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The words hit her like a blow to the chest. “Donovan . . .”
“Yeah. That’s what guy I am. The broken kind. The kind you can’t count on. I told you that from the start.”
Her stomach was knotted, her emotions curling in on themselves. Donovan had thought about suicide. Donovan kept a picture of the moment in
his room. “Why did you hang it on your wall?”
It was easier than asking why he’d wanted to die. It was the only thing she could get out.
“Because some days I’m still on that bridge. Me up there alone and the world going on across the water, doing just fine without me. I walk past this photo every day to remind myself to keep moving forward. Not to stop and risk taking the photo. It can’t catch me if I don’t stop moving.”
She closed her eyes, pain seeping into her. Is that what it had felt like for her mom? She’d gone a hundred miles an hour until she couldn’t. Until all got still and quiet and dark. Until the monster she was running from won. “What happened that night?”
He let out a tired breath, a weary one. “I stood on the bridge and almost jumped. I’d like to say my education stopped me, that I recognized the signs that I was in trouble. But it wasn’t that. Someone saw me and called nine-one-one. Paxton was still my emergency contact, so when he got the call, he flew in to help me get my head straight. I spent thirty days at a facility just like The Grove. Then Pax sent me here to bury myself in work.” He turned her toward him, his eyes sad, some of the Donovan she knew coming back. “You told Lawrence today that he had pinned his hopes on a fantasy woman who didn’t really exist. Well, this guy you think you’re falling in love with isn’t real either. I’m still messed up, Marin. I don’t sleep well. I get bouts of depression. I keep the meds around because I go through rough patches. This needed to be temporary because I’m temporary. This version of me is temporary.”
Tears burned her eyes now. “It doesn’t have to be that way.”
“It is that way. And you don’t need that. You’ve already spent way too much time taking care of the people in your life. Too much time worrying. I don’t need you worrying about me, too. And I don’t want you to see that side of me. I like how you see me. What we’ve had here has been great. Like that week in college. Perfection immortalized in time because we didn’t let it go long enough to mess it up. Let’s keep it that way. Let it stand on its own, and we can call on that memory when we need it.”
She shook her head, tears tracking silently over her cheeks but fierce determination welling in her. “I don’t want a trophy on my mantel, Donovan. I don’t want a memory of happiness. I want happiness. And when we’re together we have that. I’m not saying your depression isn’t real or that I can fix it.” She swiped at her cheeks. “Believe me, if anyone knows about the power of brain chemicals, it’s me. But that disease preys on loneliness and you’re feeding it. You’re feeding it by pushing me and everyone else away and not fighting harder to keep this job or what we have going. What if opening yourself up to someone helps? What if when the darkness hits, you have me here to chase it with you?”
“I don’t need a nurse,” he said, the words sharp.
“That’s not what I’m saying.” She threw her hands out to her sides. “Hell, you act like I’d be signing up to be with some ticking time bomb, but have you thought about me? The risk label that comes along with my history? I have no idea if one day my mom’s disorder is going to sneak up and wrap its arms around me. My mom wasn’t diagnosed until her twenties. The docs think having a baby set off the imbalance. What if that happens to me?”
She’d never voiced that blinding fear out loud, but there it was. She wasn’t in the clear. She could have to face those demons, too. It kept her up at night sometimes. And hearing the words ringing in her ears, made her feel chilled all over.
“But it’s not going to stop me from living my life. How many people come through the doors of The Grove who are managing just fine despite their challenges? These things don’t doom us. We fight. Everybody fights. Every single person out there in the world has something to deal with. And people still find happiness and success and love and live full lives. That’s the whole point of our job. If it were hopeless, why would we go into work every day and try to help our clients? What would be the point? And what if we’re just what each other needs? Have you ever thought of that? I know it hasn’t been long, but what if the universe is giving us our shot and we’re turning our backs on it? What if this could really be something?”
He stared at her a long time, his gaze holding so much, but then he shook his head and stepped back with a smirk. “I can’t believe you’re going there. The One, Marin? I told you there’s no such thing. And if there is, I’m not it. You’ve only slept with one guy. You’re attaching to what’s familiar. Once I leave, you’ll see that. You’ve just got sex brain. This isn’t love and was never going to be.”
The words splashed over her like icy-cold water. She wanted to get through to him, knew this was his defense mode, but she’d be damned if she was going to stand here and be insulted, her feelings belittled. “So that’s it, huh? I lie about what happened. You get fired. And see ya in another life?”
He crossed his arms, that steel gate sliding back in place. “I never lied to you, Marin. I told you what this was from the start.”
She gritted her teeth and tossed the bottle of aspirin onto the bed with a rattle. “You didn’t lie to me. But you’re certainly good at lying to yourself.” She stabbed him with a look. “Watch me walk away, Donovan, and know that you’re not doing this for my own good. You’re not the martyr here. You’re doing it because you’re fucking scared.”
She turned on her heel and strode out. Past the guest room where he’d surprised her in the closet. Past the island he’d spread her out on. Past the table where they’d shared so many nights, laughing and being the one thing Donovan claimed he couldn’t be . . . happy.
She didn’t look back. She wouldn’t allow herself to.
But when she made it to her front door, she fell the fuck apart.
31
Marin took a minute at her door, trying to regain her composure and not walk in a sniveling mess in front of Nate. She wiped her face and evened out her breathing and prayed that he was in his room or the kitchen so she could sneak by. But when she walked in, she saw immediately that there was no shot of going unnoticed. Because not only was Nate there but so was the pink-haired girl, Blaine. But they weren’t discussing art this time or choosing which pizza to order. There’d be no room for discussion with the way they were all twisted up on the couch, Nate with a big handful of boob and his tongue in Blaine’s mouth.
What. The. Fuck? Marin thought the words were in her head, but apparently they’d slipped out because the two teens immediately jumped away from each other, Nate’s hand getting tangled in Blaine’s shirt liked it’d turned into a Venus flytrap.
“Shit.” Nate yanked his hand back and looked to Marin with wide eyes.
Blaine tugged down her shirt and scrambled up from the couch, panic on her face. “Uh, hi, yeah, I’ve gotta go.”
“Wait.” Nate reached for her, but Blaine was already grabbing her flip-flops and hauling ass toward the back door. Face as pink as her hair.
The screen door slapped the backside of the house and the reverb of silence was deafening. Nate looked back to Marin, surprise morphing into full out annoyance. “Jesus, Mar. What the hell are you doing home so early?”
The sharpness in his tone had her drawing up. He was going to come at her. Oh, hell no. “What are you doing feeling up a girl on my couch when you’re dating Henry? What are you doing feeling up a girl at all?”
