Lose Me: (New Adult Billionaire Romance) (Broken Idols)

by M. C. Frank

  We change in the little white cabins by the fig trees and come out with our lips turning blue with cold. We get into the water and swim to the Rubble. On top of the cliff, the yellow villa is silent, shutters down, terrace empty.

  The water isn’t so bad, as the sea still retains some of its autumn warmth, and I soon get used to it. It feels so good to swim; I haven’t been here since that Tuesday. I try not to think about that day, and focus instead on my strokes and the memories of all the times I trained here with dad or Coach, but still I have a headache by the time I start climbing the rocks.

  Just from remembering.

  “You okay?” Wes asks. I look at him as he stands there, the wetsuit accentuating his biceps, the soft down of his hair darkened by the water.

  “No,” I answer. “I’m not okay.”

  “I know,” he says. “This is what today is all about. You have no idea how much I want to fix you, baby, but I can’t. No one else can do it for you but you.”

  “Face your fears and all that, huh?” I mumble, grabbing a rock and starting to climb up the jagged cliff of the Rubble.

  Wes follows right below me, carefully placing his hands and feet in the exact spots as me. I’m so proud of him, being smart instead of trying to show off, which is what every other guy I know—including my dad—would be doing right now.

  His whole attitude makes me realize that this is not about him. He’s just here to support me, but this is not something we’re doing together. It’s all up to me.

  And I’m scared out of my mind.

  Fake it till you make it, as Katia says. Well, she was full of crap. I reach the top and look down, getting dizzy. I know it’s stupid, and I know I’ve done this dive a million times, but my brain is certain that if I jump I’ll drown.

  Like certain certain.

  “Ready?” Wes says, panting slightly behind me.

  Was this thing always so high? I don’t remember it being so far above the sea. Wait, maybe the sea receded. Does it do that in this beach? Maybe there’s a tide? No, there isn’t. And global warming is the waterline rising, not dropping. Right.

  We’re completely alone, no one there for miles. Even the street is nearly deserted.

  “Stop being stupid,” I whisper to myself.

  “Stop being a twit, you mean,” Wes says behind me.

  I turn around and grab him, kissing him full on the mouth. Before I can take a proper breath, I jump off and free-fall, feet first, into the water.

  The cold is nothing compared to the fear that grips me as soon as my body hits the surface. I open my eyes and water gets in my vision, bubbles twirling crazily around me, and for a second I forget to float upwards, opening my lips in a panic and getting in a gulp of water.

  Instinct kicks in and, since there’s nothing wrong with my legs or my head this time, which is to say I’m not having a seizure or a crippling headache, I rise to the surface and take a big gulp of air.

  “You good?” someone yells at me from above.

  Wes hasn’t jumped after me. He’s still on top of the rocks, leaning down, watching me.

  I lift my hand in a thumbs-up.

  “It was perfect, baby,” he shouts, and of course it wasn’t, but I know what he means and I smile. “I knew it,” his voice, loud and clear, rings all around me. “You can do anything, you’re fearless!”

  “Get down here,” I yell at him.

  He extends a leg and does one and a half somersault in the air, shooting like an arrow towards the water. “Show-off,” I murmur, but a smile spreads itself across my lips in spite of myself.

  I don’t have time to say anything else, because he lands with an elegantly small splash right next to me, grabbing my arm and dragging me for a long dive with him. We surface a few seconds later, and he gasps for air against my lips, kissing me at the same time.

  “Besides,” he pants after a minute or so, when we finally part, “I’ve got your back.”

  “I know you do.” I want to say everything to him. I’m ready now. “Listen, I never thanked you for saving me those both times and for arranging everything with the hospital and the operation. . . ”

  He makes a gesture as though he wants me to stop, but I look at him straight in the eyes and he understands that I have to say these things.

  “And the reason I never did,” I go on, kicking my legs to keep afloat in the blue-green waters, “the reason I never did was that I didn’t truly feel thankful. I know this is a terrible thing to say, but for a long time there didn’t seem to be a difference between when I was sick with. . . with the tumor,” I swallow as I say the word, “and when I was sick after the operation. Or sick with fear.”

  Wes circles my waist and pulls me to him. I rest my head on his shoulder.

  “I want to be different too,” I tell him. “What you wrote in the note you left me. . . I read every word, Wes. I know it by heart. I know I have been granted life for a reason. I know that being a walking, taking miracle is a responsibility as well. Surviving is not enough. I want to live. And if you have to fight against your. . . ”

  “Addiction,” he supplies, seeing me hesitate.

  “That. If that’s a constant battle, mine will be a war against the fear that something bad will happen. I don’t know if I can ever totally overcome it, but for the first time I’m willing to try. To face it, not to cower away in a corner.”

  “You already did,” he tells me, pressing a wet kiss to my temple. His lips feel like ice cubes.

  “Yeah, but it was only once,” I reply. “And you’re right. We will have all the time in the world, you and me, all our. . . lives.”

  “. . . lives,” he says at the same time as me and we smile at each other, happiness bursting out of our chests like a current. His chest rises and falls as he gulps in a breath, but before I can ask him what’s wrong, he pulls me beneath the surface to kiss me in the water.

  “What was that for?” I ask, as he propels us above water in a few seconds. The heady sensation of his lips taking mine is making me dizzy.

  “To exorcise one of my own fears,” he says. “The memory of almost being too late.” He cups my neck and presses my body to his.

  “We were doomed from that day, weren’t we?”

  “Totally,” he replies, his face serious.

  Theo’s tortured eyes from the hospital flash before my eyes, out of nowhere. I remember every strange, tortured word that came out of his mouth, I remember the way his face looked, a mask of pain and sorrow. I know nothing about him; I have no idea what he’s going through. But a week ago, my heart had tightened painfully for him and I just wanted to hug him, to make all this pain that was weighing him down disappear.

  How does it feel for his friends to feel like that and be unable to help? I remember how Pan looked at him, like a bear ready to pounce on anyone who attacked her cubs. What if Wes had felt like that about me, and I had wrenched myself away from him? Away from everyone who wanted to share my fear, my pain, my sorrow.

  I don’t want to be that person. The person who doesn’t even want to fight for their own life.

  ‘Why would you want to do that?”

  ‘Do what? Live?’

  Even after all the pain I have experienced, nothing compares to the depth of suffering I saw in the chocolate-brown eyes of the rich kid who’d been left behind by a brother who went to the war. And yet, I’d been that person for a bit.

  I almost gave up.

  And I had no right to.

  So that’s when it finally hits me. What he’s been trying to tell me from the beginning, even before he knew what was going on with me.

  “I don’t regret what happened that day,” I say. “Wes, I don’t.” I repeat it, surprised to hear the words coming out of my own lips. “I don’t regret having had the tumor. I used to think of it as that horrible, horrible thing that happened to me out of the blue, and it was, but now I realize. . . ”

  Wes doesn’t interrupt me. He just floats next to me, waiting for me to finish
my train of thought.

  “I realize I’d have to have it. I’d have to have it in order to overcome it. In order to become who I am today and who I want and hope to be tomorrow. That girl who thought she was tough because she could kick your ass in soccer and pretty much anywhere else—she wasn’t really tough. She had to remind herself not to die every single day. She didn’t know how to fight the fights that mattered. And I’m not saying I know how to fight now, but I’m learning to. I’m learning to survive; to live. I’m. . . Is it wrong to say I’m glad this happened?”

  It takes a moment for him to speak. “I love that girl who had to remind herself not to die every day,” he says, his voice breaking. “I didn’t know that was what you had to do at the time, and it would have broken my heart if I did, but I’m so proud of you for surviving the only way you could. That’s why I fell for you, head over heels. Your strength, it drew me towards you like a magnet.”

  He pulls me close and presses his lips to my cheek.

  “But what you’ve become now. . . It’s a complete transformation and I can’t believe how privileged I am to be witnessing it. I told you I love how this whole thing changed me, what it made me become. And I can’t say I’m glad it happened, not in a million years. . . ” he sucks in a breath. “But, baby, I am beyond words proud of you and of the woman you’re becoming.”

  Did he actually say ‘woman’? I feel a furious blush spread across my cheeks, and duck my head in the water.

  He just looks at me and smiles, flipping onto his back and spreading his arms lazily, as though the sea isn’t nearing Arctic temperatures.

  “All right,” I say. “So, I need you to go.”

  “Huh?” his sandy eyebrows shoot up. I look at his lips longingly; they’re red and dripping with water. “Don’t do that.” His voice is hoarse and I realize I’d been licking my lips. Instead of stopping, I smile, biting them, and look up through lowered eyelashes. “Don’t start something you can’t finish,” he groans, grabbing my waist.

  He drinks my lips thirstily and then we tangle our fingers together, starting to sink slowly. I forget all about the cold as the familiar rush of his proximity floods every sense. I could stay like this forever, with his arms around me, his body between me and the freezing wall of water. His hands travel all over my back, ending up on my neck. When the water reaches our foreheads we untangle ourselves and kick to the surface.

  “What were you saying before starting this ridiculous come-on?” he rasps, lifting me so I can wrap my legs around his waist. “Damn, baby, when you move your hips like that it makes me crazy. . . no, that’s not helping. Stay absolutely still. Hold on a sec, I can’t. . . breathe.” He runs his hand through his hair, shaking the droplets from his eyes. “So, what was it?”

  “Eh? Oh right,” I murmur. “I said please leave. I need some alone time with the Rubble, like old times.”

  He holds me away from him for a second to look at my face with a serious expression. “Leave as in, go sit on top of the rock, or leave as in, get in the car?”

  “Leave like go back to town,” I whisper as I trace a line of kisses along his neckline.

  He starts moaning. “Baby, what are you doing to me?” I feel him go weak beneath my fingertips, and I tighten my legs more securely around his waist.

  “I need to do this on my own,” I say. “But stay for a little while.”

  “I’m this close to unzipping your suit,” he murmurs.

  We stay like this until we can’t take it any longer, and then he swims to the shore. He tells me he can’t bear to leave me alone, and I plead with my eyes. “What if. . . um, what if something happens, what if you get tired and I’m not here? Or—?”

  “Nothing is going to happen,” I interrupt him. His eyes have started to look tormented again, and I can’t stand it. I speak matter-of-factly, hoping that just saying things out loud will help scatter both our fears. “I just need to do this alone, that’s it. I’ve done it many times this summer, you know.”

  “Oh, I saw,” he replies. His eyebrow shoots up, and he starts smiling again; I know that smile, it’s his ‘let’s have fun teasing Ari’ smile. “I saw you dive. You were really good.”

  So I dunk him.

  After that he leaves, reluctantly. I stay in the same spot, watching the splash of his strokes getting smaller as he reaches the beach, then his tall, slim silhouette as he jogs across the sand in his wetsuit. He unzips it and lets the top part hang around his waist—I can understand how he feels hot in the middle of a windy wintry day.

  I too feel like I could burst from my skin. But first things first. Taking my eyes off him with difficulty, I start swimming towards the Rubble.

  ◊◊◊

  And so it finishes, this particular chapter of my life, just like it began.

  Just me and the Rubble, the water sparkling in the sun around us. I dive until my limbs feel like they’re made of rubber and my lungs start burning. It’s from excitement this time, though; not fear.

  Behind me, voices.

  Dad telling me it was perfect.

  Coach assuring me I’ve got this.

  Lee lifting his hand in a salute.

  Ollie screaming ‘all right!’ in celebration.

  Katia calling to tell me how lucky I am to have met the pirate in real life, for the thousandth time.

  And Wes.

  ‘Besides, I’ve got your back.’

  And someone else. Someone else. Calling, calling, calling to me ‘I love you.’ Visible and invisible in the vast expanse of water at my feet, in the clouds above me.

  Blue surrounding me on all sides.

  I pause for a second on top of the rocks and take in the familiar view. So much beauty, so much love. I feel as if I can breathe it in, the love that surrounds me. Someone created this world for me to live in. Someone is watching over me right now.

  The same Someone who saved my life when I flatlined in that operation room. Because it’s true. I may have tried to avoid this realization for some time, because it was too scary, but it is true. Someone saved my life.

  I needed saving. And I was saved. I know it wasn’t Wes or the doctors, or just luck. It wasn’t just one of these random things that happen. I’d be an idiot to think like that.

  ‘You’re a walking miracle,’ Jamie said to me over and over at the hospital.

  Well, I want to start living that miracle. Leave all the guilt and fear behind.

  ‘I also don’t judge you guilty.’

  That’s the life I want to live. Loved. Unafraid. Forgiven. Transforming, growing day by day. Not alone. Never alone.

  I dive and climb and dive again until the water is just water, and the rocks are part of my homeland’s soil, and the dive is just another stunt.

  I dive with my fears staring me in the face, and I refuse to look at them.

  Somewhere in the distance, maybe in the next rise of the road, Wes is waiting for me—I’m pretty sure he didn’t go home as I told him, he’ll just stay there until he sees me walking up from the beach, covered in dried salt water and exhausted, if I know him at all.

  Tomorrow or the day after, pappous and yiayia will lay down the white tablecloth on the long, narrow dining-room table and we’ll all sit down for a huge dinner with dad, and Wes. Yiayia will have cooked spanakopita and pastitsada and her famous bergamot pies that are the pride of Corfu, and she’ll make us take seconds of everything, until Wes won’t even be able to remember why he ever thought souvlaki was so awesome in the first place. It will be nothing compared to this spread.

  Maybe Katia will be there too, she’s still home for the holidays. She’ll tell me how pretty my hair looks and I’ll make a face and then she’ll have to say hi to Wes, who will tell her he’s heard everything about her. She’ll blush and he’ll explain that I’m always talking his ear off about her and I’ll say shut up, I’m not, and Wes will laugh and punch me playfully and Katia will look down, totally swooning inside, but also kind of intimidated and kind of happy. I’ll com
pletely feel the same, and I won’t be able to wait until she and I are alone in my room to ask her whether she’s lost some weight and if she’s eating properly in Athens.

  Also, what does she think of my brother?

  Everyone will pretend they’re not watching Wes all the time, but he’ll notice. He’ll be cool with it though, except maybe for once, when he’ll lean down to whisper to me that he can’t wait until we’re alone. Maybe Ollie will catch a flight from L.A. and he’ll be there too, and I’ll have everyone I love in the same room to tell them once again how happy I am to be here with them, alive. Living.

  Then we’ll eat everything in sight and fall into that cozy, post-Greek-food hibernation in front of the fireplace, my hand tangled in Wes’ fingers, Ollie drooling on my shoulder. Maybe I’ll catch Katia’s eye across the sofa and she’ll smile at me, lifting her new phone to take a picture of the three of us lying there, sprawled like kids next to the Christmas tree.

  When Ollie wakes up maybe he’ll suggest we go for a game of soccer and Wes will mumble that he didn’t know we celebrated Thanksgiving in Greece, cause that sure felt like one heck of a meal, and my grandma will tell him in Greek that this is how we eat every Sunday. He won’t understand, but he’ll laugh anyway, then run upstairs to put on a pair of my dad’s sweats.

  We’ll spend the rest of the day together, and when the night descends, Wes and I will go for a little walk on the kantounia, the moon peeking down at us from dark heavens, and he’ll not take his arms from around me for a second, our bodies close, our breaths warming our frozen fingers. He’ll grab me and kiss me in the same tiny alley we walked through that night in September, and we’ll forget all about the cold.

  He’ll tell me how he was watching me on those days we trained together on set, how he was conscious of my every movement, and how he was mad that I wouldn’t even look at him. I’ll tell him I was totally checking him out the whole time and I’ll expect him to laugh, but his eyes will go tender and serious and he’ll wrap his arms around me and say ‘I love you, Ari mou.’

  The day after I’ll come back here, at the Rubble.