“I figured you just needed some space,” he responds gently. My heart hurts. I never deserved a man like Asher. “But you’re here now,” he says with a small smile as he leans forward to try to kiss me.
I jerk away with a sharp shake of my head, and hurt flashes through his eyes. “I have to leave the program.” The burn of tears starts behind my eyes, and my throat tightens as I try to fight them off. “I have to transfer somewhere else. Somewhere where no one will know what happened between us.”
His face blanches. “Summer, you can’t—” he starts, but I cut him off.
“I can’t stay,” I cry, failing to hold back my emotions. “Not now that everyone knows. Sure, it’s technically fine now that you’re no longer my professor, but people know we started before that. It’s a small program; everyone will know before long, and it’ll affect which clinics accept me for my practicum. I have to go.”
“Summer,” he pleads. “You can’t just transfer this late in the game.”
“I can. I’ll have to retake some courses… and shell out more money. But I can do that somewhere no one knows me, where no one knows what we did. I can’t have that hanging over me.”
“You don’t think this paints me in a bad light, too? That this won’t affect my career?”
“Then why are you fighting for this!” I exclaim. I need him to be mad enough to let me go. I can’t have him ruining his career for me.
He grabs my hands and entwines them with his, refusing to let me pull away when I try. “Don’t you remember what you said to me months ago?” I bite my lip as a fat tear rolls down my cheek. “We have something special. Something that other people may never experience in their lifetime. I love you… and if we have to face the backlash for our relationship being under the spotlight… I’m willing to do so. For us. I’d weather any storm with you.”
He loves me. Neither of us has admitted that out loud.
I can feel my heart breaking.
A shaking sob escapes my chest as I succeed in pulling away from him. “Don’t you get it? We thought we wouldn’t get caught; we thought we were smarter than everyone. Neither of us would’ve gotten into this had we known the outcome.”
“Don’t say that,” he snaps. “That’s not true, and you know it. You’re just scared, but we can get through this. I can get a position at a different university.”
“You think anyone is going to hire me now that this has gotten out? It’s a miracle they haven’t kicked me out of the program. They’ll stick me with whatever awful clinic is left over, and my career will be over before it even starts.”
“We can finish up your schooling here, and then we can move!” he insists.
“You think that’s the solution here?” I laugh, but it lacks humor. “Uprooting both our lives?”
“I’m willing to do it for you. You can transfer elsewhere if that’s what you need, but let me come with you!”
“So what, I transfer programs and you apply for a job at the same school, and we try to hide it better the second time around? Do you think any school won’t reach out regarding either of us? You know how extensive those interviews are. You know what they dig up.” It’s a miracle another program accepted me—I think I owe that to Dean Callahan, and I don’t believe he recorded this on either of our records. If we stayand continue this relationship, I bet it will be.
“I can speak to the dean, because we’d be leaving, maybe he won’t put anything down on our records. Or at the very least yours.”
I let out a disbelieving laugh at the idea. Asher may be right; the dean might allow both of us to leave without marring our records. But I can’t be the reason Asher loses his position at a university he loves so much. I can’t let him move away from Elijah and Jared—his mother and father.
“Seriously? Don’t be dense, Asher.” I know it’s an awful thing to say, but there’s a small, selfish part of me that thinks this might be easier if he’s pissed at me. His reaction says it all. His green eyes widen in shock at my words, and his mouth parts.
“You were the one who was calm when all this happened.Youcalmedmedown.Youwere the one who said everything was going to be okay and that we shouldn’t just assume the worst!”
“The worst happened, Asher!” I scream. “Don’t you fucking see that?”
“I’m trying here, Summer,” he lets out a desperate sigh, his eyes pleading with me.
I shake my head. “You don’t get it. I have to do this for me.”
“What about us?”
“What about us!” I shout. “This was doomed from the get-go. We both knew that! We never should’ve started this. That’s why we hesitated. Whyyouhesitated.”
He takes a step back as if I physically struck him. “You’re going to use that against me now? Use it as an excuse for you being scared and running away instead of fighting for us?” he demands.
“It’s true. You knew that there was a huge possibility that this was how it would end.”
“No, I didn’t!” he yells, throwing his hands up in exasperation. “I figured if this relationship were going to go up in flames, it would end with me getting fired, and I was willing to let that happen. For you! For us!” He takes a deep breath. “But it’s obvious that you don’t feel the same way.”
