“You’re smothering me. I need to be on my own for a while. I need your key back and you need to leave.” Evan winced at my lie. He brought his fist to his mouth as his Adam’s apple bobbed up and down. He laughed humorlessly and turned to me. Maybe I could have kept him just a little longer, but it was getting harder and harder to hide how sick I was. The hard glare in his eyes and the tic in his jaw confirmed I’d accomplished what I had set out to do. I was dying inside, but it was the only way.
“Smotheringyou. Do you know how much I worry about you all goddamn day? How fucking scared I’ve been all these months you’ve been sick? So sorry if loving you got on your nerves.” He shot up from his seat and dug his keys out of his back pocket.
“You want your key back? Here!” Evan threw my key on the table so hard it bounced to the floor. I’d been upset over past relationships before, but nothing had ever been as painful as this moment. That was because what we had was real, and I had just destroyed it. There was a gaping hole in my chest. When Evan walked out of my door tonight, even though he wouldn’t know it, he would be taking my heart with him.
I put my head down and made my way over to the door, unlocked it and held it open. Evan huffed behind me.
“Wow. Okay I won’t waste any more of your time. If space is what you want, space is what you’ll get. All the fucking space you need.” Evan stormed to the door, then stopped under the threshold. He scowled at me as our eyes met.
“So, you don’t love me, Paige? Just say it. You don’t love me.” I looked away, and tried my best to look irritated and bothered rather than devastated. My broken heart wreaked havoc on my insides. Evan needed to walk out before I disintegrated in front of him.
Everything in me wanted to hold him, say I didn’t mean it, pull him back into my bed and never let him go. But then what? He’d be stuck taking care of a sick girl who probably couldn’t give him anything but more heartbreak. This was awful, but better now than later.
“Fine.” Evan spit the word at me as his chest heaved. “Enjoy yourspace. Good-bye, Paige.”
He slammed the door behind him and I finally let myself crumble to the floor. I sobbed so hard I gasped for air. I crawled over to my couch and watched out my front window at Evan holding on to the door of his truck to catch his breath. He looked the way I felt, as though he had just lost the most important part of himself. He banged his hand against the roof before he got in and sped away so fast his tires screeched.
In time he’d see. I did it for him.
Thirty-Two
Evan
Life without Paigebecame routine fairly quickly. Wake up at three o’clock in the morning, head to the gym to work my body to the point I couldn’t feel anything anymore, go in to work and check on job sites, head home and drink enough to pass out.
It’d been almost a week, and I still couldn’t make any sense of it. I was so pissed off I could barely see straight. Maybe Iwassmothering her and that pushed her away. I still worried about her, and I still loved her so damn much. I struggled to breathe every time I thought of her. I read over her note in my wallet so many times her handwriting had faded.
Not seeing her at all was killing me, and as angry as I was, I kept trying to figure out a way to stay in her life. But there was no such thing as halfway with Paige. She was more than just my girlfriend, orex-girlfriend as the case was now. She was my best friend, the first person I wanted to speak to every day, and the one who knew me better than I knew myself. Life without my Daisy was unbearable; when she left she’d taken all the beauty in my life with her.
A light knocking at the door brought me out of my wallowing.
“Can I come in?” Ellie asked as she wheeled little Jack into the office. Jessica was out for the day, and Ellie paused for a moment before setting the brake on the stroller and sitting in her husband’s old chair.
“Little odd being here. I keep expecting him to walk through the door.”
“Yeah, me too.” I stood to give Ellie a kiss on the cheek and steal a peek at my sleeping godson. The godson I shared with Paige.
“I hope I didn’t bother you...”
“Ellie, stop. You’d never bother me. I’m sorry I haven’t been over to see you guys. I’m trying to keep up around here.” I sat in my chair and leaned back. Ellie nodded.
“Paige said you guys broke up.” Ellie frowned as she crossed her legs.
“Apparently I was smothering her and she needed space.” I huffed and shook my head.
Ellie let out a deep sigh. “Well,apparently, she needs space from everyone. She rushes me off the phone, and Aunt Tess is ready to break down her door. She told Tess she’s been out working long hours, but I don’t think she’s going in to the office at all. Every time I’ve driven past her apartment, her car is there. She always goes in to the city on Thursdays and I know she was home last week. I think something is very wrong, Evan.” Jack stirred in his carriage and Ellie quickly rocked him back to sleep. “Last time I went over to Paige’s apartment, she had a medicine cabinet full of pill bottles. I was looking for a band aid and didn’t mean to snoop. Did you know if she was taking anything?”
I shook my head. “Other than the medicine for her throat, her birth control, and Advil—no not that I know of. Did you ask her?”Pills?Paige hadn’t said a damn thing about any new medicine.
“Yes, but she just blew me off and ushered me out the door. I don’t think she just has a weak immune system. She’s lying to all of us. I think Paige is really sick, and I think her pulling away from everyone means it’s becoming harder for her to hide it.”
Ice ran through my veins as my hands shook. Jack had asked me to take care of Paige, and a few short months after his death I’d already completely fucked up.
Ellie rubbed the back of her neck and looked at the ceiling. “I have a theory.” Ellie bit her lip and looked away.
“Ellie, spit it out.” She still wouldn’t turn around, so I shot up and whirled her chair towards me.
“Ellie, what’s your theory?” She looked down for a moment, and then met my gaze with watery eyes.
