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“Because I am just so tired of feeling like this!” she shouted, continuing to remain vague.
Sucking in another deep breath, I turned to rest my back against the side of the car. “Lennon, I wanna help you out, but I can’t if you don’t tell—”
“Are you in love with me?”
The beating of my heart came to a screeching halt at the sound of the question finally leaving her lips after all this time. It had been a while now since that time outside her house, when I’d gone over in a hurry with all intentions of telling her exactly how I felt. She didn’t pick up on the scent then, and I thought I could avoid it altogether until it no longer mattered to either one of us. But that wasn’t how it had gone down, and I didn’t know what to say that wouldn’t purposely ruin her relationship or what was left of our friendship—or both.
My fingertips rubbed the spot between my brows as my gaze dropped to the asphalt beneath my sneakers. “Come on, Lennon,” I grumbled in protest, begging her to not let me be the villain. Not this time. “We both know you don’t wanna hear the answer to that, so why bother asking?”
“Why wouldn’t I want to know?”
“Because regardless of if you want to acknowledge it or not, whatever I say will change everything,” I replied. “Whether I say yes or no, there will be consequences. Do you really want to face them?”
She didn’t speak for another few seconds, and that could only mean she was thinking. Contemplating, weighing her options.
Then, she asked, “So, when do you leave?”
My chest ached with the realization that she didn’t want to know. She didn’t want to hear me say the words I hadn’t said to another woman since I had been in my teens and too naïve to know what was real or not. For the sake of her relationship with Peter, I knew it was for the best, and then my heart wondered when the hell I was going to start doing the best for me.
Maybe today will be the day.
“Tomorrow,” I said, my voice raspy and rough against my throat.
“How long will you be gone?”
Dragging my tongue along my upper teeth, I quickly did the calculations in my head. “Two and a half months, give or take a few days.”
“That’s a long time,” she replied quietly.
With my eyes on the front door, imagining my parents embarking on the next couple months alone, I said in a tone to match hers, “Yeah, it is.”
“Can I see you?” she surprised me by asking. “Just for a little while. I … I want to see you one more time before you leave.”
I trapped my lips between my teeth as I considered the consequences of seeing her. It would be torture for me, and for her, what would that mean for her relationship? Peter didn’t like me. He didn’t trust me, and he was right not to. But she was her own person. She was a big girl and could make her own damn decisions, and if she thought she could see me and not let things get too far, then who was I to say no?
“Okay.”
Her sigh hit the speaker, and then, in a voice held tight with excitement and trepidation, she replied, “Okay.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Lennon
Peter left me sitting on my parents' porch with a kiss on the cheek. “I can't imagine us playing longer than a few hours tonight,” he said. “Steven has to get back early. Cassie's pretty pissed he's playing at all.”
“Yeah, I bet,” I said, suppressing my eye roll.
It had been a few weeks since Cassie and Steven had announced they were expecting their first child. She wasn't far along, still in the first trimester, but the nonstop need to puke was running her ragged. Coupled with exhaustion, she was finding it difficult to get anything done.
Steven, as it’d turned out, wasn't the most understanding or supportive.
He was there for her when he felt like it and didn't see any reason to skip out on the things he wanted to do. His reasoning was that women before her had toughed it out on their own, and he saw no excuse for why she couldn't either.
To quote Dylan, it was a dick move.
“Honestly, I think she's being kinda dramatic,” Peter admitted, shaking his head. “He needs to be allowed to have a life. The world can't stop because she's pregnant, you know?”
“She'ssick,” I said, taken aback.
