AllFreeNovel
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“All ofwhat?What have I done? Nothing. I’m the same as I was, except you—”
“You’re the one who said I changed you.”
“Okay, but you don’t want me to say that, so forget I did.”
She gave him a withering look.
“It couldn’t have been me, Dahlia. I’m…” He looked around the sandwich shop. “I’m a loser and I screw everything up and I can’t commit or decide or change anything about my life.”
“Well, that doesn’t sound like someone I want to be with.”
He groaned.
“Is that really who you are?”
He raised his gaze to hers, and he didn’t know what to say. How could he promise her when he wasn’t even sure of himself? She couldn’t be right, could she? Could he actuallynotscrew things up?
“Niles, I’m crazy about you. And Ilikeyou. I really do. I even want…” She trailed off, shaking her head, looking down at the floor. “But if you need me to save you right now,fuck. I’m not even remotely able to save myself.”
DAHLIA SHOOK TOMMYawake. It was early morning. She’d texted him, left him notes, waited up for him, told him she needed to talk to him, and he was never around.
He shoved her off sleepily, muttering to himself.
She grabbed his shoulders again and shook him.
He opened his eyes. “Dahlia?”
“Sorry,” she said. “I was trying to tell you this before today, but here we are.”
He yawned, scratching his stomach. He sat up in his bed. “Tell me what?”
“I’m moving out.”
“You’re what?” Now he was wide awake, scrambling out of the covers. “You’re moving in with that naga, aren’t you? I knew—”
“No,” she said. “It’s a studio apartment in the building where The Lost Dog is. I need to be on my own for a while.”
He drew back. “That’s got to be crazy expensive.”
She nodded. “It’s more than here, but it’s about as much as when we didn’t have another roommate. I’ll make it work. It’s what I need. I need some space.”
“But… but… what about the rent here?”
“Well, Jennifer thinks maybe she knows someone who might want to move in here, and so hopefully, you guys won’t be on your own for too long.”
“This is crazy, Dahlia,” said Tommy. “This isn’t even like you.”
“Well, do we really know what’s like me?” she said. “Because I feel like I’ve been spending most of my life making decisions to try to placate other people.”
He was wary. “Well… well, you do kind of do too much, I guess. But no one asks you—”
“You did,” she said.
“Me?” He shook his head. “I sure as fuck didn’t.”
“Not in words,” she said. “But you manipulated me into depending on you and to feeling guilty about what I am and to feeling like I had to rely on you to be the one fucking person in the world who would truly accept me—”
“Hey, that isnotwhat I did.”
