It’sJared. All of it.
Jared closes his eyes. “Listen to me—,”
I grab his face between mine, forcing him to look at me. “Do you love me?”
“Emmy.” He wipes at my face, his voice shaking. “God, please don’t cry. I need you to listen.”
I am crying. And I don’t care if I sound desperate, or needy. Because I can feel something precious slipping through our fingers. Slipping through my fingers,again.
It doesn’t have to be like this. Not again. Not this time.
Another Bennett boy, standing in front of me and ripping my heart into shreds. And I don’t think I’ll recover from this one. “Do you love me, Jared Bennett?”
His eyes are shining. “All I have for you is love, Em. Every bit of me. But it’s notenough.”
“I don’t understand.” I’m still holding onto him. “What are you talking about?”
He pulls away from me. Backs away.
“Please,” he says hoarsely. “Listento me, Emmy. I’m – I don’t have anything to give you. I don’t even have a damn job. I’m a bad bet.”
“No, you’re not.” I wipe at my eyes. “I don’t care about any of that.”
“Well, I do.” His voice firms. “I want to be a better man for you, Em. I’m not saying no. I’llneversay no to you. But just… not yet.”
He pulls something out of his pocket and holds it up. “I’m trying, Emmy. I promise. I just need a little time.”
Jared doesn’t stop me when I lean forward and take the coin from his hand. I turn it over. It’s only plastic, but there’s writing on it.
Sixty days.
“I have an alcohol problem.” He swallows, his cheeks flushed from the cold as I still. “It started after Ben died, and then it got worse.”
The drinking at the bar. “But I saw you plenty of times. Every day, and you were – you werefine.”
“And the rest of the time I was in the apartment, Em. Mostly passed out. I’d have a few beers, walk you home and then spend the rest of the night drinking.” His voice is quiet. “It’s not always a constant thing. But the point is that I can’tcontrolit. I can’t stop, not once I start. I didn’t… I didn’t mean to lie to you about it. But it was consuming me. If I hadn’t drunk so much the night you were attacked, I could have walked you home.”
It wouldn’t have mattered. Not the way it happened. But the guilt sits heavily in his words. Weighing on him. “You couldn’t have stopped it from happening. Not unless you were there.”
“Maybe,” he says tightly. “But I’m never going to know for sure, Em. And that… that doesn’t sit right with me.”
I wrap my fingers around the token tightly. “But this token… this isgood. Sixty days. You’re getting help.”
“It’s probably always going to be there,” he says thickly. “You deserve to know what you’re getting into, Em. And I need to know that I can be someone you can depend on. That takes longer than sixty days and a token. It’s a start, but it’s not enough.”
I squeeze my eyes shut. “You don’t need to prove anything to me. You already have, Jared.”
He’s spent years proving it. First with Ben, and then with me.
“But I need to prove it to myself.” His words are soft. “I want to be your forever, Em. I’m putting in the effort to make sure it works out that way. But I’m not kissing you, not taking this any further, until I know I can be that person for you. You are too important to me to let down again.”
His words sink into me, a promise and a plea. It begins to rain, scattering our coats with drops of water.
Jared takes a breath, glancing up at the sky with a sheepish look. “I’m not entirely sure what to do now.”
I still feel as though my heart might tear.
Not yet.
