I nod and kiss her forehead. “Just sleep, baby. Just sleep here.” I grab her hand to lead her to our bed. Because it’sourbed. There is no place for anyone else but her in it.
She doesn’t say anything as she crawls under the covers and snuggles herself up to me. I curl my arm around her and hold on for dear fucking life because I am not ready to let my girl go.
I never have been, I never will be.
I wake up in full panic, sweat coating my body, my heart beating wildly in my chest, that tug in my soul yanking me awake.
I haven’t had a nightmare in a while, but after the night we had, it doesn’t surprise me. It regurgitated a lot from both of us.
My eyes open and my hand searches the bed for Sunny. Feeling the emptiness where she normally lays, my eyes open wide as I try to adjust to the darkness in the room and rid the sleep from my mind.
“Sunny?” I ask into what I realize is an empty room. A room where I only exist right now.
“No,” I choke as I fumble from the bed.
She’s gone.
Her pile of belongings are gone from the corner of our room. I run to the closet to see all her clothes that once hung there are also gone, and all that remains are empty hangers. I look in the bathroom to see her toothbrush no longer sits next to mine.
My chest heaves up and down as I bring a hand to my mouth to try and stop the sounds that want to escape it.
I thought she was going to stay. I thought we were going to work this out. I thought that maybe, just maybe she could see why I did what I did. I thought things were going right instead of so wrong.
What once was a full heart becomes a void. Frantically it beats in my chest as it loses a part of itself, leaving a hollow, jagged mess. The lack of her so ever present, and that string now screaming as she slips from me.
That soul bridge now seems so long, her too far, that no matter how loud I yell, no matter how much my heart calls her name, she will never hear, and she will never come back.
I turn back into my bedroom and pick up my phone off the nightstand. I have one single text from her.
I took the night to think, and I know what I need to do.
CHAPTER NINETY-ONE
TYLER
Before I know it,I’m unlocking the door to Sam’s apartment with shaky hands, struggling to open it through blurred tear-filled eyes.
I didn’t even think before getting in my truck and driving here in the middle of the night.
As soon as Sunny walked out the door, leaving me in bed oblivious to the hollowness I’d wake up to, it’s like something inside me snapped, waking me to realize my new reality.
A life without her.
I spent every free minute I had tracking Ryan down and I still don’t know where he is. All my efforts and exhaustion have led to the one thing I didn’t want it to lead to.
Sunny walking out the door.
Defeat. That’s what this unfamiliar feeling is. It grips my chest like a vice, making everything I am feel worthless. Failure courses my veins and fills my chest in place of her.
My entire purpose is her. My heart is so filled with her, I can’t even call it my own anymore. Yet somehow, it has been wasted, failed, and defeated because I can’t even protect or save the one reason for my existence.
It isn’t something I’m familiar with, and I’m not happy about this introduction to one another. It’s like a fucking sucker punch to my gut, leaving a hallow void where my girl once filled me.
I wanted to know the parts of her that died and came back to life. I wanted to know the things that haunt her as she tries to find rest from her long days. I wanted to know why her home was full of ghosts and why she swore to never go back. I wanted to know the strings inside her that kept her together since mine were so deeply woven there, to. And for how long they’d last until they snapped. I wanted to know why she refused to tell anyone about her past and why she left scarred and wrecked, refusing to let anyone help her.
It made me angry and useless, not being able to understand these things. Even after six months of feeling like I knew every part of her, it made me realize I still barely know who she is.
And I hate it because despite the fact I have the knowledge of her entire life in my hands, on my computer, scattered across my desk, despite the fact I spent the last six months exploring her body and soul, I simply don’t know her at all.
