CHAPTER149
“What was?” My head snaps back around by his random declaration.
“When I was sixteen, when you asked me about the girl I loved.” He stares at the floor and not at me, his hands flat on the couch. I’ve nothing to say, no words filter through my brain. I just gawk at him as he frowns back at me. I’m stilled by the shock and the heavy thud inside my chest, nausea swirling back up violently as each syllable registers, and I absorb the confession. I think my heart gives out completely.
I don’t want it to be her, anyone else, just not her. Why did it have to be her? Was that some female intuition all along inside of me screaming that she has meant more to him?
“I was with her for a year; I was mad about her.” He sounds like he doesn’t believe it himself, a dryness to his tone. I don’t want to hear this. I can’t bear it.
“What happened?” I croak.
Mouth? Were you not listening to my brain when it said I don’t want to hear?
He looks uncomfortable and gets up to walk across to the table near my bedroom door. He pushes around some weird modern wooden sculpture there, the tension running through him as he searches for the words. I’m frozen and holding my breath, a sea of emotions aching inside.
“She broke my heart, Emma. She fucked my best friend.” He drops the sculpture back in place.
Oh my god. Why would anyone want to cheat on him? I mean look at him. Why would she want to hurt him?
I shake my head as if I can’t believe it. I don’t want her to be the one.
Is she the reason he’s the way he is? Why he keeps women at arm’s length, and it’s just sex and fun? Did having his first love savagely rip his heart open make him unable to trust any women in his life? Keeping them all at a distance, the way I do with everyone else.
“Why did you start seeing her again?” It’s out before I can stop it.
Do I want to hear him tell me how he’s never got over her? No, I don’t.
He shrugs and gazes at me intensely.
“It’s complicated.”
When is it ever not?
“Stop saying that,” I wail, instantly on my feet and angry.
Why?
Because he is my Jake. Not hers. I want him to want me and only me. I know it’s never going to be that way, and it ruins every part of me. It rages and burns that once, long ago, she had exactly that, and she threw it all away. She was a complete idiot!
“Emma, what do you want me to say?” He moves toward me and pushes me back to sit down as he stands over me. “You think I planned any of this shit?” He looks broken, eyes damp and face unreadable, yet somehow sad.
“Do you love her?” I ask, almost sobbing it out in desperation, fear gripping me inside.
Don’t cry, please, don’t cry. Not here. Not now. Not in front of Jake.
Disbelief flashes across his face, and I can’t read it. I’m scared of his answer, so I cover his mouth.
“Don’t.” I’m shaking my head. “I don’t want to know.” He grasps my hands and pulls them away.
“Emma, it’s not what you think,” he pleads, his body trying to cage me in against him, but I resist.
No? What do I think? What could be worse than this?
“I can’t … I can’t right now. I just need to go.” I shove him away, lost in teen Emma mode, and reject contact while my heart is crushing in on itself.
“Stay, Emma, please. We need to talk.” He’s trying to pull my arms to him, but I’m pushing him off. Marissa is right there in the next room. She’s pregnant with his baby. She’s the first love of his life. She’s the reason he avoids relationships. What am I supposed to think? She’s the reason I’ll never have a chance with him.
“I need air, space. Jake, I need space.” I gulp down tears and panic, and finally throw his hands off me. He lets me go and moves back rejected; he’s letting me leave, but I don’t want to go anymore. I don’t know what to do. I hesitate.
He says nothing, just gives me his boyish wary look, his frown deepening. I can’t stay here, so I go into automatic pilot. I stalk toward the door, pulling up my hood, and I don’t look back, knowing that walking out is the only choice I have. I don’t look back, even when I hear him call my name.
* * *
I run about three blocks before I stop and let the heart-wrenching pain overtake me. I cry like I did the night he left me on the yacht, and I think I may actually die this time. If my lungs don’t self-implode, I think my heart might. The pain is unbearable and raw, and I’ve never willingly exposed myself to enduring it this way, except that night.
I sit on a bench cradling my head between my knees, and I think I may even throw up. This isn’t my life; my life is calm and easy and straightforward. My job, my apartment, my responsibilities, they all slot into place, and I manage them all well. This isn’t really happening. I’m in a parallel universe, or I’m dreaming. I’ll wake up any minute and this will all have been one long, bad dream. Except I know that it’s not. Meeting Jake has slowly changed it all; he is too potent to be around, changing me, changing how I think and live, until I don’t feel like I am in control anymore.
Is this how we got here?"
