Page 73 of Almost True
He kissed the back of one hand, then the other. “You are most definitely not alone. And even when we’re apart, you will always have a friend, and an ear, in me. You know that, right?”
There went my throat again, filling with concrete. My jaw ached from how I crushed it closed to keep from sobbing all over his shirt. I couldn’t say what that meant to me and how it also broke my heart, so I nodded.
He’d always have me, too. My friendship, though I couldn’t imagine how I’d actually give it to him from across the country, and I knew without a doubt, my love.
CHAPTERFORTY-ONE
Aidan
I’d stayed strong all day. I hadn’t lashed out when Maddie suggested we go to Scoop for dessert after our dinner at Guac. I hadn’t let loose the tantrum I wanted to throw at how the seconds kept ticking by without my permission.
But now, as she let us into the house she’d bought but wouldn’t occupy in less than twelve hours, I felt utterly weak. I wanted to beg her to stay, but that wasn’t what either of us needed. In fact, the image of her pitying face letting me down as I cried and told her I wasn’t sure how my life would look when she left was one of the primary tools I used to keep the words locked inside me.
I would not ask her to stay.
She didn’t need that pressure from me. Everyone pulled and pawed at her, grasping for something to have. Something she could do for them. Something they could gain. And I would never be like that with her, both because it would destroy what we’d built and because I didn’t want anything buther. I didn’t want her money or house or wealth or reputation or business acumen or connections. If anything, those were hindrances to our lives and that’d become more than clear in the last day.
But as she tossed her keys onto the counter and pulled me up the stairs with her, I knew I couldn’t let her leave without at least a little honesty. The mood in her room as she lay down on the bed and tugged me so we were nested together was nothing short of utterly somber. We’d promised each other we’d make the best of the time we had left, and yet neither of us had the heart to pretend like this wasn’t the last time we’d lay like this. The last time we’d come home together. The last time we’d spend a day making memories, being a part of somethingtogether.
“Maddie,” I said in a quiet voice, as though speaking too loudly would change something.
She slid her hand up and down the arm that I’d hooked around her belly. “What?”
I inched back and, with a firm hand on her hip, urged her to roll and face me. Her eyes were wet, and she brusquely wiped away several tears.
I shook my head, heart aching, and just… said it. “I know we’ve only spent a few weeks together, but I need you to know… I love you.”
She pressed a hand over her mouth and blinked away tears. Her hazel eyes were brimming again almost instantly, and I hated that I knew they weren’t elated. There was no joy in the confession.
“I’m sorry. Maybe I shouldn’t have told you, but if I’ve learned one thing in this life, it’s that we don’t always get a second chance. With you, I did. Somehow, we’ve stolen these weeks together. I’ll forever be grateful for this time together, but I know enough not to expect a third chance. You don’t have to say anything, but I needed you to know.”
She nodded and moved the hand that had covered her mouth to cup my face. “Thank you,” she whispered. She must’ve sensed that same breakable quiet I had.
Then she dropped her head into my neck and I held her close, savoring and wishing. Cursing and begging. Wondering and waiting.
Before long, she relaxed against me completely. Her mind had been running much like mine had, but she bore the burden of trying to move back to the city, back to herlife, as a changed person. I knew a little bit about attempting to reenter one’s life after it’d been split wide open. I didn’t know what it was like to have someone nearly take my life, but I certainly understood a brush with death in many senses.
I wanted to wake her and talk more. To make love again. To tell her everything would be okay and she was strong enough to handle anything. But what she needed was rest, and here was one small thing I could give her.
* * *
We woke with a start at the sound of her alarm. Four-thirty in the morning had come quickly. She rolled away and padded to the bathroom while I worked to get my eyes to open all the way. I hadn’t actually planned on staying in the bed with her, but I hadn’t been able to pull myself away. Even at the price of my eyeballs feeling glued shut thanks to my super dry contacts and the hungover feeling gnawing at me thanks to so little sleep, I’d stayed.
It was only now, as I took in her room, that I realized she’d already packed. Or at least, she had a large suitcase tucked against the wall next to her door.
When she emerged from the bathroom, she was fully dressed, face adorned with minimal, perfect makeup, and a kind of efficiency cloaked her.
“Do you need help packing?” I asked lamely.
“No. I packed most things last night and someone will come do the rest this week,” she said, not meeting my eye.
She must’ve packed while I’d slept. Knowing that pricked at my sensitive skin, driving home how our lives were already diverging despite it being such a small thing. “Okay. Let me grab this for you.” I took the bag, desperate for some way to help her. I could understand staying focused on the task at hand. I felt as emotionally spent as I could recall being any time in the last few years, and she had to be, too.
“Sure. Thanks.” She slung a large handbag over her shoulder and we moved to the ground floor. Her phone pinged and she glanced at it before shoving it into an outer pocket on her bag. In the kitchen, she collected a few things—a small water bottle, her sunglasses, a string cheese from the fridge—and shoved them all into another pocket.
Too soon, we were moving toward the door. She was opening it and assuring me her security team would be here in twenty minutes and they’d take care of locking up once the housekeepers did something she called “closing” the house.
Closing it. How perfectly final. What an ending.
