I hadn’t expected the jealousy that surged up within me at the mere thought. I didn’t know what it meant — that, or the fact that I missed him sometimes.
A lot of times.
All the time.
I thought about him when I first woke and when I was falling asleep. I thought about him when I ate, when Italked, when I daydreamed, when people tried to find out the truth. I thought about him, but that was all I could do.
I couldn’t pick up the phone and call him even though I wanted to hear his voice. I hadn’t realized how much cutting him out of my life would hurt. I’d thought I’d be okay once I’d returned home.
I wasn’t.
I wished I hadn’t left.
But there was no going back to that, either. I was stuck in this half-life, neither able to go back to how things had been nor to return to him. I couldn’t rebuild until I could move on, and I couldn’t move on until my life no longer consisted of reminders of my absence.
“Ryder—”
“Just let it go,” I said, voice sharp. “I’m not telling you anything.”
She reeled back as though I’d slapped her, and tears started to roll down her cheeks.
Guilt immediately raced through me, and I sighed. “I can’t tell you anything,” I amended. “I’m sorry. I wish I could.”
“You need to talk about what happened,” she pushed, wiping her tears away. “Ryder, you can’t keep…”
She kept talking, but I wasn’t listening. Over and over, she said my name.
Over and over, I knew I wasn’t the person she thought I was — not anymore.
Hearing the name Ryder was an irritant, something that grated on me more and more each time I heard it. I wanted to shout at them that I wasn’t Ryder, but that would mean acknowledging that the damage had gone much deeper than I wanted to admit.
It would mean acknowledging that I’d become Toby.
There wasn’t any doubt about that, not really. Not anymore. I knew, and I couldn’t escape that fact any more than I could escape the fact that I missed him.
I had to mourn the loss and move on, but I couldn’t get him out of my thoughts.
Was he okay? He’d been so fucking lonely…
Which was why I’d ended up there in the first place. Without me there, what would he do?
“Ryder!”
I jumped, blinking at her. I realized she’d kept talking to me, but I didn’t have any idea what she’d said.
“Sorry,” I mumbled.
She reached out to touch my cheek, and all I could think about was when he’d do the same thing. He’d touch my cheek and pull me close, and he’d want so much more than I could give…
Except I’d started to give it to him, hadn’t I?
The bitter truth was that I’d given everything to him, and he’d still sent me away.
He’d sent me away because he’d thought I’d wanted it. Hell, because I’d thought I wanted it. But now…
“I’m so worried about you,” she said, just as she had so many times before.
I was tired of hearing it.
