“You’ve been my friend too long,” I mutter. “Can you not just let me hide it for a freaking second?”
Jade laughs, making my hair ruffle. “No. I’d be a shit best friend if I did that.”
“Yeah, you would be. But you’d be nice,” I sass back, sitting up quickly and wiping my eyes. “He’ll resent me. I told you that on the phone. There’s no way he’s going to just…accept that what he did for me was worth it.”
“And…” Jade raises an eyebrow, waiting for me to admit what’s actually wrong.
“And, when he realizes it, he’ll leave me for good. Ever since he broke it off, we’ve still been circulating in each other’s lives. We secretly,” Jade snorts as I say it and I cut her a glare. “Secretly, started hooking up again and I thought I could do that… Could accept it. But now? Now that I know what he did for me? There’s no way it goes back to before. And he’ll leave for good this time.”
“Rox, you didn’t ask him to do that for you. He did it because he chose to. Because he loves you.”
I look down, trying to hold the tears back. “How can he look at me and not be reminded of what he had to do? At all he’s done? Won’t I just become one big, physical representation of bad memories?”
Jade stays silent, letting me have the moment I need to grieve, to get the scary thoughts out so they don’t have as much power over me.
“Maybe I need to completely cut it off. To move and quit the shop.”
“What the hell, woman? No.” Jade jumps in quickly.
“It’s his shop. His life. I can’t… I’ve intruded long enough and with all he’s done for me, it’s the least I can do.”
“Don’t you dare think that way.” I’ve never heard Jade’s voice be so commanding towards me. It’s like her mom tone to Tyler but worse. “Don’t you fucking let that thought take root, do you hear me?” Her hands grip mine tighter, and I feel the frustration leave her, the tension in her hands and body melt back down to normal. “Let me ask you something and really, really think about it because I think you’ve forgotten some things, Roxie.”
I nod, swallowing a lump in my throat and looking towards her.
“Do you look at Ty, after all those years with Mickey, and feel anything but the sense that it was worth it?”
“Jesus. You’re not pulling any punches today,” I gasp, but the longer I sit with what she says, the more I see it. “No, not at all. Everything I went through, it was what I had to keep Ty and Asher safe, and that, that’s never something I’d blame on him.” My eyebrows pinch together. “It was my choice.”
“Then why in the hell would you think Ty would feel anything but the same for you? That guy has stayed by your side for years.Years, just watching and waiting. Content to make sure you’re living happily while he’s alone because helovesyou.”
“He stayed away from me for years…”But… Did he though?My mind asks me loud and clear.
“No, he really didn’t,” Jade says with a soft smile that doesn’t meet her eyes. “He didn’t stay away from you, Roxie. He let you be free.”
“No matter what Roxie, you deserve to be free. To never have to do anything you don’t want to do. And I’m going to make it my life’s mission to make sure you are free.”Iremember those words he vowed to me as if it was yesterday and not nearly a decade ago.
“I don’t think the guy even looked at another woman since you two broke up. Asher said he hasn’t hooked up with anyone, or at least hasn’t told him so. And you know those two, they’re worse than two old ladies in a nursing home when it comes to gossiping.” She chuckles, but my jaw drops as my eyes squeeze shut before snapping open. She clocks my expression because Jade’s joking smile shifts to one of earnestness. “He’s always been here, Roxie. Steady and yearning for you, just in the quiet.”
“I need to see him.”
CHAPTER 45
If I just smudge thisline here, I might be done,I think. I’m hunched over my small desk at home, the same one I had when I shared an apartment with Asher all those years ago.
I don’t know what urged me to recreate the drawing of Roxie and I in the woods the night before she was transferred from Haven, all those years ago. Her soft hair flowing over my thighs as I tried to keep her as comfortable as possible as she laid curled on her side. I didn’t sleep a wink that night…but it was worth it.
I sweep my pencil over the final curve of her hips as she lay there and I know it’s finished. It’s…exactly like my memory.
I thought I knew love then. I thought I was able to understand love and sacrifice because of my family growing up. I thought familywassacrifice. That everyone was meant to give and give and give, no matter if there’s anything given in return.
But Roxie, she showed me that that isn’t true.
She was the first person besides Asher who gave me something back. The first person who made sure I had my fair share before anyone else. The first person who stood up for me against my family. The first person I ever fell in love with.
Theonlyperson I’ve ever fallen in love with.
I stare down at the paper, lost in the memories and the ‘what-ifs’ of it all and I know, I fuckingknowjust how badly the two of us love each other. But I want her to be free. That’s always what I’ve wanted–no, needed.
