And she feels…
“You feel real,” I rasp.
She freezes.
“I am real,” she whispers. “I’m right here.”
I stare at her, the scent of her shampoo already making me light-headed, the heat of her hands on my ruined skin twisting something vicious and tender inside my chest.
“I thought you were a dream,” I murmur, voice cracked and thin. “I thought I drank you back into my head.”
Her lip trembles as she unzips the hoodie and pulls a napkin from the pocket. It’s not clean. She doesn’t give a shit. She presses it to my bleeding knuckles, trying to be gentle, but the tears in her eyes say she wants to scream. And I fucking deserve every second of it.
“You shouldn’t be here,” I say.
Her hands still. “But I am.”
“I don’t deserve this.”
“Maybe not.”
“You should hate me.”
“Maybe I do.”
Her eyes meet mine. And I’m done.
Gone.
Drowning.
“I tried to fuck you out of my system,” I confess, every word a nail driven straight through my own ribs. “I tried to drink you out, burn you out, punch you out — but you’re still here. Still fucking here.”
Her breath hitches. Her fingers tighten around my wrist.
I lean in, my forehead nearly touching hers. “I see you when I blink. I hear your laugh in the static. I smell you on my skin when I haven’t even touched you. You think I wanted this?” My voice shakes like it’s fighting to stay in my throat. “You think I wanted you to be the one who fucking broke you?”
Tears slip down her cheeks.
“You did break me,” she whispers. “But I let you.”
I exhale like something inside me just tore open.
“I hate you for leaving me in that bar,” she breathes. “I hate you for pretending it didn’t mean something.”
My lips hover above hers.
“I hate me too.”
And then I kiss her.
No.
I fucking devour her.
There’s no hesitation. No pause. No transitional breath. Just raw, ruined desperation tearing through me like shrapnel.
My mouth crashes into hers with weeks of madness behind it. My hand grips her jaw, the other — still bleeding — tangles in her hair and yanks her closer like I’m trying to drag her straight into my lungs. Her lips part and I taste salt and sugar and a salvation I have no right to crave.
