Page 24 of Choose You

“Say goodbye to your daddy and let's go. We have a call with your grandparents in a couple hours and we have lots to do beforehand.”

“Yay!” Emmie’s smile grows. She loves Emily’s parents. They still live in Colorado, and they only get to see each other a couple times a year. These weekly video calls my momma schedules keeps them involved in Emmie’s life despite the distance.

Momma puts Emmie down and she rushes over to give me a hug. “You be good for Grandma. I’ll see you after work, okay.”

“Okay. Love you.” She wraps her little arms around my neck and kisses my cheek.

“Love you, too, kiddo.” I give her a kiss before I sit her down. I wave goodbye as Emmie and Momma walk hand-in-hand out the front door. I glance out the back window and see Jessica sitting next to one of the large trees in the backyard. A strong urge to go to her overwhelms me. But I see Ryan walking toward her and know this is not the time. He wasn’t kidding when he said they had things to discuss. I just hope Jessica isn’t in a worse mood when they’re done.

CHAPTER 9

JESSICA

Yesterday was the longest day of my life. Not the worst, but definitely the longest.

The worst day of my life was coming home for my parents’ funeral only to find out that the one person whose comfort I needed most married another woman the weekend before. I’m not sure there’s anything that could top that emotional roller coaster. Although yesterday was pretty damn close.

I stop next to the large oak tree in the backyard and lean against it. Glancing around the property, I’m hit with so many memories growing up here—most good, some bad. I’ll treasure all those memories for the rest of my life, but I’m hit with the realization that I don’t know if I can handle living here again. I always thought I’d come home to stay, but now I’m not so sure.

After my parents died, I still thought of this house as mine. Sure, I was hurting—who wouldn’t be after losing both parents and the man they loved in one week? But I never expected running away would become permanent.

Even after Matthew broke up with me before we left for college, I still planned on coming home and marrying him. I saw him every holiday and break. Even though he broke up with me, he still made love to me like I was his forever. And I let him. I understood his struggle with self-worth. I held onto the truth that one day he would marry me. Our time in college was nothing more than a temporarysetback. I believed that with all my heart. Up until the time he married Emily.

Being back home is harder than I expected. I didn’t expect to still love Matthew so fiercely after all this time. There’s a part of me that hates him—hates what he’s done—and I certainly don’t trust him. How could I after how he broke me? But all the pain, and hurt, and heartache hasn’t even come close to diminishing my love for him. He’s my soulmate.

With my lettersclutched to my chest, I grabbed Matthew’s hand. “Come on, let’s go out by the big tree.”

We ran out the back door and across the backyard. Matthew has his letters, too. We applied to the same two colleges, University of Washington and University of Minnesota, and we got our letters for both schools this week.

We decided to wait and open them together. The anticipation of not knowing and being so close to the decision that would affect the next four years of our lives was agonizing. If we didn’t get accepted into the same schools, I swear I’d die.

He really wanted to go to Minnesota. I didn’t care which school we went to as long as we were together. The thought of being apart from Matthew was too painful.

When we reached the tree, I pulled him behind it so we were hidden from view. We came back here a lot and made out. It was far enough away from the house that as long as we were behind the wide base of the trunk, no one could see or hear us.

He pressed me against the tree and kissed me. Damn, could this boy kiss. Hard. Soft. Wet.

I parted my lips and his tongue dove into my mouth and every inch of my body went up in flames. Even after four years of kissing this boy—or man now, he was definitely all man now that we’re eighteen—every kiss with him felt like the first kiss. His lips always left me all tingly inside and aching for more.

He broke away first and dropped his forehead to mine. “Shall we read our letters?”

I nodded, still too breathless to speak.

He stepped back and pulled his letters from his pocket. Mine were still inmy hand and a little crumpled after that kiss. “Which one should we open first?”

“Washington.”

Our eyes met, and we nodded in unison. We ripped open the ends and pulled our letters out. Hesitating at the same time, we both took a deep breath before unfolding them. I scanned mine quickly and smiled when I read the word congratulations. I got in.

When I looked up at Matthew, my smile quickly faded. He stared at his letter with a scowl. “Well?”

“I didn’t get in, you?” He still didn’t look up at me, and that made my heart ache.

“I did, but hey, there’s still Minnesota. Let’s open those.” He nodded but he didn’t look so sure.

We opened those letters even faster and as soon as I read the first line, my eyes welled up in tears.After carefully reviewing your application, we regret to inform you that we are not offering you admission to the University of Minnesota.

I looked up at Matthew, his eyes glued to his letter with a huge grin on his face. “Oh, my God. You got in.” I shoved my letters into his chest and ran. I ran as hard as I could into the forested area that separated our family's property. There was only one place I wanted to be right now.

---