by Ronica Black
“I’m letting you go.”
“You’re pushing—damn near shoving me away.”
“I’m being realistic.”
“You’re running. Hiding. You’re scared.”
“No.”
Blake came at her, forced her back against the couch and straddled her. She took Cam’s hands and placed them on her face. “Tell me you don’t have feelings for me.”
Cam’s voice left her as the warmth of Blake’s body took precedence.
“What I feel—doesn’t matter.”
Blake leaned in. “Yes, it does. It’s what’s got you so scared. Tell me you don’t want me, Cam. Want this.” She kissed her. Lightly, delicately, her lips taking their sweet, sweet time in tasting hers.
Cam couldn’t help but respond and she yearned to cling to her, to melt into her. But instead of balling Blake’s shirt in her hands and tugging her closer, she gently pushed her away.
“I can’t deny our attraction. I’m not even going to try. But that’s all this is. It couldn’t ever be anything more. For us to think otherwise, with our differences, personal and professional, and the distance between us, we would both end up getting hurt.” Her voice faltered just as she finished and her throat felt like it had caved in.
Blake stared at her long and hard and then climbed off of her. “You’re afraid I won’t come back.” She faced the fireplace, as if relating to its cold, desolate emptiness, ran her hands through her hair, and then looked at her again with obvious anger. “I told you, Cam, I want to be here. I want my clinic, I want…you.”
“We don’t always get what we want. Things happen. There’s no guarantee—”
“Look, I understand that you’re scared. And I understand why. But for someone who has prided herself the past few years on appreciating the little things in life, the important things, like love, while refusing to worry about all the rest…” She shook her head. “You need to do what you told me to do the day we first met. You need to take your own advice. And live in the moment. Live in the now. Because life is short, Cam. I would think you would know that better than anyone.”
She waited a moment and when Cam didn’t speak, she seemed to deflate. “Maybe someday you’ll be able to live like you preach. Because I think that you want to be able to do that more than anything. And I’m hoping someday you can. Good-bye, Cam.”
She turned and walked to the door, kneeling quickly to give the dogs a tearful kiss good-bye. Then she was gone and Cam was alone.
Once again alone.
Chapter Forty-three
Cam awoke at her desk and realized she’d fallen asleep again while writing late into the night. She rubbed her face, which was sore on one side from the press of her spiral notebook, which, she noticed as she glanced down, she’d drooled on as well as slept. She ran her finger over the finger pad of her laptop and woke her computer. She was relieved to see her document had saved and that she’d actually been able to get more done than she had been able to in the last couple of weeks. She pushed back her chair and stood.
The dogs followed her into the kitchen where she made herself some coffee. Then the dogs trailed after her out onto the patio.
She stood at the wall and looked down the beach as dawn broke in the east. Her heart sank as she envisioned Blake running along the sand, the dogs happily ambling alongside her. Her mind did this to her every day. Bringing Blake to her the way she’d seen her almost every morning. Jogging toward her in her tenacious manner, like a soldier on a mission, the dark, wet sand absorbing her footfalls, the gray light of dawn behind her. But Blake never reached her in these visions. She always slowly faded before she got to her. An apparition that vanished into the mist of the sea, crushing Cam with a new, different sense of loss. Not the loss of what had been and would never be again. But the loss of what never had the chance to be.
She sipped her coffee and watched her dogs play at the water’s edge. For the first week or so after Blake left, they, too, had seemed to be expecting to see her every morning. And they, too, seemed bogged down with sadness at her absence. She wasn’t sure how they were all getting through, the hours of each day dragging on and on. But somehow they were making it, one minute at a time, inhaling and exhaling, but doing little else. A routine that, at one time, had been their norm when Cam had plowed through her grief over Lexi.
Her writing, which had been feverish with Blake there, had lagged and almost ceased completely when she’d left. After a few days of wallowing however, and staring at wine she couldn’t bring herself to drink, Cam had picked up her pen again and began writing down her feelings. She’d then poured those into her manuscript, weaving them into the story, understanding her characters and their pain and journey now better than ever.
Her agent, Irene, seemed to agree. She’d called after reading the draft Cam had sent her and raved about the new direction she’d taken in her work. She’d encouraged her to keep at it and to come up to Phoenix for a meeting soon to discuss it further. So far, Cam had put her and that meeting off. She wasn’t yet sure what she wanted to do with the manuscript. If anything at all. And Irene would try to talk her into selling it. Cam hadn’t produced anything new since the accident and Irene was antsy to get Cam back out into the public eye. Her fans were, according to Irene, restless, confused, hungry for more of her work. Irene wasn’t concerned that the new manuscript was outside of her usual genre. She’d said if anything, Cam would gain a whole new fan base in addition to the one she already had. And that there were many successful authors who wrote and published in different genres.
Cam sipped more coffee, placed the mug on the ledge and walked down to the beach. She walked through the cold sand, hands in her pockets, inhaling the chill coming off the hissing sea. Her flannel sleep pants weren’t very thick, nor was her long-sleeved Billabong shirt. But the dawn air didn’t bother her. She liked how it felt as it spread throughout her chest and settled into her bones.
She didn’t venture far from the house before she stopped and stared out at the ocean. For an instant she thought about stripping out of her clothes to wade out into the Sea of Cortez and dive under the waves to swim and swim until her body screamed for air. At which point she’d surface, suck in giant gulps of oxygen, and then go back under to stroke and kick against the weight of the water again, lost in the dark peace of its silent cocoon.
How far out could she swim? How long before her arms and legs and lungs could take no more and she’d succumb to that dark, quiet, peace?
Would I fight it?
If I pushed myself to that point, to the point of exhaustion and my body began to fail…would I fight those last few seconds when the end was inevitable? Would I try, kicking and flailing for the surface? And if I did, would it be because of instinct? That desperate, innate need for air that every human has, or would it be my own conscious, purposeful doing? My own want and will to live rather than something instinctual and involuntary?
It would be me. My own want and will to live.
She was sure of that. There had been a time, not so long ago, when she wouldn’t have been so certain. Now, however, she was.
But why?
Why would she want to surface and suck in that priceless, God-given air?
What was driving her to continue?
Hope?
She didn’t think of the future. Didn’t dream or want for anything specific.
So why did she think her desperate scramble for the surface would be stemmed from her own conscious will to live?
“Cam?”
Cam turned, startled to hear anyone on the beach at that hour, or really at all. There were very few residents visiting their oceanside homes at present.
McKenna came to stand next to her, her smile looking somewhat hesitant. “Am I intruding? You looked so deep in thought.”
“I—” Was. But I was starting to scare myself. “Just appreciating the splendor of the sea.”
“It is something,” she said. “I could get lost in it forever if I wa
sn’t careful.” She hugged herself and it reminded Cam of Blake and the way she’d often done the same to ward off the cold sea air. She had to glance away from her, the memory too unsettling.
“I didn’t expect to see you guys back so soon,” Cam said. Sloane and McKenna had left for Phoenix not long after Blake, and though they hadn’t said when they’d planned to return, Cam had assumed it wouldn’t be anytime soon, given it was off season.
“It’s been a month,” McKenna said. “If you can believe that.”
I can. Feels more like an eternity. “Hard to believe,” Cam said. She felt McKenna turn to look at her.
“How have you been, Cam?”
“I’ve been all right.” It was her standard response as of late and her friends didn’t question her further, though she suspected they wanted to. So, for the most part, she stayed cooped up at home.
McKenna knelt and scratched Bingo’s head as he bounded up to say hello. “Your little guys seem well. Happy. How about you?”
“Happy enough.”
“Ah.”
“Ah, what?”
“You’re not so happy.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“You didn’t have to. Not with words anyway.”
Cam looked at her. “I forgot how you are.”
“How I am?”
“Insightful.”
She laughed. “You don’t have to be so polite, Cam.”
“Okay, fucking psychic. And I’d say nosy, but you seem to sense things without even trying to pry. But, yeah, at other times, you can be nosy too.”
She cracked up. “That’s more like it. Tell me how you really feel. Seeing as how we are past pleasantries and neighborly politeness? I’d like to think we’re really friends at this point.”
“We are,” Cam said, meaning it. McKenna was a friend. Could quite possibly become a good one. The same could be said for Sloane. There was just one thing Cam had to consider in having the two of them as friends. And she didn’t want to think about it.
“I don’t want to discuss how I am. Not beyond what I already said. I’m all right. Let’s leave it at that.”
“For now?” McKenna tried.
Cam couldn’t help but laugh. “It’s so easy to see how you and Blake are such good friends. You’re both so God damned determined and relentless sometimes.” She stiffened as she realized what she’d said and who she’d said it about. She angled away from McKenna’s direct view and pretended to search the sand for shells. She found a few small pebbles and began tossing them out into the water. She was done with this conversation now and she hoped McKenna, with all her insight, would take notice and leave her be.
She didn’t want to go back there, couldn’t afford to go back there.
She’d moved on from Blake and all the feelings she encompassed.
She’d begun anew again.
She took a few steps forward and looked down at the water as its chill enveloped her bare feet, biting into her skin.
The sensation took her breath away and sent her blood thrumming, forcing her mind to awake and fire.
She watched the water creep toward her again and she took a step back, literally and figuratively, to get a new perspective.
Have I really moved on?
Have I really begun anew?
Chapter Forty-four
“We’re relentless about things we care about,” McKenna said, coming closer. “Things that are important to us.”
Cam tossed another rock, trying to dismiss her own questions on the subject. If and when she did seek the answers to them, she’d want to do it privately.
“We don’t like to let go,” McKenna said. “Especially if what’s important to us is a person. Someone we care deeply for.”
“Sometimes you have to let go,” Cam said, wiping her hands and then shoving them into her pockets. “Sometimes you have to know when to say when.”
“And sometimes, Cam, you can’t. Even if you want to believe it’s the right thing to do. Even if it seems like the right thing to do. In those instances, when you think you’re doing the right thing, for whatever reason, and you find that you just can’t let go, no matter how hard you try, then that’s a clear sign that what you think may be the right thing isn’t the right thing after all. No matter how noble or well-meaning you think it is.”
“I know you’re well-meaning right now, McKenna,” Cam said. “But I told you, I don’t want to talk about this.”
“I am well-meaning. And I’m not listening to you, am I? I’m not shutting up or leaving you alone about this. Because I care. I can’t stop caring about you or this. If I could, then that would suggest that the right thing is being played out. But I can’t stop. Because the right thing isn’t being done. Well-meaning or not.”
“I don’t know what she’s told you,” Cam said. She was starting to get upset, pissed that McKenna wasn’t respecting her wishes and annoyed at all her well-meaning gibberish. “But I did more than just what I thought was right. I faced reality. One of us had to.” She started walking back toward her house, not caring in the least if McKenna thought she was rude. In her mind, McKenna was being rude by pushing the issue.
“She hasn’t said a word,” McKenna said, hurrying after her. Cam didn’t slow her pace. “She never would. And she didn’t have to.”
“Yeah, the whole psychic thing,” Cam said.
“She’s my dear friend and I know her very, very well. You want to call it psychic, go ahead. Call it bullshit for all I care. It doesn’t bother me. But what does bother me is seeing my dear, good friend hurt. And seeing my new, dear friend hurt. Needlessly.”
Cam closed in on her patio. She whistled for the dogs who were farther behind her than she’d realized.
“She’s working herself to death, Cam. Even sleeping at the practice some nights. She won’t talk to anyone. Won’t spend time with anyone outside of work. Her folks are worried. Her mother has come to me asking me if she’s sick and just not telling anyone.”
“She’s probably upset about the clinic,” Cam said. “And having to tell them about it. She’s been anxious over that for a long time.” Cam started walking up the patio steps. The dogs rushed up alongside her.
“She’s given up the clinic, Cam.”
Cam froze.
“She dropped everything. Told Sloane and everyone else she was no longer interested. That it was a pipe dream and ridiculous.”
Cam took in a big breath and tried to control her reaction. “That’s her choice, McKenna.”
“You know as well as I do, that is not her choice. You know that isn’t what she wants.”
“Blake does exactly what she wants,” Cam said. “She’s the most stubborn, willful, and determined woman I’ve ever known.”
“Then you should know what it is she’s doing.”
“She’s doing what she wants.”
“Just like you are?”
Cam continued up the steps.
“You’re both so full of shit you can’t see what’s right in front of your face. What everyone else within a fifty-mile radius of you can see. Or…what I think…I think you can see it. Both of you. And you feel it. And that’s why you’re both doing your damnedest to stay away from each other. You tell her to fuck off. She leaves. And now she’s giving up her life’s dream so she won’t have to be anywhere near you.”
Cam spun on her heel. “You’re blaming me for her choosing to not to pursue her clinic? Christ, McKenna, that’s low. That’s really low.”
“Cam, she’s giving it up because it would mean she would be here. In Mexico.”
“So? She wouldn’t be near me. She’d be close to town.”
“To Blake, Cam, it would be too close. Don’t you see? She’d be too tempted. She’d be able to feel you. She’d want to get in her car and come to you. Blake is a very stubborn woman, Cam, but when she loves…she’s all in and it’s the one thing she cannot control. Despite her wanting more than anything to be able to. She can’t come back. She won�
�t come back. Cam, she’s already told us she’s never coming back to our place. She hasn’t said why, but I know why. Being anywhere close to you and not being able to love you, to be with you, it would hurt her too badly.”
“So, what am I supposed to do?” Cam said. “Move?”
“Don’t be a jerk, Cam. It isn’t you and I see right through it.”
Cam threw up her hands. “Then I’m lost. I don’t know what you want me to do.”
“I want you to do what’s in your heart. I want you to face your true reality and feel it and deal with it whether it scares you or makes you uncomfortable or drives you insane. Blake, I have a feeling, tried to do it. I know that woman’s heart and what I saw in her that last time she came to you was love. And it was real. And for whatever reason, you turned her away. And she won’t push you on it, Cam. She’s not like that. She’s very strong in many, many ways, but she is human and rejection sucks, I don’t care who you are.”
“It can’t work,” Cam said, but her voice was weak, telling of her own lack of conviction.
“If you love each other, it can work. It will work. Because you will both make it work.”
Cam shook, the cold suddenly penetrating. She stared beyond McKenna and out into the sea. She thought about diving down under the waves again and swimming as hard as she could until her lungs felt like bursting.
“I’ll leave you be now,” McKenna said. “I would apologize for upsetting you, but I’d only half mean it. I don’t want to cause you any pain, but at the same time, I do want to cause you to feel. And if pain is a part of that picture, then it is. I care about you, Cam. And I care about Blake. This is the last I’ll say about this to either of you, regardless of what you do.”
She walked away and left Cam staring out at the sea, where she was imagining pulling at the heavy weight of the water with her arms and kicking against it with her legs. Her lungs were burning, her muscles on fire, desperate for air. She could see the glimmer of the surface from the dark depths, but the depths were calm and comforting and offering her peace and solace from any more pain. They were tempting her, encouraging her to give in and let go. To stop trying, to relax her body and just sink, down, down, down. But she looked up at the pale glimmer of light. Where the surface was, where life was. And she saw Blake. Saw her swimming at her from just below the surface, her hand outstretched. And Cam felt a surge of life explode inside her and she swam harder, wanting, needing to get to her. And when she reached her and she touched her hand and shot up out of the water to suck in the wondrous air, she realized she wasn’t there. She was alone, treading water, gasping for breath. But it felt so good to breathe. To be alive. To feel the cold of the water, the chill of the air, the ache in her body. And she knew then, that though she’d chosen to swim because she’d seen Blake, the thrill and rush of life was so good she knew she’d choose to swim for herself from now on, regardless of who was or was not waiting for her at the surface.