Page 62 of Those Heartbreak Scars

“But you do now.”

“It doesn’t matter.” There’s not a damn thing I’m willing to do about it. “She’s with someone. Really with them.”

“So you’ll fight it.” She nods. “And you’ll drown in how much you want her every time you see her. Every time you watch him touch her. Or kiss her. Until it becomes impossible to control. Until it’s unbearable.”

“No.”

“No?”

“NO.” I punch the steering wheel. My lungs are so tight. Every breath hurts. “I’m not you. I’m not that prick you married.”

“You’re human, Gray. And you’re miserable. Or you were before you started spending time with America. I honestly don’t even know if you were happy with me. But you deserve to be. As much as he does. As much as she does. As much as any of us.”

“No, I don’t.” I shake my head as I pull into the parking lot. I probably look like I’m talking to myself. I am talking to myself. But it doesn’t change anything. “I don’t have the right to be happy at someone else’s expense. You didn’t have the right to do that to me either.”

“So we should all just be miserable then? Like your mom and dad? Stuck with each other and hurting one another when they could have walked away.”

“It’s not the same thing and you know it. My parents are miserable people. They could leave each other and they would still be unhappy. You and I would have found a way to be happy together.”

She shakes her head. “I’m sorry, Gray. I did the best that I could given the situation. I never meant to hurt you. But we would have made each other miserable eventually. You’re starting to accept that.”

A kid on a bike slaps his hand against the hood of my car, breaking me out of my trance-like state. Shoulders heaving, I wipe the wetness from my chin.

Indy had said something similar in the hospital the day she broke up with me. Not the part about us making each other miserable. But that love and loyalty weren’t enough for her. She wanted more.

For months I have hated her so much for my not being enough to make her stay. I don’t hate her for that as much as I used to.

Chapter Twenty-Three

America

“They played your song at Silks today,” I tell Dove when I return from an early aerial class to find her curled up on the couch with a strong cup of tea. “It slaps. It’s so freaking awesome.”

I bop around to the tune that’s still stuck in my head as I dunk a tea bag in my cup. Add a dash of almond milk and a swirl of sugar. Make it good and strong before I discard the bag and join her.

I have a meeting a little later this morning with the counselor at the university that I don’t want to think about. At least not until I have to. Gray was going to come with me in case I had to deal with Alfie. He won’t be doing that anymore.

He won’t be in my life anymore.

God, that’s a desolate thought. A pang grows in my chest, and I push away the negative thoughts that plagued me all night and sent me running to do a workout that would take all my focus.

I can’t let them creep in or I’ll break down again. Everett deserves more than that. I promised him I’d give him the chance to make me forget Gray. I have to do my best to put him out of my head. And my heart.

“How are you doing?” I sit down across from Dove. She seems lost in her thoughts and the cup of tea she’s cradling. She hasn’t said anything about what happened between her and her asshole manager.

Not that we’ve had a chance to talk. Yesterday was a complete wash. By the time I’d made up with Everett and told Gray to stay away, she’d been practically comatose. She was still sleeping when I left this morning to take a class. I’d hoped it would take my mind off the look on Gray’s face when he saw me kissing Everett.

The emotion I saw there. It still makes me lose my breath. “Dove?”

“Sorry?” She startles and lifts her thumb to her lips, biting on the side of it. The shadows under her eyes are too dark. They don’t just look like exhaustion. They look unhealthy. Like she’s been on a bender.

She tugs on the arm of her comfort sweater and I notice that several of her fingernails are broken. She only breaks out that sweater when she’s sad. “Did you have to fight him off? Did he…”

“Oh.” She glances at her hands and shakes her head, curling her fingers into her palm. “That’s not… it’s not what it looks like.”

“Then what happened?”

“He worked it out,” she says with a shrug.

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