Page 63 of Don't Let Me Go
Something orsomeone?
“Alex isn’t stressing me out,” I assure him.
“I didn’t mean Alex.” He swallows. “I mean me.”
For the second time today, it feels like all the air has been sucked out of the room.
“Why would you be stressing me out?” I ask.
Jackson opens his mouth to say something but stops himself. He stares down at his hands and shakes his head like he’s debating whether to answer. Finally, after a deep breath, he looks at me and says, “You’ve been a really good friend to me since I moved here. Hell, you might be one of the best friends I’ve ever had. I know that’s a weird thing to say. We only met, like, two weeks ago but—”
“I feel the same,” I tell him, unable to stop myself.
Jackson looks surprised, then relieved. Like I’ve just lifted a hugeweight off his shoulders. But his relief is fleeting. After a few seconds his eyes lose their confidence and his face darkens.
“That’s?.?.?.?good to know. But what I’m trying to say is?.?.?.?if we’re friends, the last thing I’d ever want to do is stress you out or make you feel bad about yourself, you know? I don’t?.?.?.?I don’t want tohurtyou.”
I’m not sure what’s prompting Jackson’s concern about his behavior toward me or why it’s coming out now, but I hate seeing him so distraught.
“I know that,” I assure him. “I know you wouldn’t hurt me.”
“Not intentionally, no. But Duy told me you have a hard time trusting people and letting them in, and I’m worried that I might?.?.?.?do something that would make you regret being my friend. And I don’t want to screw you up or make you think that you can’t trust people just because I don’t have my shit together or know what I want.”
What he wants? Does that mean me?
“Sorry,” he says, shaking his head in frustration. “I know I’m not making any sense. I just—I don’t want to be another Alex. I don’t want to be another shitty thing that happens to you and causes you to have another worst year of your life. I want to be one of the good things—one of the best things. Because?.?.?.?because that’s what you are to me. You’re one of the best things in my life, Riley. And I don’t want to lose that. I don’t want to loseyou.”
Jackson looks at me, his face a roiling mixture of sincerity and confusion, and I have no idea what to say. What can you say to someone who tells you that you’re one of the best things in their life? There aren’t words.
But maybe the time for words is over.
I reach out and take Jackson’s hand in mine. Much to my relief, he doesn’t pull away. He just looks at me, his eyes full of tenderness and something else. Something that I feel welling up inside myself.Something that I’m pretty sure is longing.
I bring my face closer to his until our lips are only a breath apart. With a tilt of my head, I start to close that distance when, without warning, the front door swings open.
“Oh, hello!” Jackson’s aunt exclaims. She’s standing at the front door, her arms straining under the weight of half a dozen canvas grocery bags. “I didn’t know anyone was home.”
“Hello,” I squeak, my voice barely a whisper.
I wait for Jackson to say something. Anything. But the color’s drained from his cheeks. He stares at the floor, unable to look at me, his face an unmistakable portrait of shame. And I know with every fiber of my being that I have truly and irrevocably fucked up.
“I have to go,” I mumble, rushing toward the door.
Jackson doesn’t stop me.
He doesn’t say a word.
Chapter 24
Jackson
“Was it something I said?” Aunt Rachel asks, setting her groceries on the floor.
I don’t know what to do. My brain is shouting at me to go after Riley, but my body refuses to move. I don’t think Rachel saw anything, but the thought that she could have has me frozen on the sofa in a cold sweat. I don’t understand what just happened. One minute Riley and I were talking and the next we were about to kiss. At least, I’m 99 percent sure Riley was about to kiss me. Was I about to kiss him?
“Riley had to go,” I hear myself answer, my mouth on autopilot.
“Is he okay?”
