“I wasn’t always,” he lamented. “At that point, I was pretty much a lost cause. But you’re right. She had no right to make me feel that way. I stormed out of the house and flipped her off when she tried to tell me I couldn’t go anywhere. I was almost twenty and she had no control over me. I screamed at her that she didn’t need to worry about me, that I wouldn’t be back, and I took off.
“I’d been planning how to do it for over an hour when I saw your headlights in the distance. And it’s fucked up that you say you were focusing on my headlight, because I was doing the same,” he admitted. Dax wrapped his arm around my waist and scooted as close as possible without being in my lap. I’m not sure I would have minded if he had crawled up so he was sitting on my thighs. “I’d planned on swerving off the road when no one was around because I didn’t want to be found. I can still remember hearing‘it’s time’over and over in my head as the beams from your car grew closer and brighter.
“It was the exact opposite of what I had planned, but I did it anyway. I listened to that voice and swerved as our vehicles passed each other. I jerked the handlebars to the left, but then quickly turned them all the way to the right. I’d considered riding into your path, but even as fucked up as I was, I couldn’t do that to anyone else. It was my pain to bear.
“I’m so sorry for what it did to you. It’s fucked up that I can sit here and tell you everything that went through my mind in a matter of seconds, but I promise you, I didn’t want anyone else feeling guilty for what I had done. I’d like to think I wouldn’t have done it if I’d known how much it would still affect you, but I’m not sure.” At least he was honest about his uncertainty. I was pissed as hell at him for being so reckless with his life. For not realizing how hard it would be for anyone, me or any other driver who could’ve been out on that road, to watch him bleeding in the ditch.
“It’s in the past,” I told him. I wasn’t going to tell him it was okay, because it damn well wasn’t. But like everyone kept telling me, there was no way to change it. And now that I had Dax, I had answers, and I was going to find a way to take my father’s advice and start moving forward. “I’m just glad you’re here and that you realized how important you are.”
“Some days I still wonder about that, but I have to hold on to the hope that there’s some reason I changed my plan,” he said sadly.
We spent the next hour talking about the accident. Dax glanced at the clock on his phone and realized it was almost one in the morning. “I hate to do this, but I really do need to get some sleep.”
I didn’t want him to leave. The thought of being alone in the house terrified me. Where I’d once wanted nothing more than to keep my secrets buried deep in my own mind, I worried that the nightmares were going to be stronger than ever tonight, and I wanted Dax next to me. His presence would serve as a reminder that I’d twisted everything around in my own mind.
“Stay with me,” I blurted out as I walked him to the door. Just once, it’d be nice if I didn’t make these huge decisions as I watched him walk away from me.
