. That realization would have depressed him mere weeks ago, but at that moment it brought him a great amount of comfort.
"Hello to you, too," she said, her smile warm but sad.
Taylor blushed instantly at his awkward and abrupt greeting.
"I'm sorry. I just didn't expect to see you here. I..." he trailed off, suddenly aware that Alexa, Chelsea, and Carley had their eyes glued to the surprising scene unfolding right in front of them.
"I'll be right back," he said to the group of girls seated on the bench.
Alexa nodded with a small smile and a knowing, yet strangely protective look in her eyes. As he drew Melanie toward a more secluded area of the park to talk, he felt a subtle pang of guilt for not making any introductions. But he was too frazzled and surprised to think properly, and he hoped that they wouldn't hold it against him.
"I hope I didn't interrupt anything," Melanie said, once they found a bench in the shade and sat down side-by-side.
"No, you didn't," Taylor reassured her, although as Alexa's smiling face popped into his mind he thought to himself that really, she had. He leaned his elbows on his knees and let his fingers drift across the faded wood on the bench as the knot of confused emotions inside of him struggled to untangle itself.
"You look really good, Tay," she said softly, reaching out to move a strand of hair from his eyes.
Surprised by the gesture, he glanced up at her and saw a look of pure tenderness on her face. It was a look that he hadn't seen in quite some time. They'd fought so much in the recent past and had built such solid walls around themselves for protection against the pain that Taylor no longer believed they were capable of being civil toward each other, let alone friendly. For once, he was glad to have been proven wrong.
"So do you," he replied.
"I mean it," she continued, her hand falling to her lap and fiddling absently with her ring-less finger. He smiled; he often fell prey to that same nervous habit. "No offense, but you were an absolute wreck before you left, like you were on the verge of completely falling apart. And that scared me so much, even though I was too stubborn to show it. I was so worried about you - we were all so worried. I didn't want you to hurt yourself or do anything stup--"
"Mel," he interrupted her by putting a finger to her lips, effectively stopping her mid-sentence. "I know it was pretty stupid of me to run away from everything, and I appreciate your concern, I really do, but I'm fine. I promise. I just needed to get away for awhile."
She nodded, his words seeming to calm her down slightly, although the troubled look lingered in her eyes. "I just hate that you're suffering, and I hate knowing that I'm the cause of it. I know things didn't work out the way we wanted them to, but I care about you so much, Tay. Always have, always will."
He closed his eyes as her honest words washed over him, cleansing him. He felt tears edging their way into his line of vision, and despite his best attempts to blink them out of existence, a few managed to escape anyway. Embarrassed, he chuckled softly while she watched him wipe them away.
"You know I'll always care about you, too," he said.
"I do know that," she whispered in a slightly broken voice, and only then did he notice that her cheeks were wet with tears as well.
"C'mere." Taylor wrapped his arms around her, rubbing circles on her back, and they stayed in the embrace for as long as they both needed to.
"We must look like quite the pathetic pair right now," she murmured into his shoulder.
"Yeah, we probably do," he agreed, finally pulling away from her and leaning back against the bench. Casting his eyes skyward, he discovered that the sadness in his chest had been replaced by a foreign yet welcome sense of peace.
"How did you know to find me here?" he asked through the comfortable silence that had lapsed between them. "Did Ike put you up to this?"
"No," she said, a trace of guilt in her voice as she laughed before correcting herself. "Well, Isaac told me that you were in New York. He couldn't help giving me his two cents, of course, but that's not why I decided to come. You probably remember that I have relatives in the city, so I flew out here to stay with my aunt for a week. I thought it might help me clear my own head. I didn't want to call you and seem like I was trying to hunt you down - I figured you've been dealing with more than enough of that lately. But I won't lie and say I wasn't hoping to bump into you. Funny how I found you here in Central Park, of all places."
"Well, I'm glad you did," he said truthfully.
"Have you thought about coming home?" she asked, her voice gentle.
Taylor tugged his fingers through his hair with a sigh. There it was again - that inevitable question that he had no clue how to answer. Of course he had thought about coming home, but he wasn't ready to leave New York yet. He doubted that anyone would understand that, though; not even Melanie, who was the only person who might be able to actually relate to what he was going through.
"I really don't know where home is anymore," he admitted. "But I know I can't stay here forever. I don't want my absence to ruin an amazing career that we've worked so hard to build. I just...I think I need some more time."
Melanie nodded, the distance in her eyes indicating that she was only half-listening, her thoughts somewhere else. "Is that girl I saw you with earlier - is she your...?"
"No," Taylor replied, not wanting to make her say the word that she was clearly struggling with. "Alexa is just a friend. She's actually Mason's girlfriend, if you can believe it. They've been kind enough to let me crash at their apartment this whole time."
"Mason?" she squeaked, her eyebrows raised in shock. "As in your ex-girlfriend?"
"The one and only," he said, smiling because Melanie's bewildered reaction to the news had so closely mirrored his own.
"Wow, I didn't see that coming. This day has just been full of surprises," she said, shaking her head as the tension on her face dissolved into relief. "I should probably go now, though. I'm supposed to meet my aunt for lunch..." She pulled her phone from her purse and frowned at the digital clock on the screen. "...a half-hour ago. Shit."
Taylor laughed. "If she gives you any trouble for being late, feel free to blame me."
"I just might do that." She ruffled his hair before leaning in for another hug, the embrace more abbreviated than their last one, but no less sweet. "Goodbye, Taylor," she said as her fingers brushed against his cheek. "Please take care of yourself."
"Goodbye, Melanie," he whispered back, closing his eyes to block out the possibility of any more tears.
When he opened them, she was already walking away from him, and before he knew it, she had disappeared, lost inside of the busy crowd of strangers.
"Who was that pretty lady?" He focused on the source of the familiar voice and saw Chelsea's young, eager face gazing up at him with wide, unblinking eyes.
"Just someone I used to know..." he said with a wistful smile.
"Oh." She frowned and chewed on her lip, appearing to ponder his answer for several moments before she gave up and grabbed his hand. "Want to play hide-and-seek with me and Carley?"
"I'd love to," he said, letting her pull him off of the bench as she ran off to find her sister.