by Cindi Madsen
“I was. I am.” A tight band formed around my chest as I thought just how much I cared about the blond, sunshiny girl with the huge earrings and even bigger heart.
“Well, I heard her and Lyla talking the other night about an engineering program her professor asked her to be a part of. Did she mention it?”
I shook my head.
“She was so motivated to get to college that she graduated high school early, and now she’s considering giving up an amazing opportunity, one I know she’d enjoy. Giving it up for you—because of the time it’ll require, and she worries she can’t have both. I’ve seen her lose sight of who she is before, and I can’t just stand by as she does it again.”
Beck curved his hand around the bill of his hat. “So…since she obviously cares what you think, I’m asking you to convince her to take the opportunity. Convince her that it doesn’t mean the end of your relationship.”
“I’ll take care of it,” I said, even though it did mean the end of our relationship. As much as I’d tried to hold on to the hope that ending things wasn’t the only option, reality rushed in. Megan thought she had to choose me over something she loved. Me, the guy who got too drunk and didn’t remember the end of a party. The guy who’d ruined another girl’s life because he chose hockey. “I know how much she loves engineering. I’ll get her to take it.”
He cleared his throat. “I’ll…try to get used to the idea of you and her, then.”
Fortunately for him—for everyone but me, probably—he wouldn’t have to. Megan had the biggest heart of anyone I’d ever met, and I knew the only way she’d put what she wanted first was to take myself out of the equation.
The other guys had trickled into the locker room, then, and I’d dragged myself through practice, texted Megan, and told her to meet me here at the diner.
I thought of dealing with life without her. Of not having her sitting in the booth next to me while I attempted to spend my sleepless hours studying, like I could use them for good instead of admitting how drained they left me. There’d be no more sweetener packet field goal competitions, my eyes no longer in danger of being taken out at any moment.
No more sleeping next to her—real, pure sleep.
In spite of talking myself into this decision, and telling myself over and over it was best for her, I wanted to be selfish. To beg her not to take part in anything that would mean we’d have less time together.
Which was exactly why I had to end it. I’d learned that my decisions affected other people time and time again. I’d promised the last girl I loved the world, and I hadn’t delivered. I wouldn’t make that mistake again.
Loved. My heart snagged at the word that resounded through my brain and I did my best to shove it away and stop myself from going there.
Megan deserved the world and more. She deserved some guy who wouldn’t drag her down. The more I thought about it, the more certain I was that she’d orchestrated some kind of deal so Lissa could receive the counseling she needed—she’d swooped in to help my complicated, messy family.
That was my job, and while I might be in over my head, I could handle it. Megan would give and give, because that was the kind of girl she was. I knew she’d never end up like Jazmine, but the thought of her bright, infectious energy being drained until she was a shell of who she used to be was enough to strengthen my resolve. No messing up all that ambition and her bright shiny future.
The diner door opened and I knew without looking it was her—my skin hummed, my heartbeat quickened. Everything seemed better for one glorious moment.
Clenching my jaw, I sucked in a breath and then let it out. I stood as she neared, and she must’ve sensed something was up, because there was hesitance in her posture and tentative smile.
My fingers twitched, and my arms ached with the need to pull her in close, have her pressed to me one more time. I can get a few more seconds of being selfish, can’t I?
No, because then I’ll never let go.
“Hey,” she said, and she reached up and toyed with her earring. A gloriously huge hoop with turquoise beading and matching feathers. A hole opened up in my chest, and I couldn’t believe how much I was going to miss crazy earrings.
“Hey.” I gestured across from me and she slid into the booth. Her eyes went to the sugar caddy, and she ran her fingers across the top of them like I’d done a minute ago.
Larry showed up and poured her a large cup of coffee, dropping a pile of extra sugar packets next to it.
Another thing I hadn’t thought about, Larry being here to witness it all.
Megan dumped in the sugars, snagged a couple more, and then took a sip. For a moment I got lost staring at her lips and the way her tongue darted out and fanned across her upper lip.
“Megan.” I reached for her hand and then decided better of it. I pressed my palm flat against the surface of the table. “We can’t do this anymore.”
“Stay up late drinking way too much coffee?” I think she tried to make it sound like a joke, but her voice squeaked at the end.
Her smile faded, and I had to remind myself that there were so many better guys for her. Maybe she’d meet one in the engineering program. I already wanted to shove whatever robotic creation he made up his ass.
Which was why I didn’t delude myself thinking we could still be friends.
“Wow. I haven’t even uttered the words ‘we need to talk’ or given you the speech I practiced about how I need more of a commitment from you yet. Haven’t even gotten the chance to ask you if you really make bets about sleeping with girls.” Her chin quivered. “I actually spent all weekend telling myself I know you better than that.”
So she knew about the bet, and clearly she was working to convince herself she hadn’t been completely duped—I supposed that would make this easier. But I couldn’t bring myself to let her think she was part of some sick bet. I didn’t want to hurt her more than I had to.
The back of my throat ached, my words scraping on the way out. “It’s just not going to work, this thing with you and me.”
Unshed tears glistened in her eyes and I hated myself. “What was this thing? I wasn’t another one of your bets, I know there was more to it. The way I feel when I’m with you…” She put her hand over her heart. “You felt it, too, I know you did. I’m not totally crazy.”
A sharp pain stabbed me right through the chest. “I just can’t do the relationship thing right now,” I said. “And now your brother knows, and it’s way too much drama. I don’t have time for it.”
“Oh, so it’s not as exciting now that we’re not hiding. You have to deal with real issues and being part of my life, and that takes effort, I get it.”
I worked to keep my breaths even. In and out. No showing how much this killed me. “I’m trying to end it before anyone gets hurt. That’s it.”
“You’re a little late. Because I am hurt.” She pinned me with her blue eyes. “In the middle of it all, we were still friends, remember? What? Now you don’t even want to be that?”
“It’s not a good idea. We don’t walk that line very well.” I took a swig of my coffee to have something to do, but all it did was sour in my gut. “I’m sorry it didn’t work out, and I wish you the best.”
I stood and she stood right along with me. “You wish me the best? Really?” She grabbed my arm. “If you’re going to dump me, just have the balls to tell me the truth. Is it someone else? Is that why you pulled away any time I asked for more?”
“Why does it matter?”
“Because it does, and you not telling me is making me think the worst.”
The problem was, it could’ve happened. I didn’t remember the end of Friday night—I was hammered enough that I could’ve screwed up. Megan definitely didn’t deserve a guy like that. But still, the thought of lying and saying there was someone else would crush her, and I didn’t want to crush her. I just wanted her to leave me in the rearview mirror so she could join that program and live her life without having to deal with my m
esses.
“No, this isn’t about anyone else. It’s because this isn’t working anymore.” My chest ached like someone had reached inside and was twisting my heart, squeezing tighter and tighter, until it threatened to burst. “Like you said, you want more, and I can’t give it.
“You’re the one who paid for the counselor for Lissa, aren’t you?” I blurted it out, not sure why, but I wanted to know I was right about that, too.
Guilt flooded Megan’s features. Then she lifted her chin. “I was trying to help—I’m in a position to, and I wanted her to get the counseling she needed before it was too late.”
For the past month and a half she’d settled for what I could give her, which was pathetic compared to what she gave me. “Thank you for helping my family, but I don’t need your charity. Please don’t butt into my business again.” I hated to push, to imply it had made me want to end things, when it made me want to hug her and never let her go. But it served as further proof I wasn’t right for her.
I tossed a handful of bills on the table. “Like I said before, good luck with everything.”
“Don’t you want to add ‘it’s not you, it’s me?’ How about some other cliché things? Like how I’m going to make someone really happy someday, or that we can still be friends. Oh, wait. You already shot that down.”
A tear ran down her cheek.
The self-loathing flooding my system soaked deep into my bones, making them ache. “You can have the diner if you want. I’ll find somewhere else to go at night when I can’t sleep.”
“I don’t want the fucking diner. It was yours to begin with, and you can have it, because after this, I won’t be able to come in here anymore. Just take everything. And here…” Megan dug into her backpack, extracted a cardboard Thor hammer, and tossed it on the table. “My sister had party favors for her birthday, and I brought that back for you, thinking it was some kind of good omen. Clearly I’m an idealistic idiot.”
She started past me, but paused, close enough to touch. Her gaze remained fixed on the door. “For the record, all I wanted was you.” With that, she stormed out the door and was swallowed up by the dark night.
In theory, I was halfway to the type of guy I could feel proud of now. But pride didn’t fill me. Nothing did. And that nothingness spread until I was hollow and empty, the words “All I wanted was you,” echoing over and over until I didn’t think there was anything of me left.
Chapter Forty-Five
Megan
Einstein curled up in my lap, purring when I scratched under his chin. It was like he sensed I needed some unconditional love.
But the second I stopped scratching, he meowed and abandoned me, so apparently it wasn’t as unconditional as I thought.
And now I was having deep thoughts over cat love.
Lyla came back into the room with cookies and cream ice cream and two spoons. “I’m not saying this’ll fix it, but it’s how Whitney and I have always dealt with things.”
I took the extended spoon, and as soon as she opened the lid, I dug in. I’d texted Vanessa, but she was at a study group, and I couldn’t face going back to my room to cry alone.
So instead I’d come to Lyla’s apartment and cried my eyes out as I rehashed the end of Dane and me, friendship and all. My heart was filled to the brim with sadness, every pump sending it farther through my body until it felt like that was all there was and all there’d ever be.
The ice cream slid down my throat, spreading the cold. I wished it had more of a numbing effect—I could use complete numbness right now.
The knock on the door was rapid fire, the type of knock I assumed came before “Or I’ll blow your house down.” Not sure why my brain went to folktales, but clearly it wasn’t firing on all cylinders.
It wasn’t the big bad wolf. It was my roommate, but judging by the fierce expression hardening her features, she could do some serious destruction if she decided to use her powers that way. “What did that asshole do? I’ll kill him.”
“It’s more what he didn’t do,” I said, sniffing in the most attractive way. “We’re done—before I could even ask for more of a commitment, he wanted out.”
Vanessa sat next to me and hugged me tight.
“I’m going to pass on putting a hit out on him, but thanks for having my back.”
Her curls brushed my cheek as she nodded. “Anytime. I didn’t expect to like anyone so much after Ciara left. Now I feel kind of guilty, because I like you even better.”
Happy tears sprung to my eyes, mixing with the sad ones. I had a real friend, no need for quotations or a so-called tacked on before the word. I felt so lucky to have Lyla, and with Vanessa here, too, I realized that despite compromising on a few of my checklist items, I hadn’t failed. “Just… Never let me even think about picking a guy over my ambitions again, okay?”
“I’d like a medal for my epic restraint in not saying I told you that you’d be crazy not to take the engineering opportunity, no matter what happened with Dane.” Vanessa frowned. “Since I just said it, that’s not really restraint, is it?”
Lyla’s eyebrows arched, but she actually did restrain from speaking her thoughts aloud.
“Okay,” I said. “Both of you made it clear you didn’t think I should pass up the opportunity.” I felt so stupid for considering it now, and it only deepened the torment over the entire crappy situation.
The truth was, I thought I’d been crushed by a guy before, but it hadn’t been nearly as agonizingly painful as this. Sure, I regretted sleeping with Brandon and how doing so was all it took to get a reputation as being easy.
But I didn’t regret sleeping with Dane, or the time we’d spent together, even as I wanted to erase it all so the thought of him didn’t rip my heart in two. It made no sense.
And to think, I’d actually longed to fall in love at one point.
Even though I’d never spoken it aloud, I knew I’d loved Dane. Part of me still did, as messed up as that was. I dug out a huge spoonful of ice cream and shoved it in my mouth. “Now I know why they say love bites. It’s like it tore chunks out of my soul.”
Vanessa slung an arm around my shoulders, and Lyla hugged me from the other side.
The door swung open and Whitney stepped inside. Her gaze flicked from the three of us to the ice cream.
Then, without so much as a word, she came over and joined the group hug. “I’m sorry,” she said. “Guys can be dicks sometimes.”
I almost asked how she knew it wasn’t something else, but instead, I just held on to these three girls, glad that while an overwhelming sense of loneliness had settled deep into my bones, I wasn’t totally alone.
Me + Lyla + Vanessa + Whitney = strong enough to eventually get through this.
So even though tonight hadn’t ended the way I wanted it to, and I wasn’t sure that whole better to have loved and lost than not loved at all thing was true, I wasn’t going to let it ruin all the progress I’d made.
I had these awesome friends, the engineering program to look forward to, and I no longer held back who I was. I’d put my whole self out there and stood up for what I wanted.
And damn it, I was worth fighting for.
If Dane didn’t see that, he wasn’t the guy for me.
I had a feeling I’d need to tell myself that fact a lot over the next few weeks. I didn’t want to think about what I’d do if it took more than that to get over him, even as my heart whispered it would take longer than that to fully heal.
Chapter Forty-Six
Dane
I never knew that it could physically hurt to not text someone.
Larry refilled my coffee mug and cast a pointed glance at the empty bench across from me.
“Don’t start,” I said.
“The very nice pretty girl doesn’t come in anymore, and you sit here looking all sad. It’s kind of hard not to notice.”
The hollow sensation that’d been my constant companion opened wider, sucking away every ounce of happiness it could find, wh
ich wasn’t much these days. “That sounds suspiciously like starting.”
“I just don’t know why I have to suffer because you didn’t stop her from walking out of here last week. Maybe you could make it right? Have you tried flowers? Big-ass flowers. Women love that.”
“I don’t think that’d be enough. Thanks for the coffee, but I’ve got some studying to do.” I pulled my books toward me, not wanting to see the disappointment on his face. It wasn’t last week that I’d failed to stop Megan from walking out, either. It was a week and three long-ass days.
It was torture, each of those days and nights and all those minutes and seconds.
I glanced at my phone, and a dull ache wound through my wrist, ran up my arm, and settled in my chest. I turned my attention to my coffee, sipping it and waiting for the caffeine to kick in. The problem with barely sleeping was that it dulled your senses, and I’d OD’d on caffeine so much it hardly made a difference anymore.
When I heard the door open, I automatically looked, hoping Megan would walk in, even though I knew it wouldn’t be her. I did a double take at Hudson and Whitney. They came over and sat across from me.
“Is this where you’ve been every night this past week?” Hudson knew I occasionally came here, just not how often.
“Bro, I’m trying to get through all my assignments. I’m behind.”
Whitney hadn’t said much to me since Megan and I parted ways, and I was sure she’d seen her—for more than the few minutes I allowed myself to stare at her in our calculus class, from the very back of the room. Before I could stop myself, I asked, “How’s Megan? Did she take that position in the engineering program?”
Whitney tilted her head. Since she and Lyla were all about the girl-power thing, similar to the way my sisters used to bond together to outvote me, I thought she’d tell me to go to hell, or some other such pleasantry.
Instead her features softened. “She’s in the program, yeah. Not sure about how she is. I think pretty hurt still.”
My throat tightened and I scratched my jaw. “She’ll get through it. She’s strong, and in the end, she’ll be better off without me.”