Page 11 of Unravel Me

“Such an old motherfucker. You really can’t hang anymore can you?” Carter teases.

“Oh, I can. I just don’t want to hang with you lame assholes,” I yell over my shoulder as I walk away and leave the gym.

I approach my motorcycle, a beautiful 2016 Harley Davidson Sportster, and swing my leg over, ready to head home and leave the day behind me. I live for the feeling of being on my bike, the connection I have with it—just me and the road. Riding takes all my focus, consuming all of my senses, and allows me to be completely lost in the moment but intensely alive all at once. As the wind hits me, the engine purrs under me and I’m flying over the pavement, my mind completely free of everything except this.

The only other time my mind has ever emptied is when I was with Ivy. When I was near her, I was pulled into her orbit.

Consumed.

Obsessed.

Lost to everything that washer.Even though we were kids, I knew it was more than that. I always knew. She was made for me.

Anger is still coursing through my bloodstream as I anticipate getting the fuck out of downtown and into the open space that will allow me to push myself and my bike to the limit.

The moment I get to the edge of town where everything opens up, I fucking gun it.

Chapter 5

IVY

My phone rings next to me for the millionth time since I left Brooks’ apartment on Friday. Even though I’m 99 percent sure it’s him again, my fingers itch to flip it over and check on the off chance it’s Zoe or one of the dozen places I’ve applied at this week. Brooks has been incessant in his pursuit to talk to me. His phone calls and texts have been getting progressively more demanding and psychotic. After the barrage of phone calls and text messages the night I left him, I blocked his number. Now he just calls me from various work numbers and leaves voicemails. Giving in to the need to know who it is, I pick up my phone.

Missed Call

Unknown Number

Lovely. My phone chimes in my hand with an incoming text.

Unknown Number: You’re mine Ivy.

No the fuck I am not. How the knee to his undercarriage and me moving out of his apartment wasn’t a bright, flashing neon sign for this asshole is beyond me. Clearly he is absolutely delusional. At least he hasn’t shown up at Zoe’s. It would be hard not to reconsider beating him with a table lamp if that were the case.

Blocking the new number and putting my phone back down, I return to the computer to continue my job search. I’ve applied at every restaurant in the Downtown Seattle area whether they’re hiring or not, and I’m about to expand my search. I’m desperate. I know it’s only been a week, but I haven’t had any luck. I’ve worked so hard and love cooking so much. I really don’t want to have to go back to bartending. I want to run a kitchen. Needing to take a break, I pull up the fake social media account that I keep for random times I need to cyberstalk people.

Hello, Nora, no profile picture, thirty years old, from Ogunquit, Maine. I place my cursor in the search bar and hesitate. Do I really want to go down this rabbit hole? While I’ve stalked people for Zoe and myself before potential dates, mostly for her, I’ve never searched for anyone from Aspen Ridge. Leaving home was the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do. The pain of Sawyer’s betrayal, of leaving him and everything I’ve ever known, was too much to bear, and I haven’t been able to bring myself to look anyone up. Leaving Aspen Ridge right after I graduated high school changed me. All of the plans and dreams that were crushed in the wake changed the course of more than just my life. The pain was suffocating.

Like every day over the last two weeks, I raced home to check the mail. Admission letters were going out and I wasstill expecting letters from several schools. Sawyer had already been accepted to the University of Washington, his first choice. Which makes sense since it’s his parents’ alma mater. The look on his face was pure joy when he opened his acceptance, and then per usual, his focus shifted from himself to me.

“I know you’ll get in too. Then after our freshman year we’ll look for a little apartment together close to campus. I can’t wait to live with you, Ivy. Wake up to you every single day. We’ll finally be able to start our lives together.”

“I hope so. All of this hinges on me actually getting in, though.”

“You will. They’ll be lucky to have you. You worked hard.”

“I just want to be together.”

And I did. Sawyer was all I knew from the time I was eleven. When I was with him, nothing else in the world mattered. He was endgame for me. But that day, I received two admission letters. One to the University of Washington, and one to my dream culinary school in California. That was the first event that triggered the rapid spiral that led to me leaving Aspen Ridge for good.

I hover my cursor over the search bar, torn between curiosity and apprehension.

What if he’s married?

What if he has a family of his own?

My heart sinks into the acidic depths of my stomach, nausea rolling through me in waves.

I quickly slam my laptop shut and shove it to the side. Pulling my legs to my chest and dropping my head back onto the couch, I accept defeat. I don’t want to know. Call me a coward, but survival will make you do crazy things. And I’ve been in survival mode since the day I got on an airplane at SeaTac. Brooks was right about one thing, I am an ice queen. The pain would have swallowed me whole if I hadn’t shut off completely. If I can justhold it at bay and not allow myself the time to think, then I will be okay.

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