Just hearing his name squeezed my heart painfully.
“I just can’t see how I’m worth it all,” I confessed.
“That’s the issue, don’t you think? That’s the fear that everybody has. Do you wonder if maybe he worries about the same thing? It’s why falling in love is so damn scary.”
It never occurred to me that Pace would doubt being lovable, and yet even as she said it, pieces clicked into place.
“If I had to guess why you made that list, it wasn’t just to help you navigate your social anxiety. It was to open yourself up to life. And that’s hard and scary, but you knew that going into it. Don’t quit now, just when it’s getting good. I’m so damn proud of you for being more courageous than I ever was.”
“Thank you,” I said.
Pride filled my chest at her words. It had been such an intense few months since I made that list, so many terrifying emotions, but I had done it. Iwasproud.
She was right. This was the journey. The hardships, the ups and downs, for good and for bad. If I wanted to show Pace that I was a woman that he could count on as a partner, then I needed to prove it.
And I think I knew how.
31
Pace
It wasincredible how I was still able to function with my heart shattered.
Every morning, I moved through the motions of life and spent every waking moment in my head. I debated how to undo the hurt I’d caused Sophie, explain that while ill-timed, my mortifying proposal had been sincere, and how I could show Sophie why I was broken.
But then I would hear Kaylee’s words, that what we’d felt wasn’t that serious, even though I had done everything to take care of her. I would remember how Levi had retreated and not needed me at all, and I would not send the message, not speak the words to Sophie.
The days of December turned over in the calendar. The town buzzed with a festive energy that was lost on me; I wasn’t really there.
I made myself busier than ever. I searched for every and any task I could find around town. I helped decorate the town square. I cleared snow from the sidewalks. I never stoppedmoving because if I did, the reality of my loneliness crashed down on me. I couldn’t look at my barren house and not think of Sophie’s cozy home. I couldn’t sit on my almost-new couch and not think of our SHMOS. I was a shell of a man, pretending to be normal.
I worked harder than before I’d found that damn list.
I pretended to be my old happy self as the people of town not so subtly poked and prodded at me.
“What’s going on, Pace? You good?”
“You’re not your usual happy and smiling self.”
I hadn’t been keeping things as under wraps as I thought. And when I brushed off those questions, they were instantly followed up.
“Where’s Sophie? I loved seeing her around.”
“Tell Sophie we’d love to have her over.”
It was going to be like this. It was going to be Sophie for the next decade now, and not Kaylee. Because they couldn’t understand what I did wrong to lose her. They didn’t see that underneath all my willingness to help other people, there was something inherently wrong with me. I wasn’t enough to keep those who I loved.
As much as I’d made myself available to the town, I actively avoided Levi. The irony was not lost on me that I was doing to him exactly what he had done to me when he was hurting: hide. That thought left me even more miserable. I didn’t want to be this version of myself, but I didn’t know how to shake this self-recrimination and malaise of guilt either.
Today, I was down in my home gym, trying to abuse my body until the thoughts stopped. But it wasn’t working. I growled as I picked up the weighted bar for another set of bench presses. I groaned and tried to push the bench press bar up to the sky, but it got stuck on my chest. The utter frustration and shame of my actions made me weak.
That fucking list.
It’d been leaked and I?—
I couldn’t let myself think about the horror and fear on Sophie’s face.
It all caught up with me.
