He started to type something but stopped. He did this a few more times, the ellipsis appearing and disappearing on the text chain.
Ash:It’s not what you think.
Karla:So you aren’t ignoring me? Because it looks that way.
Ash:We’ll talk soon. Enjoy your week.
Enjoy my week? My WEEK?!
That jerk was ghosting me!
***
The only thing that kept me from tracking down Ash and raging at him was the fact that I had a bookshop to run. If it wasn’t for fictional characters, I would’ve tracked the jerk down and given him the biggest piece of my mind—after I made sure he was OK.
I hated that my biggest concern was his well-being after he was the one to ghost me, but I couldn’t help it. I knew Ash kept a lot of his dark moments to himself. I hoped that wasn’t why he was keeping me at a distance—so he could drown by his lonesome.
I knew he struggled, but I also knew he was waking back up and becoming more of his true, authentic self. He was coming back to life. His eyes were starting to sparkle more, and that made me happy. Yet now, it felt like we’d taken two hundred steps backward in his healing journey, and I wasn’t allowed to be there as he struggled.
That was what hurt the most.
“I haven’t seen Ash around much lately,” Daniel mentioned as he wiped down the countertops after a work shift had come to an end. “He missed the last book club meeting.”
“Yeah. I guess he’s been busy,” I said as I stacked books on a shelf. I was short with Daniel because the last thing I wanted to do was talk about Ash. When I talked about him, it made me want to cry. I didn’t feel like crying over him. I’d already cried for him all those years before.
“Did you two get into a fight?” he questioned.
I shook my head. “No. We just decided...” My words faded off, because that was a lie. We didn’t decide anything. Ash made a choice on his own, just as he had when we were teenagers. He walked away and left me.
Daniel walked toward me and tossed the cleaning rag onto his shoulder. He sighed as he crossed his arms over his chest.“Listen, I know it’s not my place to try to give you advice, especially after I confessed my feelings for you and you so kindly declined my date offer—”
“Daniel—”
“I’m not upset about that, Karla. Truly, I value our friendship, and I’m happy you were honest with me. But I think it’s time for you to be honest with yourself, too. You love him, don’t you?”
I paused as my eyes flashed with tears. “I do.”
“Then get him back. Call him.”
“It’s not that simple... he pushed me away. He has things that he’s dealing with, but he won’t let me in. He shut me out.”
“Well, clearly, I don’t know shit about love, but I do know that what I saw between the two of you seemed real. I saw how you look at him.”
“How do I look at him?”
“Like he is the whole world wrapped in one person.” Daniel wrapped me in a sideways hug. “And unfortunately for me, friend, Ash looks at you in the same exact way. I’d never seen two people who just... fit.”
I began crying, because I knew he was right. Ash meant the world to me. He always had and always would, but what was I supposed to do about that when whenever he got scared, he ran away?
I deserved someone who stayed.
50Ash
I was a coward. There was no getting around it. I’d been avoiding Karla because I was spiraling deeper into my mind. Seeing her in that hospital bed triggered me. I couldn’t get the image out of my mind. I hadn’t slept in days because of that fact. Still, I was a coward. I owed Karla a conversation. I just hadn’t a damn clue what to say to her.
One day after I walked home from a game of basketball with the guys, I was surprised to see Greyson sitting on my front porch. The moment he saw me, he stood.
“Greyson, what are you doing here?” I asked, confused. “How do you remember where I live?”
