When I turn back, I try to breathe through the pain, carefully choosing my next words. “You left. That’s why I hated you. I never blamed you. And three months later, when I got the offer to go to school and train in Chicago, I left too. I ran away from here and all the memories of Evan and some of the ones of you too. My parents had been a mess for a while, but after that night, they were irreparably broken. My family was shattered in ways that could never be mended. Evan was gone. You were gone. And Finn... Finn was trying to hold me together in a way that was never going to be fair to him. Skipping classes and staying with me instead of doing all the things he needed to be doing. And he would have kept doing that if I let him. He would have let me ruin his life. His future. His plans.”
I think back to the ways my best friend held me together when nothing else could. I swear I think Finn wants to fix everything for everyone because of me. Because he couldn’t fix me. He couldn’t fix what broke that night, and he’s never wanted to see anyone else hurt since. “When I told him about Chicago, he promised to come visit. So I left too.”
Jamie lowers his head to mine, his warm breath fanning my tear-stained face. “I was a kid, Ace. I didn’t know how to dealwith everything. I blamed myself for not doing something else. Something different. Anything. . . For not being able to save him. We thought we were invincible. We were supposed to be fucking invincible... How could he be gone?” He runs his fingers through my hair and searches my eyes, but I’m not sure what he’s looking for... and I’m not sure what he finds. “I couldn’t unsee it, Ashton. I couldn’t stand to look at you and think about the way you must have blamed me because I blamed myself. I just fucking couldn’t. And by the time I could... By the time I dealt with it and started to process it, you were gone, and you hated me. And I hated me too, so I let you go.”
“I—”
“But I’m fucking done letting you go.” He slides his hands to the back of my legs and lifts me as he walks us both over to the couch in the corner, sitting me down in his lap and framing my face with his calloused palms. “I’m fucking done. You were mine when we were kids. You might have been Finn’s best friend, but you were mine until that night. Until you started looking at me like a stranger. Like maybe Iwasthe man Evan saw and didn’t think was good enough for his little sister.”
“He didn’t mean that?—”
“Yeah,” Jamie cuts me off. “He did, and he wasn’t wrong. We were young. And who knew what we could have been back then or if we could have made anything between us work. But I dealt with my shit and grew the fuck up, and I’m not a kid anymore. I did what I had to do to be worthy, and I fucking swore that one day, when you were ready to look at me again, I’d be the man you deserved.”
Jamie’s eyes hold mine, refusing to let me look away. “And I might have walked away, but I was always there. I’ve been to every show you’ve ever danced in at least once. I’ve watched from the back. I’ve cheered the loudest, and sent flowers without cards, and made sure you never saw me. Because I was selfish,and I was there for me, not you. I wanted you to be happy. I wanted you to be living your best damn life. And I knew that was without me in it.” His lips brush over my forehead before he leans his to mine. “At least until February. Until that night in Chicago changed everything.”
Oh God. He doesn’t even know all the ways that night changed everything.
“Jamie... You don’t even know—” My throat clogs as the tears that had finally slowed, start all over again.
“I know everything I need to know, Ashton. I know you’re incredible. You’re brave and strong and beautiful. I know you love Kyrie like she’s your own baby, not your sister. And I know I want to be part of that. I want to be with you. I want you to let me in. I want you.” He pulls back, and I swear everything I ever wanted to see is right there in his eyes. “Let me in, Ashton.”
“I’m scared,” I whisper and wipe my eyes, wanting so badly to believe him. “I’m?—”
“I won’t leave again,” he tries to reassure me. “Never again.”
I shouldn’t laugh.
Really, how do you go from crying to laughing in the span of one shaky breath? Because that’s what I do. At first, I’m crying, tears falling down my face as the first bubble of laughter works its way up my throat. Before the tears stop and the laughter doesn’t. Loud and obnoxious and totally out of my control.
Kyrie stirs behind me, but I’m fairly certain hysteria has taken over, and I don’t know how to tamp it back down.
“Ashton—”
“You don’t even know how much everything’s changed, Jamie.” I look over at Kyrie as her little whimpers grow louder and laugh even harder, wishing I could stop.
“Ace—”
“Jamie, I’m pregnant. I took six tests today. Six. The first two with your cousins. Who, by the way, told me they hoped thesex was at least incredible, and I almost threw up on them the way I threw up on you. I seriously doubt they’d say that if they knew it was with you. Did you know Lexie thought you were a manwhore? Dillan set her straight, so at least that was good,” I ramble. “But seriously,”—a laugh mixes with a sob—“six tests and two bouts of vomiting later, I’m about as sure I’m pregnant as I can be before I see a doctor. And before you ask, it’s definitely yours because you’re the only person I’ve been with in so long, I might as well have been a born-again virgin.”
Oh shit. Now that I’m on a roll, I can’t seem to make myself stop. “And I’m sorry because I don’t even know how it happened. We used a million condoms. Another thing I told your cousins. They were impressed. Again, not that I told them it was you because... eww... Look,”—I shake my head trying to clear my thoughts—“I’m a mess... my entire life’s in chaos. Some days I’m so worried about taking care of Kyrie, I don’t even remember whether I brushed my teeth. I don’t know how to be pregnant or be a mother. I don’t know what I’m going to do. I just don’t know anything...”
I manage to finally gather some semblance of control as the laughter subsides, and the tears come back in a steady stream.
Fuck hormones.
Fuck emotions.
And fuck this night because I’m over it all.
And when this man wraps his arms around me and lays my head against his chest, I give up and give in and take whatever strength and peace I can find here with him. “We’ll figure it out together, Ashton. I’m here. I’m with you. And I’m not leaving.”
His words wrap around me and hold me as tightly as his arms, and I want so desperately to believe him.
“Do you promise? Because I’m so scared, Jamie.” I close my eyes, wondering how he can be so calm when I feel sonot.
“I promise,” he tells me as he runs his hands in soothing circles on my back in a way that makes me want to believe him. Even if only for tonight. “We’ll figure it out together.”
He sounds so sure of himself... Maybe he can be sure enough for the both of us.
