Page 68 of The Dating Coach
"You sound like my father," he said, voice turning cold. "Reducing everything to profit and loss. I thought you were different."
"I am different. I'm realistic." The lies felt like swallowing glass. "This was always temporary, Liam. A crisis response that got out of hand."
"Temporary?" He stared at me like I'd stabbed him. "Is that what you tell yourself? That whatever's happening between us is temporary?"
"What's happening between us is unsustainable," I forced out, even as my heart screamed in protest. "We both know it. Better to end it now before—"
"Before what?" he demanded, stepping closer again. "Before I fall completely for you? Before I rearrange my entire life around the hope of something more? Too fucking late, Gemma. All of that already happened."
The confession hung between us, raw and desperate. I wanted to reach for him so badly my hands shook.
"Then undo it," I whispered. "Take Prague. Take Sweden. Take whatever gets you away from here and back on track."
"You mean away from you."
"Yes." The word came out steady despite the way it destroyed me. "Away from me."
The silence stretched between us, filled with everything we couldn't say. That I was falling for him so hard it terrified me. That the thought of him in Prague made me want to scream. That I was doing this because I cared too much, not too little.
"You're a coward," he said finally, voice hollow. "You're so terrified of letting yourself have something good that you're sabotaging us rather than fighting for what we could be."
"Maybe," I admitted. "But at least you'll have a future."
"Without you, I don't want one," he said simply, and the honesty in his voice nearly broke my resolve.
"You say that now—"
"I'll say it forever," he interrupted. "But you won't hear it. You've already decided I'm better off without you, evidence be damned."
He turned to leave, then paused at the door. "You know what the worst part is? You're doing exactly what our parents do – making decisions for others based on fear. Controlling the narrative because you can't trust people to choose for themselves."
"That's not—"
"It is," he said firmly. "And until you stop running from whatever this is between us, until you trust me to know my own heart, we're stuck."
He left without another word, the door closing with a finality that echoed through my bones. I stood there in my chlorine-soaked suit, shivering in the artificial light, and wondered if protecting someone from heartbreak meant breaking your own heart first.
Back at my apartment, I found Karen and Mia waiting with wine and tissues, clearly prepared for emotional triage.
"That bad?" Karen asked, taking in my destroyed expression.
"I ended it," I said numbly. "Told him to take Prague."
"You did what?" Mia shot upright. "Gem, no. You can't—"
"I can and I did." I collapsed on the couch, too exhausted to cry. "He's better off without me."
"That's bullshit," Karen said bluntly. "That's fear talking, not truth."
"His entire future—"
"Is his to decide," Mia interrupted. "Just like mine was. You don't get to make choices for other people, Gem. Even out of love."
"Especially out of love," Karen added. "That's just control wearing a protective mask."
Their words echoed Liam's accusation, hitting with doubled force. But I was too deep in self-justification to listen.
"It's done," I said firmly. "He'll take Prague or Sweden or wherever. He'll play hockey and study architecture and meet someone simple. Someone who doesn't destroy everything she touches."
