“What is?”
“Anytime you didn’t feel valued, it’s my shortcoming.”
I reached out, taking hold of his hand and squeezed. “No, you don’t make me feel...cheap. That’s not what I’m saying.”
“I don’t think that’s what I’m trying to say either.” He hung his head squeezing his eyes tight. “I know that when we get home whatever this is is done. But I want you to know how important this has been to me.”
Breathing deeply, he lifted his head and met my eyes. It was as if I could really see him for the first time—the softest, most protected parts of him. I bore it like a responsibility. I cherished it like a gift.
He licked his lips. “I want you to know how much I’ll miss you.”
I was more confused than I had been at the beginning of the conversation. What was I supposed to understand, that he would regret losing this casual hookup? Or that he felt more for me than he wanted?
Knowing that I was asking a question that had the potential to really destroy me, I opened my mouth anyway. “So, why are you just...accepting it?”
He blinked. I couldn’t tell if he understood or if he was just apprehensive to answer.
The words clung to my tongue, too scared to be spoken. The wash of the ocean drifted a constant noise in the silence between us. I almost couldn’t hear myself speak a paper-thin whisper. “You don’t have to miss me.”
Chapter 19
Jamison
“You don’t have to miss me.” Sadie’s thumb rubbed along the edge of her other hand fisted in her lap.
My toes curled and uncurled inside of my shoes, but otherwise I didn’t move. Her quiet sentence pummeled inside my head, tumbling over and over, leaving me to wrestle with knowing she was at least interested in something more with me, and the truth that I wasn’t the kind of man she needed, despite how badly I wanted to be.
“I don’t think I can give you what you want,” I admitted.
Her spine stiffened, the vertebrae locking into place and making her seem to grow a few inches. She was still much smaller than me, but there was no question that she held a power capable of ruining me.
“What do you think I want?” she asked in a steely tone.
“You might not remember, but you asked me once what brings my life meaning. I told you my job—”
"—Iremember,” she interrupted.
I swallowed. “Well, that was the truth. But . . . it’s kinda because . . . I don’t think I can have anything else.”
She softened, tilting her head. She considered me with enough compassion to make my chest ache. “Would you want anything else?”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“Why not?”
Flashes of the weeks and months after my dad died lit inside my mind. Each one carried a different sting of emotion. Mom was barely able to get out of bed to get Mike to school in the mornings. Mike’s grades dropping, and spending all of his time in his room with angsty music pouring from his walls into the hallway. Managing my school load, keeping food in the fridge, and paying the bills with the life insurance money. Feeling like I was underwater with a straw to breathe from, barely keeping myself and everyone else going.
Just remembering it filled me with overwhelm.
I thought I was maintaining a placid expression, but when Sadie entwined her fingers with mine it was clear she saw something I usually kept hidden.
I squeezed her fingers. She was soft, and her nails stood out a pale purple against our skin. Her hold was strong and firm. What would life be like with her hand to hold? Just having someone to help carry the load on occasion would have made the loss of my dad easier to bear. It would make it easier now.
But what would life be like if I had her and then lost her?
“I wasn’t enough,” I finally forced out, my voice wooden.
“When?”
