“You can come in,” I say, hopefully loud enough that he can hear me, but my voice feels hoarse. Luckily, Logan nods and comes inside. His dark brown curls have been flatted against his head and face—that’s how long he’s been standing out in the rain. His clothes are soaked to the bone, so much so that I can see the outline of his muscles underneath the fabric.
There’s a pang in my chest. God, he’s so beautiful. And he’s looking at me like I’m the most precious thing in the world, and I’m about to disappear into the wind.
Which, for all intents and purposes, I am.
He opens his mouth, but closes it, his eyes thoughtful. He then repeats the motion and finally says:
“Do you want to talk about it?”
His thoughtfulness stings. Knowing what I have to do is torture. But not now. For now, I just need a rest. “I don’t want to talk about it yet,” I say. “But I do want you here. Can you just … be here with me and not ask?” There’s a pang in my heart when I realize this is what Logan needed from me before.
He nods, giving me a smile, then grabs my hand with both of his and looks deep into my eyes. “I’m here. Okay?”
I’m all out of tears by now. I simply look back at him and nod. “Okay.”
Logan lets go of my hand and starts the car, then turns on the heat. I’m shivering and surprised he isn’t, although it might not just be the cold that’s doing this to my body. I feel like I’ve just been swallowed and chewed back out.
So we start the drive back home in silence, exactly how I wanted it to be. I don’t sleep, but I do rest my eyes. Even though it’s dark out, and the clouds shield the sky so that even the moon doesn’t shine through, the little light that remains in the world feels like too much to process.
Because I’ve got a lot more to process.
And it hurts that it feels so right. The way we’re both silent but able to hold comfort in this silence. The way he’ll occasionally glance back at me with a worried smile. The way I want to tell him to stop the car so I can kiss him, taste his mouth, strip him of these soaked clothes …
It’s all too much.
But Sophie and my dad are right. It’s not that I don’t deserve this. For once in my life, I truly feel like I do. Like I’m worthy of Logan. Like I deserve to be happy despite everything I’ve done. And maybe one day, I can have it all.
But not today.
The rain begins to slow down. Before we’ve arrived back at the resort, some of the clouds have cleared, giving way to the moon at last. But now I can open my eyes. I’m not feeling my best. Not even close. I’ll need twelve hours of sleep or more to recover from everything I’ve been through today. But I’m beginning to feel human again. Whole again.
And that’s a start.
Logan pulls into the resort and makes his way directly to my cabin. The closer we get, the more the anticipation starts biting at my heels. I don’t want to do this. I want to say ‘fuck it’ and do what I feel like doing. But it wouldn’t be fair. It wouldn’t be fair to me, and it wouldn’t be fair to Logan.
My heart’s drumming against my chest when he pulls up at my cabin. There we go. We’re here. By now I’ve stopped shivering, but I’m still cold and uncomfortable in my wet clothes, and despite everything else, I’m craving the comfort of warm, dry fabric against my skin.
Logan stops the car. He looks at me, his gaze intense, his eyes dark. “Let’s get you warmed up,” he whispers.
My lower belly tightens at his words. There’s a part of me that wants to be selfish, that wants to take advantage of this moment and fall into bed with him. But I’m not going to do that. I’m not going to ignore everything else at the top of my mind and take advantage of Logan like that. That’s not who I am.
“Maybe you should drop me here and grab some dry clothes at your place and come back after,” I suggest while my hand grabs the door handle.
“I’m going to be okay,” Logan responds. “I … I don’t want to leave you alone. Not like this.”
I take a deep breath. Maybe he’s right. I’d been hoping to extend this moment a little longer. To delay the inevitable. “Okay,” I say, then open the door to make my way into the cabin.
Logan follows closely behind me. I unlock the door, my hands trembling slightly, and enter without a word. I remove my shoes and make my way to the bed at the center to sit on it as casually as I can.
Logan follows me with his gaze, then imitates me. Soon, he’s next to me, and I can feel the warmth of his body tantalizing mine. How sweet it would be, how delicious, to have his chest against mine, for our skin to mingle and become one.
I look up at him and sweep a bit of hair stuck against his glasses. “Logan …” I whisper, feeling my chest burn with both pain and desire at once.
Logan’s hand meets mine. “Avery, I have to apologize. What I said back there …” His eyes look down. “It was completely out of line. And I didn’t mean it.”
I give him a sad smile. “Logan, it’s okay.”
“It’s not okay,” he continues. “Because you were right, and that struck a nerve, and I lashed out at you for it. You’re right that I should go back to what I love doing. I’m just … scared.” A sigh comes out of him, as if he had been holding it in for a long, long time. “No, I’m terrified. I’m terrified to feel these things again. To feel … that fatigue, the soul-sucking exhaustion that tears everything apart. I would do anything not to feel that again.”
