Lemmy shows up next, storming into the house with worry all over her face. It’s abundantly clear she hasn’t slept. She gasps when she sees me, and is immediately buried inside my freezer, fishing out an ice pack. She marches right to my side and presses it gently to my face, pulling her chair right up to mine.
I take it she knows the details, too. Not sure how, but she does.
I glance down at her, and those gray eyes search mine. Something about her presence breaks down my fortress. She’s always been my sounding board. The arms that I fall apart in. I swallow heavily, my eyes lining with tears that I have tried my hardest to keep inside.
Pull it together. I’m not the one who deserves to be upset here.
She reaches for my hand. I squeeze the life out of hers. “She’s a good one to lose your eyesight for.”
I huff a laugh of disbelief.
Lowesy winces at the joke altogether.
They stay the majority of the day. I think they’re worried about me, either about my mental state or that my injuries are worse than I’m letting on. Saltzy and Wyatt leave first. After being here all night, they shouldn’t have stayed as long as they did in the first place.
Lowesy leaves a few hours after them, making sure to give me one of the tightest hugs in the world before he does. He tells me that he loves me and that he’ll come back to see me tomorrow.
Lemmy stays.
That’s when I lose it a bit, on the couch with her. She rubs my back and holds me, ices my face, and force-feeds me my medication. When I doze off, she goes out back in her heels and feeds the animals, lets the dogs out, and makes me lunch. She doesn’t ask, even though I know she wants to. She waits. Like she always does. Like I do for her.
“He’s never going to forgive me,” I say finally, wincing as I ice my face.
She glances at me, buried under a blanket, Toke is snoring on top of her feet. Clover is snoozing under that blanket with her.
“He will.”
“You didn’t see him.”
“But I know him,” she reminds me gently. Her gray eyes scan my face, and it’s clear that it pains her to look at me. “He feels things deeply. Anger, yes. But love? Immensely.”
“Betrayal?” I huff, dropping the ice pack to my lap.
“It’ll sting for a bit,” she admits, running her hand over Toke’s fur. “There was always going to be a moment, Boston. A situation where he realizes that she’s her own person, and that she holds back because of him. He can’t control her. She should be allowed to date who she wants to date.”
“He’s just protecting her,” I mumble, offering yet another excuse for my buddy’s behaviour. Because I hurt him.
Lemmy stares at the side of my face. “From you?”
I glance at her through the one eye that I can still see through. “From the world, I guess.”
“If I wanted to keep someone safe,” she says calmly, reaching toward me. She pulls the ice pack from my lap and brings it back up to my face, nodding when I grumble and reach up to hold it there. “You would be my first choice to look after them. He would be my second.”
Something warm and painful opens up in my chest. We have always been protective of each other, him and I, and of our people. We made our own crew in this city. A place that was neither of our homes before we made it such. Declan’s friend group would never pull the shit I pulled.That’sreal loyalty.
“I crossed the line, Lem.”
She sighs, dropping her head to the back of the couch. “By sleeping with her, or by falling for her?”
My eyes fall to my lap. So, it’s obvious then.
She rolls her head to look at me. “You’re allowed to fall in love, Boston. So is she. He can’t have a say in that for either of you.”
“I ruined my relationship with him over it.”
“With her, too, it seems,” she says gently. She reaches for me, and I give her my free hand, letting her squeeze it. “People like you and I fight with everything we’ve got to avoid those feelings. To avoid permanence. To avoid commitment.”
I dip my chin. She’s right.
