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“I know!” my dad screams back. Birds flap away from the trees and he glares up at the sky. “I’m fucking sorry, Sul.” He takes a deep breath through his nose.
“Sorry for which part?”
“Raising my voice at you,” he says, his reddened eyes meeting mine. “And for saying that to Akara. I didn’t want him to leave you after…fuck.”
“After what?” I take a heated step forward. “After my relationship leaked? Because Akara might be right, Dad. This might all return to normal once the world thinks the triad was a lie and that I’m just with Banks. Then will you go back to being happy again that Akara left me? That your grand idea of Choose One worked? Or were you just hoping that Banks was the one to self-sacrifice?”
“No.” He shakes his head a few times, gaze dragging across the snow until he looks to me again. “I’m so fucking sorry, Sulli. Leak or no leak, private or public—it doesn’t fucking matter because it doesn’t change something.”
“What?” I cage my breath.
“You’ll never be completely happy if you lose one of them. And I know…” He chokes on emotion and pinches his eyes. “I know what it’s fucking like to drag yourself down—and I’m angry at myself for asking Akara and Banks to shackle themselves with that weight. I asked them to step back from what makes you all fucking happy, when life’s too fucking short.” He almost starts crying. He blinks back tears, staring up at the sky. “I just thought you’d be alright with one—you’d still be happy with one—and then I saw you three at the lake house. I saw them run after you into the woods.”
Pain passes between us. I’m barely breathing.
“And I realized I’ve been trying to take away the people you need and love in this world, and that’s not fucking right. It’s not okay—you won’t be okay, and I can’t lose you to that or to silence or anger or resentment. I want you to be able to live your life one-hundred-fifty miles per hour. No brakes. And I’m so fucking sorry I tried to slow you down.”
My cheeks are wet. Heart pounding with a ragged tempo. I’ve waited so long to hear those words. Fuck, I thought they might never come. He apologized three separate times, and hearing everything he said should bring relief and happiness, but I’m weighed down in unbearable grief.
“Your approval is too fucking late,” I tell him, holding back more tears.
He wipes at his own eyes. “I fucking know that, Sul.” He drops his hand. “I fucking know.”
I take a short breath. I think about forgiveness. How I suck at it. How in times like this, I wish to be better than my past. How I’m in so much pain. And right now, I just really need my dad.
I rub my fist over my tear-streaked cheeks. “But I’m not going to hold it against you.”
His eyes rest against mine in confusion. “I’d understand if you fucking did.”
Tears build and more squeeze out of my eyes. “No, I need you too much to be mad at you.”
His face breaks. “Sulli—”
I clutch at my jacket. “It hurts really bad. And I don’t know how to get it to stop.”
My dad bridges the final distance, and he wraps his arms around me in a hug. He’s the sturdy foundation that I’m built from. The mountains. The air. The ocean. “It’ll fucking be okay.”
“But I love him. I still love him.” I don’t see how that’s going to change.
Akara is already gone.
49
AKARA KITSUWON
I stand at the top of a mountain, water in every direction. A breathtaking island. Palm trees sway on sandy beaches. Waves crash into jagged rocks, and snow…snow falls from the sky and kisses my skin. It builds on the island mountaintop.
My breath smokes the air as I see her standing at the edge of the cliff. Sulli stares off at the horizon, back turned to me. Her wild, brown hair blows in the cold breeze.
“Akara!” Banks screams. He’s standing close but out of reach from me. Feet chained to the ground.
I try to move to him, but my body jerks back. Shit. Chains wrap around my own ankles.
Snow falls harder, and I glance up to the cliff. Sulli whips around, green eyes on both of us. She scoots backwards towards the edge. “SULLI!” I yell, pure terror shooting through me.
“NO!” Banks screams.
I yank at the chain.
He grapples with his restraints.
She keeps stepping backwards. Her eyes numb to the world. “SULLI! STOP!” Panic rips through me as I claw at the lock on the chain. Fingernails bleeding. “STOP! STOP!”
“SULLI!” Banks screams louder, his veins protruding from his neck, face reddened.
“STOP! SULLI!” Spit flies from my mouth as I yell with raging desperation, and I start tugging with my ankle. I can break it. I can break my foot.
