Page 60 of Between Never and Forever
It’s just my shitty fucking luck.
“It’s just impossible. I thought it was nothing.”
“If you really thought it was nothing, then why were you worried she’d ruin it? Why not just call her back on Friday?”
He swallows hard, the silence screaming louder than anything he could say. He takes a deep breath, then tilts his head to the ceiling.
“I don’t know, Sav,” he whispers. “I don’t know.”
A cyclone of raging thoughts cloud my head. He wanted to slum it with me. He wanted to forget about his real life and fuck around with me before he had to go back home and face the music. Before he could go home and be a fucking father. I try to silence them, try to tell myself that this is Levi, and he would never treat me that way, but then another one comes barreling in, louder than the others.
I was going to be the homewrecker.
I was going to be my mother.
I squeeze my eyes closed and shake my head, trying to quiet the thoughts, but they won’t go away. They just get more persistent.
Levi is going to be a dad. Levi is going to have a baby with Julianna Lark. Perfect, kind, respectable Julianna Lark. Her momma works at the bank. Her daddy isn’t a drug dealer and backwater pimp. Her family is active in the church. She calls his momMs. Judy.
And who am I?
I am my mother’s daughter.
I’m the stripper he fucked on spring break. I’m the girl tarnishing his shiny halo. Setting fire to his perfect angel wings.
I don’t know which feelings hurt more, the inadequacy or the jealousy. The fact that it isn’t me that fate chose for him. It isn’t me the universe wants him with.
I wish it was you, he’d said.
God, I wish it was, too.
“Get out,” I whisper. I stand up and gather his clothes, then put them in his arms before repeating myself with more force. “Get out.”
“What? Savannah no, stop. This is ridiculous.” I shove at him, until he’s stumbling backward through my hallway. “Would you just stop? Let’s talk about this.”
“No amount of talking is going to change this.” My tears have stopped. I’ve willed my anger to burn through them. “Get out.”
“Stop it, Savannah. I’m not leaving you like this.”
He stands tall in the middle of my small living room. In just a towel, clothing balled in his arms. He looks furious and determined, and that just pisses me off more.
“Julianna Lark is now your priority,” I say, my voice shaking. “Julianna and whatever child she pops out.Theyare going to be your number one focus. She’s not just youronceanymore, Levi. She’s yourone.Theyare your one. They are where all your attention will have to go, because that baby deserves good parents Levi, and you’re going to be a good parent.”
I pause to take a breath. I’m going to start crying again.
“And that’s not even what upsets me,” I say, my voice breaking. “What upsets me is that youknewall of this. Maybe you didn’t want it to be true, maybe part of you thought it couldn’t be true, but you knew. You knew I couldn’t fit into your future, and you still let me believe we could be something. You still let me believe I could be your one.”
He doesn’t speak. He just stares, and I clench my fists.
“Tell me I’m wrong,” I rasp. “Tell me I’ll be your number one. Tell me I’m fucking wrong, Levi.”
If he tells me so, I’ll believe him.
If he says I can be a priority, if he calls me his one, I’ll be okay with not being his only. I’ll keep him in any capacity possible, if it means there will be a place for me in his world. If he tells me it can work, I won’t question it. I’ll live it.
“Tell me, Levi,” I beg. “Please.”
He doesn’t.
