Page 102 of The Love of My Next Life
My shoulders fall, and I shake my head.
“No,” I say. “Nobut. You want me or you don’t.”
“It’s not that simple, and you know it,” he argues.
I pull my hands out of his grip and step back. He tilts his head to the ceiling. The dark circles under his eyes and the sickly pallor of his skin are a punch to the stomach, and images of the night before attack me.
“We can’t do this anymore,” he whispers, and anger surges through me.
Violent, unprecedented anger. After last night. After yesterday. Aftereverything, this is what he has to say?We can’t do this anymore?
“Because of Claire,” I ask. “Because of Sam?”
“No—”
“You don’t get to end this,” I say, my voice rising. “I tried to stay away from you, and you wouldn’t leave me alone.”
The sadness and reservation on his face just pisses me off more.
“I’m in it now,” I yell. “I’m in it. You don’t get to make me feel something for you and then drop me.”
“That’s not what I wanted,” he whispers.
“You almost died on me! I almost lost you! You don’t get to dump me now. I won’t let you.”
“It’ll never work,” he says. “It’ll never work.”
“You’re just giving up,” I rasp, and I turn to my closet. “You said not to give up.”
I snatch the mug down off the shelf and pull out the sticky note. I shake it at him.
“You said not to give up,” I yell at him. “I’m not! I’m not giving up!”
“Stop being so pathetic,” he shouts back, and I flinch. He opens his eyes and hits me with a look I haven’t seen from him in a long time. One of disdain and irritation.
I saved his life, and he’s back to looking at me like I’m gum on the bottom of his dirty old Vans.
“Stop being so fucking pathetic, Lennon,” he says again, as if the first time didn’t cut deep enough. “We don’t work. It was fun but now it’s messy, and it’s not worth it.”
I gasp.Not worth it?
“You’re lying,” I say, shaking my head.
“Look,” he says with an exasperated sigh. “Thank you for everything yesterday. I’d be dead if it weren’t for you—”
I scoff. He’s so casual, as if the overdose was on par with a papercut and I gave him a Band-Aid. He ignores me and keeps talking.
“—but that doesn’t mean we need to keep doing this to each other. I don’toweyou a relationship.”
My jaw drops.
“That’s low, and you know it,” I whisper.
“We’re fucking up everyone’s lives. We’re fucking upourlives. So, I’m sorry, but I can’t do this anymore.”
He holds eye contact with me for a moment before his face softens.
“I’m sorry, Lennon,” he says, then he turns to leave.
