Page 131 of This Blood That Breaks Us
“Why is this happening?” I pulled her face into my hands and was comforted by the flush of her skin on mine.
I didn’t understand it. I didn’t know her. Our time together was built on fleeting minutes and terrible circumstances, but I cared about her. I wanted to savesomeone,even if it couldn’t be me. And her touch was soft and sure and comforting.
“I can’t help. I’m sorry.”
“Tell me what to do. Tell me how to help you. Tell me how to save us, and I’ll do it.”
“I can’t.”
“But I can do it. I know I can. Don’t you believe me?” Another tear fell.
She kissed me while wrapping her hands in my hair and pulling me into her. It was a hard pull and a different, desperate kind of need. It wasn’t Her. It wasn’t Her gravity. This was better. This was affection and warmth. It wasreal. She burnedhot beneath my fingertips. My tears stopped falling. I focused on the taste of her tongue and the warmth of her breath.
“You can’t save me. Stop fighting. Please. It’ll hurt less if you stop.”
When she pulled away, tears were rolling down her cheeks.
“But you said . . . ”
“I know. But I don’t want you to keep getting hurt. Please.”
“Are you crying for me?”
“Yes. Please. Don’t fight. Ask Her to help you, and She will.”
I was hurting them. Cecily. My brother. Everyone. Because I refused to let go. Because I was fighting. I was tired of hurting people with my brokenness. My weakness prevented me from saving them. There had to be a different way.
“I don’t know how.” I kissed her, and I kissed her again. “Tell me how.”
“Just let go, Luke. Let go.”
Her lips were on mine again. Every press of her lips on my cheek and my neck had me falling. Faster and faster. I pulled at her hair. Her skin. Her face.
Falling. I was falling. And it feltso good.
I’d let go with no intention of ever grabbing the ledge again. Falling was peaceful.
I’d finally let go and hardly recognized the feeling of leaving the ledge. As soon as Cecily left, I felt the pull of Her. I kissed Her and fell into Her like it wouldn’t kill me.
“Help me.” The words were a prayer. “Help me. Please. I’ll be good. I’ll pray. I’ll try anything.”
“My Love, I’ll take your pain from you, and you’ll never have to worry about it again. Would you like that?” She used Her thumb to stroke my cheek.
It would have been easier if She was mean to me. If She was the monster everyone seemed to think. But to me, She wasn’t. She was more.
I nodded.
Is this what I’d wanted all along? All those nights spent in pain led me to Her bedroom. It could mean only one thing. She was right all along.
I always wanted my life in ruins. It was my destiny to have Her lips on mine. To be so entangled with Her I’d never get free. That’s why it never worked with Sarah. Sarah’s death was only a direct consequence of trying to strive for anything other than what was mine. And She was mine. The want that mattered.
She was the gravity and the sun simultaneously pulling me in and dragging me down, but I welcomed the euphoria of falling, even at knowing the ground was coming. She was my queen now and forever.
I was falling. Down. Down.
Forty-Three
Zach
