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It’s a lie. Obviously.
And even telling it is making me want to throw up but I have to say it.
Zach’s standing here, all taut and flushed with the cold. His black eyes watch me carefully.
“Are you going to ruin my date?” I ask when he doesn’t say anything.
The vein on the side of his neck pulses. “Do you want me to ruin your date?”
I step closer for some reason, bringing the toes of our boots flush together.
“No.” I shake my head once, boring into his eyes. “You want to watch me, right? You won’t leave me alone. So I want you to watch me on my date. I want you to watch me as someone else makes me smile. Makes me laugh. As someone else holds my hand, kisses me goodnight at the end of the night. I want you to watch all of that, Zach.”
His nostrils flare and the color on his sharp cheekbones deepens. I think it’s from anger, rather than the cold.
“That’s what you want, isn’t it? To watch me. That’s why you won’t go away. What do you think is going to happen? Do you think I’ll always be alone?” I scoff, “You’re my first love. Sometimes, I think you’ll be the only love of my life. But that doesn’t mean that it won’t get easier. That I won’t find someone that I’ll want to spend the rest of my life with. I want that, you know. Maybe I won’t love him like I love you. Maybe he won’t make my heart beat faster or he won’t make the butterflies explode in my stomach. But it’s okay. I want a home. I want babies. I want a future, Zach. Maybe it’s okay for you to live in the past but I want to build my life. I want to belong somewhere. To someone.”
To you.
Oh God, how I wish that. How I wish to belong to him. How I wish he belonged to me.
But I guess some stories are just doomed. They don’t have a life, no matter how alive they feel.
Zach swallows and lowers his head. He watches the ground for about five seconds, the longest five seconds of my life.
In those five seconds, I think he gets it. He finally gets what I’m saying.
In those five seconds, I’m fraught with panic that he’ll leave. And relief that it won’t cut me every day to look at him, and not be able to touch him.
Then he looks up and his eyes are glassy. Vulnerable. Overflowing with emotions.
“I remembered something the other day,” he begins. “When I was in that hole, I was scared. I thought no one would find me. They wouldn’t even bother looking. I was a pain in the ass. Why would they look for me? So I lay there, watching the sky. It felt like I was somewhere deep. It was hot and muggy and the sky looked so far away. And then, I saw a shooting star. It was quick. Just a flash, but it was enough that I closed my eyes and made a wish.”
He chuckles. “Goes to show how desperate I was. I didn’t believe in wishes. Do you know what I wished for?”
Speechless, I shake my head.
“I wished for someone who’d care for me. Someone who’d love me. Who would put up with me and all the destructive things that I just felt compelled to do. I wished for someone soft. Someone shiny and bright. But more than that, I wished for someone I could be better for. I wished for you. And then, I found you but I was too fucking blind to see it. I was too angry and wrapped up in myself to realize you were it. That you were a star. No matter how much dirt I threw on you, you just kept shining. And I kept watching you do it.
“It’ll destroy me to watch you belong to someone else. I’ll die a little every day if you give your smiles to him. It’ll fucking gut me to watch you build a future with him. A future I could’ve had with you but I was too fucked up to reach for it. But I’ll watch you, no matter what. In your letter, you said that you’ll watch the stars every night. Well, you’re my star, Blue. I can’t not watch you. I always thought that love makes you bleed. But I guess that’s okay. I’ll take it. If you’re happy with some other guy, Blue, I’ll take the bleeding. Because I love you.”
Right in front of me, Zach grows taller. Broader. His body becomes tighter. The tendons on his neck stand out, that vein pulsing.
He’s growing in front of me, becoming stronger somehow, and all I can do is witness it mutely. Tearfully.
And when he puts his hand on me, I can’t stop him.
