Page 120 of Past the Broken Bridges

All he does is stare, not grasping the reason my chest deflates.

I’m not being completely honest. Banks is someone in my life I have to lose, and he doesn’t even know it.

I loosely lift my shoulders, letting them drop heavily, and tell him the same thing my conscience has been sayingto me. “If you can’t love him the way he deserves, the best thing you can do is let him go.”

Those words sink in, sinking, sinking, sinking until they land in the bottom of my heart.

Instead of sticking around to hear him cuss me out, blackmail me, or deny the obvious, I walk away with my head held high but my heart in the pit of my stomach with the realization of what I have to do.

I don’t go to class the rest of the day.

I go to the college store to find the boy behind the counter. When he sees me, he rounds the corner and walks to me. “What’s wrong, Birdie?”

I’m careful when I curl my arms around his middle, not squeezing but feeling his body heat soak into me.

I don’t say a word as I rest my cheek on his chest and listen to his heart drum against my ear, its pace picking up as I loosen a sigh.

One last time.

I want this one last time.

Eventually, he wraps his arms around me and pulls me closer, ignoring the bite of pain he must be feeling.

When I look to my right, I see Lucy smiling at us before she disappears into the back to give us some space.

“Talk to me,” he murmurs, brushing hair away from my face to get a better look at my somber expression.

I think about the sage advice I gave to his father, knowing I should listen to it myself.

For Banks’s sake.

But in this moment, I don’t.

Because he tilts my chin up, stroking my jaw with the pad of his thumb as those muddy eyes do a once-over across my face that I feel deep inside my chest.

“Nothing is wrong,” I lie, swallowing the truth when his thumb lands on my bottom lip.

Banks is smarter than that. “I don’t buy that for a second. But I know what might help you feel better.”

My eyebrows jump as he reaches into his pocket and pulls out his truck keys.

The confusion makes him chuckle. “Don’t be mad, but I looked at your list when you were sleeping the other day. It was on the nightstand.”

That stupid list.

He wiggles his keys. “What do you say? I think everybody should know how to drive, and it looks like you could use the distraction.”

“You want to teach me how to drive?”

A small grin curls half his lips. “If my Birdie wants some freedom, that’s what I’ll give her.”

I’m struck speechless, staring at him like an idiot. Then, ever so slowly, a smile returns, and I almost forget about my encounter with his father.

Almost.

“There she is,” he says, tweaking my lips.

“You’re working,” I point out.

---