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He’s stopped talking for a few seconds now.
I’ve counted his breaths, the long gulps of them since then. Seven. He’s breathed seven times since he strangled me with his words.
My hands are fisted on my sides, my hair dripping water. I wish I could drip down to the floor like that, like water, and become nothing.
His stare, his words, his smell… him. Everything is too much.
It’s pulling me in, making me feel homesick. Exactly like his words just now.
“I’m not…” I shake my head. “I’m not your responsibility.”
“You’re my life.”
My thighs clench.
My entire body clenches.
In preservation? In love? I don’t know. All I know is that I need to get away from him.
“Yeah?” I swallow my tears. “So you’ll protect me from the world.”
“Yes.”
“But who will protect me from you?”
His reply is a wince and a clamp of his jaw.
Sighing, I leave.
A few minutes later, when I’m settling myself in the bed, I hear a knock; I know it’s him. I don’t open it. I clutch the sheets and stare at the brown, non-descript door.
Minutes pass but the second knock isn’t forthcoming.
Slowly, I get out of the bed and turn the knob. He isn’t there. No one is.
But at my feet is a brown paper bag and inside it, there’s enough Twix to last me for days.
He follows me every day.
Every time I look in the rearview mirror, he’s there.
Ever-present, with his helmet on, his body curled over his bike, making him look so freaking hot and completely masculine.
The first time I pull into a rest stop because I’m nauseated, Zach stops too. He follows me to the ladies’ room and when I come outside feeling a little better but a lot tired, he waits for me with napkins and ginger ale.
“You’re being ridiculous,” I say weakly once I’m done wiping my mouth and sipping on a little bit of the soda.
He studies me with a concerned frown. “I think you need to take it easy today. Find a motel and just rest.”
The sun’s strong and Zach’s directly in front of it, glowing like a star. He’s back into his old clothes, threadbare dark t-shirt and washed-out jeans with gigantic boots.
I squint up at him. “And I think you should be somewhere else. In a different part of the world.”
His lips smile slightly but his eyes remain stoic. “I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be.”
Frustrated, I thrust the can of ginger ale at his abs, spilling a tiny splash in the process. “Fine. Be that way. In this part of the world, there are no maids.” I gesture at his t-shirt. “You have to clean that up yourself.”
Grabbing the can, he shrugs. “I think I can handle it.”
I think he can.
That’s the problem. He can do anything he puts his mind to.
And right now, it looks like his mind is set on following me.
When I stop to eat, he stops too. When I stop for gas? Yeah, he’s there, as well. When I pull into a motel at night, he’s right behind me.
The farther away we get from Princetown, the colder the temperature gets. The sun is always there but it’s lurking in the background.
Like Zach.
He doesn’t try to talk to me or approach me, except when I’m getting sick at the rest stops. Which seems to have abated altogether.
The smell of my car, the leather seats, the roads. They don’t scare me anymore. I’m back to being myself before my parents died. I think I forced my phobia away.
Or maybe I’m afraid of something else now.
A certain tall, dark and handsome guy who won’t stop following me.
After days of driving aimlessly, I decide to stop at a random place.
It’s called Blue Dot.
Well, it has blue in the name so maybe it’s not random at all.
It’s further up north and it’s located among the mountains. They say it snows there in the winter and the summers aren’t as hot as Princetown.
We reach there a couple of days later. I say we because Zach hasn’t left me yet.
It’s been a little over a week since everything and he’s been there like a shadow.
I don’t trust him. I don’t trust that he won’t get bored and leave after a while.
Why would he stay? He has a life in New York. An apartment, roommates. A job that he likes and is good at.
You’re my life.
I know he said that. I know.
But I can’t believe those words. I can’t. Not after everything he’s done and how callously he rejected my love.
We stop at a diner to eat as soon as we arrive at Blue Dot.
I sit at one end of the bar and he sits on the other. The waitress is young and a chatty one, and she and I strike up a conversation.
When I tell her that I might be staying here for a while, she tells me that they are hiring. She also hooks me up with a bed and breakfast, a couple of blocks down from here.
