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“Obviously not.” He wrapped an arm around me and planted a kiss on my cheek. “Listen, Jems. I need you to remember I’m here with you.”
“I know,” I whispered. “I know you are.”
“And Jemma?” He spun me toward him, moving his hands upward in order to cradle my head. “I’m… so sorry.”
“I’m sorry, too.”
Both sorry we would have to say goodbye.
Jamie and I broke apart, and I turned to head inside to the party.
My hands stuck into my pea coat jacket pockets, right fingers tracing over the Xanax bottle. I’d completely forgotten they were even there, those pills. That I’d stuck them there for safe keeping, so I wouldn’t misplace them.
For whatever reason, I associated these pills with all the destructive things I’d been doing with my life. All the times I’d downed pills with alcohol or nearly overdosed so I wouldn’t have to deal with my life anymore. I could only barely see how bad my previous actions were now, as if I was slightly removed. Oh, a part of me wanted to continue down that dark path. Say fuck it and live the rest of my life on the edge. Take the whole damn bottle of pills and call it an eternal night.
I knew the emotions coming to the surface were going to be hard to handle.
I knew there were so many things I had yet to deal with.
I knew there were topics I couldn’t ever imagine touching. That I would have to touch. To get past the pain. To get past the parts of me that were still so broken.
Walking into this party with my mom would be hard. Especially seeing her after everything I’d started to realize with Holly.
Instinctively, I reached to open the pill bottle to pop one into my mouth. But I stopped myself. My eyes pressed shut as my grip tightened over the bottle.
Has my entire life boiled down to relying on a pill to keep me from feeling the hardest emotions? Has my entire life boiled down to relying on my ability to push things away?
I want to feel again, Jamie. But right when I need you the most, you’re going to leave.
My eyes snapped open, and I ripped my hand away from the pills.
“Saving you doesn’t mean taking away all your pain,” Jamie said from behind me, repeating what he’d said in IKEA. “I wish it did.”
I didn’t turn to face him. “We have too much work to do, Jamie. Why can’t you stay here with me forever? Why couldn’t you have… just hung on for a little bit longer before you hanged yourself? I could have found you. We could’ve lived out our lives together. We could’ve saved each other. Helped each other heal. For the next sixty or seventy years…”
I wiped away the tears forming beneath my eyes, storming toward the front door. My hands rested on the doorknob. Then, I added, “God, that was the wrong thing to say.”
“Nothing is ever the wrong thing to say.” Jamie sounded more distant than ever before.
That was when Iknew.
I twisted my head back at him from the porch, gazing at his sad smile. He snapped his fingers, instantly transforming his clothing from the typical Guns N’ Roses T-Shirt to a dress shirt and khakis. His feet remained planted on the sidewalk.
“I love you, Jemma.”
“You’re saying that like it’s the last time.” I inched back toward him, suddenly very afraid of what was happening. A lump formed in my throat.
“Because…” he started to say.
“Because itisthe last time,” I finished for him.
We raced toward each other, meeting in the middle of the walkway, as if two magnets drawn back where they belonged. Our mouths snapped together, my hands falling around his back. His fingers combed through my hair. I didn’t give a shit if that entire party was watching us through the windows. I needed to feel him, needed to commit his skin to memory should this be the very last time I would have him. The darkest of days was upon me, and I needed to remember the light that had entered my life.
“I love you,” he said again, in between our kisses. Tears streaked down both our faces. “I don’t want to lose what we have. But they’re telling me now. I can’t stay with you like this any longer.”
“Me not taking the pills was the test?” I asked, instantly regretting my decision not to take them.
“Don’t regret that choice, Jems. But, yeah. That. And so many other things. You’re going to be okay.”
