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“Amelia—”
“I know, I know.” She started walking us back down the path. “It was simply an accident, and it could have happened to anyone, but I just…I wish it hadn’t been us. But isn’t that bad, however? Because if it weren’t us, it would have been some other poor family. I wouldn’t hand the card I was dealt that day to anyone else.”
The same card we had been dealt. But she didn’t know that. She didn’t know that on that very day she lost her mother, I lost mine too. She didn’t think I had been in her room at the hospital. I had seen her hooked up to all those machines and wished her soul would be taken instead of my mother's. She didn’t know I had connected her to the worst moment of my life for years. There had been resentment and, dare I even say, hatred. But as the years passed and I watched her with my brother, I just knew that someone so filled with light could not be capable of hurting a soul. That’s when I shifted the blame to myself.
“It’s not bad. You wanted your mom around, which doesn’t make you bad. It makes you human.”
The slight pout and quiver of her lip were enough to be my undoing. “Maybe. But after she died, I don’t know. I just stopped living and just existed. My entire life had felt like it was on autopilot until—” she cut herself off before continuing. Her eyes stared into space. The sadness was evident on her face, but there was a twinkle in her eye that I had never seen before.
“Until…?” I pressed her.
“Until I moved here and began figuring out what I wanted out of this life and who I wanted to be.”
“And have you figured out what you want out of life?” I watched her profile, trying to gauge her reaction. Amelia wore her feelings on her face. There was no mistaking her feelings because she was like an open book.
She turned to look up at me. The sadness—although reduced—was still present, but a small smile sparked her eyes. “Yeah. I think so.”
I had always been clear about what I wanted out of life. I knew what I wanted when I left the Marines and set my feet back on American soil. But now, with her in my life, she was throwing everything out of whack, and I was beginning to want things I was sure I could not sustain.
My head was fucked. One thing I did know for sure was that I needed to tell this woman truth.
26
NATHANIEL
Coming off my Wednesday shift, I received zero texts from Amelia. This was unlike her. After our date in the park, something shifted for me.
I hadn’t planned on telling her about Andre. The words had just slipped from my mouth. There were very few people in this world who knew about Hama. Xander had been one of them. Now, so was Amelia.
Andre was a soft spot for me and a topic I always avoided. Xander knew to avoid bringing it up.
I had waited for the regret to sink in after I had told Amelia about it, but it never came. And that was what scared me. She was close, a little too close for comfort. She was light and energetic and all things beautiful. And I was dark scars and hatred. But now, the hatred was not toward her. Hatred was the opposite of what I felt for her. I had not known that to be possible. Not with anyone else.
It was all meant to be physical. That was what I knew I could give her. That was what I had been sure I was capable of. But this thought circled in my head for the last few days, making me question whether there was more that I was capable of.
‘Stop existing and start living.’ Those had been the words of my best friend. His last words to me were to start seeing the light.
I rechecked my phone like a lovesick teenager to see if she had texted me, and there was nothing.
I didn’t worry easily. My line of work made me relaxed and always composed. But the longer she kept quiet, the more irrational my thoughts became. I had seen people die from stupid things and unintentional acts.
What if she slipped and hit her head in the shower? What if carbon monoxide was leaking into her studio? What if she accidentally drank a poison, confusing it for a drink?
All these crazy theories filtered into my head and only made my panic increase instead of subsiding.
Deciding to jump the gun, I dialed her number as I exited my truck and headed upstairs to my apartment. The phone rang with no answer from the other side. I was getting increasingly worried. I dialed again, but just like before, there was no answer from the other side.
Where had she disappeared to?
I got into the elevator and pressed the floor number. But as I went up, my mind was only filled with Amelia and what was happening with her today. Had I pissed her off? I had a knack for doing that without even trying most days.
The doors to the elevator dinged open, but instead of turning left, I headed right toward this woman’s door. Was I being a little too persistent? Maybe. But what if her apartment did have a carbon monoxide leak? She could be suffocating, and I would have done nothing to help her.
I came to her door, redialing her number. I banged on the door simultaneously, hoping that she would hear it. But no such luck on her answering either.
“Amelia?” I called out to her. “Amelia? Are you okay?”
I knocked on the door harder and frantically, hoping she could hear me.
