Page 47 of Until We Fall

I stiffen. “What? Why?”

His fingers fall from my chest. “I know you would. Maybe not tomorrow, maybe not next week. But after some time, you’d see that I’m not…”

“Enough?” I scrape out of my dry throat. “Don’t keep thinking that.”

His jaw ripples. “But it’s afact.”

“No, it’s not.”

“Yes.” His voice rises. “Itis. It’s like I’m just waiting for what happens when you realize that I’m just some weird little nerd, that I’m notlikeyou. I’m not good enough, from my brain to my body to mydick. So, no, you can’t make a choice based on me—I won’t let you.”

“I’m not your ex,” I say. “I’m not going to leave. I’m not going to?—”

“That’s what makes it evenworse.” He chokes out a sob. “You’ve been my best friend for three years, and when you stop wanting me—” His hands are shaking, his shoulders trembling.

I don’t think I really understood until this moment what it meant to have my family love me like they do. To have people who are always there for me. To have the constant reassurance that someone isn’t going to give up on me. That they’ll be there for me, no matter what decisions I make.

Because Rory’s had the opposite. He’s learned that people are going to give up on him. He’s learned that they aren’t going to put him first. He’s heard it over and over again. Thepattern. And it’s branded him so deeply that now, he struggles to believe anything else.

“I will not give up on you.” My voice steadies. Certainty floods around me. Iknowthis. I feel it. I believe it. No matter what happens between us, I will never give up on him. “I’m not going to stop wanting you. I’m going to want you now, and I’m going to want you tomorrow. Next week and next month and next year. And a lifetime after that. You’re stuck with me.”

He lets out a breath. “You can’t promise that once you see me, youreallysee me, you’ll still be?—”

“Nah, I pretty much can promise that I’ll be attracted to you.” I close the small distance he’d put between us. It feels like my heart is dumping out with my words. Like I’m tossing it at him, and I don’t know if he’s going to catch it.

He stares at me, the frogs chirping over his shoulder, the sky cobalt now, stars peeking down.

I press my lips and then just fucking ask it. “Do you want me back?”

He shivers. “God,yes.”

I expel a breath. “But you’re scared?”

His lips part. “Yes.”

“Of what exactly?” I want to understand him. I want to really know. “Are you scared I won’t want our friendship?”

He shakes his head. “No.”

“Are you scared I won’t want your mind? Your intelligence?”

“No.”

“Your personality?”

He hesitates, not as sure this time, but still gives a firm, “No.”

I brace for the next question because I know the answer. “Are you scared I won’t want your body?”

His hesitation stings, and when the answer comes, it fists like a rock in my chest.

“Yes,” he whispers.

We have failed.

Allof us have failed.

I don’t know that we meant to, but somehow we’ve created these markers about ourselves, about our bodies, about what makes us desirable. We’ve created them foreveryone, and it’s just gotten worse with social media and everything shoved in our faces. We believe we need to conform to some bullshit standards when it’s nottrue.

---