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He turns, for the first time meeting my eyes, and I study the blue that’s normally so warm but only looks blank right now. “I heard you. The other day. When you said you hate me being here and that it’s the worst thing ever, and I get it. I forced this on you, and that wasn’t fair. But you can have your life back now.”

I frown, realizing all the ways he’s twisted my words. “That’s not what I meant.”

“So you don’t hate me being here?”

“Of course I do!” How can’t he see that? “Everything was perfect before you. Calm. I was in fucking control. Then you came along and stole it all from me.”

“Right.” He disappears down the front stairs, and I run after him.

“Don’t you get it? I wanted to hang on to that life with everything I had. I’d convinced myself that this was living⁠—”

He holds up his hand, like he doesn’t want to hear it, and maybe he’s sick of me and what I said was his excuse to leave, but I can’t just let him walk away. I can’t.

“Please don’t do this.”

He throws his bag onto the back seat and slams the door, resting his head against it. “You need this.”

“I don’t.”

“You hate me here.”

“Only because it showed me that I was wrong about everything. I hate being wrong, and with you here, I know that what I had before wasn’t living.”

Slowly, he turns to face me, eyes covered with a wet sheen. “What?”

“I need you. I need to know where you are and keep you close. I’m only sane when I know that you’re safe.”

He swallows, a small line forming between his eyebrows. “That’s not normal.”

“I don’t care.”

“You should.”

My frustration builds. “I don’t care about anything except you.”

His whole face scrunches up right before he screws his eyes closed and drops his head forward. “You can’t say that.”

“It’s true.”

“But I’m not worth all that!”

My hands are shaking as I take his chin and turn him to look at me. “You are to me.”

There’s a long, hopeful moment where we just stare at each other, where I think he might see me and all the broken pieces that only he can fix. “You’re the only one who’s ever understood me.”

“I know,” he whispers. Then he steps back from me. “That’s why I have to do this.”

He jumps into the car, taking a second to turn the engine over, and as soon as the car comes alive, he takes off. The dirt sprays behind him, and he almost fishtails into the trees before getting back in control and disappearing up the path.

I watch until the car is gone from sight. Unable to stop him.

“Sasha …” I mutter, feeling like my whole world has imploded.

Again.

Why did I hide all those years ago?

Dying would have been easier than this.