Page 8 of Rhys: and the girl who was always his

For a heartbeat, Rhys flinches as if struck by an invisible blow. “Ally—” he begins, his voice trembling.

I shake my head and step around him, each movement deliberate and pained. “I need space.” Without protest, he lets me leave.

My hands tremble as I retreat, and with a forceful slam, my bedroom door closes behind me.

Alone in the cramped solitude, I pace back and forth; every footstep echoes the lingering sensation of his touch, and every nerve thrums with the memory of how precariously close I came to surrender.

Yet I know I can’t— not yet.

Not while everything remains tangled in complexity.

For years, I had convinced myself that quietly longing for Rhys from afar was enough—that my hidden desire was a secret burden I was meant to bear alone.

And now?

Now that he’s here, standing before me, saying the words I’d dared only dream about, I feel utterly lost.

A gentle, tentative knock shatters the whirlwind of my racing thoughts. “Ally,” comes a hoarse, hesitant call from the other side—Rhys’s voice, raw and unsteady.

I close my eyes, pressing my forehead against the cool wood of the door, and sigh, “Go away, Rhys.”

“I can’t,” he replies softly, the earnest vulnerability in his tone unmistakable.

A shaky exhale escapes me as I demand, “Why not?”

“Because you’re it for me. And I need you to know that,” he declares, his words laden with honest, aching truth.

I swallow hard, bitterness rising as I retort, “You don’t get to say that now.”

“Why not?” he presses, his tone both pleading and defensive.

A laugh, bitter and laced with sorrow, escapes me as I shake my head, though he cannot see. “Because you’ve had years to say it—and you never did.”

After a long, charged silence, his voice breaks the stillness, soft and regretful: “I couldn’t.”

Slowly, I grasp the cold metal of the doorknob and twist it just enough to crack open the door. There he stands in the dim light, his face a guarded mask, though his eyes betray a vulnerability I’ve never seen before.

“And now you can?” I ask, my voice softening into a tentative hope.

Rhys exhales, his chest rising in a measured rhythm. “Yes.”

Despite the part of me that desperately wants to let down all defences, to throw caution aside and fall completely into him, a deeper fear holds me back. I am paralysed by the thought of merging our lives—of surrendering to a relentless cycle of longing and retreat that has defined us for so long.

“I don’t know how to do this,” I admit in a hush, the words barely more than a confession.

His gaze softens further, his tone laced with gentle reassurance. “Then we’ll figure it out together.”

I let out a slow, measured breath, my fingers clenching the door’s edge as if to hold on to a fragile hope. “I need time,” I confess, each word heavy with uncertainty.

He nods, his eyes searching mine until he finally whispers, “Okay.”

After a pause filled with unspoken promises, I add, “But don’t stop trying.”

A flicker of hope dances in his eyes as he responds, “I won’t.”

This time, I close the door with tender care, pressing my forehead against it as I lean in for a moment of solitude.

My heart still pounds wildly, and my skin remembers every electric caress from moments before, yet for the first time in ages, the ache in my chest feels almost bearable. Maybe, just maybe, this isn’t the end.

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