Page 182 of Haunt Me

I sing her to sleep, and when we reach her home, I don’t stop singing, even though by now she can only hear the echo of my songs in her dreams. Her head is on my shoulder, her hair trailing down my arm. I can smell her shampoo. I can feel her warmth. I lean down to rest my nose on her head. I inhale, my eyes drifting shut.

Then suddenly I am taking out my phone, my fingers burning, shaking, barely able to dial Faith’s number.

“Zay?” she asks when I don’t say anything.

I wipe my eyes furiously, and try to get my voice under control. I don’t know when it started, but I’m crying quietly, barely able to speak.

“I’m parked outside the house. If you…” I can’t form words, my lips are shaking so badly. “If you don’t get here right now to take Eden inside,” I say quietly enough so that I don’t wake her, but fiercely enough that spit comes out, “I am going to carry her myself into your dad’s house. And I swear, I am never leaving it again.”

Shocked silence meets my ear, but only for a split second.

“I’m on it,” Faith says.

She seems to realize how close I am to my breaking point, because she hangs up on me, and a minute later, she and Justin are tapping on my window. I unlock Eden’s door, but I don’t even get out of the car as Justin takes her, still asleep, in his arms and carries her into the house. Faith waves goodbye to me from outside the car’s window, and I wave back, but I don’t get out to hug her.

I hope she understands.

If I step foot out of this car, I am not leaving Chicago ever again. I am not leaving this street. I am not leaving Eden’s side. But Ihaveto leave.

I can’t stay.

I watch through the car’s foggy window as Justin climbs the stairs with her sleeping form in his arms, then closes the door behind him quietly. Light briefly spills onto the street from the downstairs window—he is climbing up to her bedroom. I wait for the light to turn off. It does. Justin comes out a few moments later, heads for his own apartment.

I just sit in the car, my guards’ cars parked behind and in front of me, and cry. I can’t move.

In my head, I am writing a song.

It’s called‘I’m Counting This As A Date’.

Eden’s Poetry

CHOOSING MY CLOTHES FOR A SPECIAL DAY

BY EDEN ELLIOT

I am choosing my clothes for a special day

A special day with my sisters, my dad, my sister’s husband

And the sad boy who once saved my life

Who knows all my secrets who held me while I cried

Falling apart and who was there for me when I had no mom

And lent me his own mom and gave me his heart and

Now I can’t look him in the eye anymore because look at me

And look at him so gorgeous he takes my breath away

Every single time I lose my words and not only that

He is strong and mature and amazing he is an actual man

I mean I should be nothing to him now other than a memory

Because I am broken but he’s still here—why? why? why?

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