AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“No. I mean, yes.” I pull my hand from his and immediately regret it. “I never wanted him here.” I run my hand through my hair for something to do. The loss of his touch burns my palm.
“Then what’s wrong?” He’s too kind, too caring, and I don’t deserve it.
“It’s just… No one has ever supported me like that before.”
I don’t add especially when he doesn’t understand things between Felix and me. From where he’s standing, I strung him along while I had a boyfriend. Or maybe he doesn’t care?
Our gazes collide, coiled with tension and apprehension. He stares at me as if he can’t quite comprehend, and it only makes me want to take it all back.
“Really?”
I drop into a chair at the kitchen table and place my cup down, already exhausted and the day hasn’t even begun. “Tom, thank you.”
“You don’t need to thank me.” He slips into the chair next to me. “Are you all right?”
“Yes.”
“What’s going on between you two?”
Shaking my head, I dip my chin to my chest and let out a nauseous kind of laugh. “Oh, that’s so not an easy question to answer.” My hands cradle the top of my head. “He booked a flight for the two of us to Toronto for this morning.”
“Oh.” He shifts ever so slightly toward me. “You didn’t want to go, right?”
I nod and stare into my coffee. It’s time to tell him. Everything. To help him understand. No one else in my life understands. Well, except my therapist but isn’t that her job?
“I’ve asked this before and you didn’t answer…” Tom’s preamble, building up to a question, causes all my muscles to lock. “You still don’t have to, but why are you doing this drive? Why aren’t you flying home?”
My skin twitches, tightening over my bones, and the desire to scratch is overwhelming. I curl my fingers into balls. He doesn’t realize how intrusive his question is and how vulnerable it makes me feel.
“You likely didn’t hear about it although it made the news.”
He bends his head to catch my gaze. “Contrary to what you may think, not everyone lives and breathes to follow other people’s lives.” His tone is light and joking. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I don’t follow celebrities.”
“I’m not a celebrity.” I sound snappish even to my own ears and cringe. “I’m going to explain about Felix, but I’ll start with what happened several weeks ago. It’ll give you context for the past few days.”
“Okay.”
I sip at my coffee, even as it sours on my tongue, and gather my thoughts. “You know I was in LA for almost a month before you arrived.”
“Yes.”
“I flew from Toronto to LA with Felix at the beginning of August. His private jet.” My insides quiver, heart pounding in my ears like a death march.
I haven’t even told him anything, and it’s as if I’m sitting in that oversized leather seat on the rattling airplane. Beads of sweat bubble on my upper lip, and my hands shake.
Doctor Hemming’s calm and authoritative voice pops into my head. She has spent more than a year with me, addressing my general anxiety and the depression that comes from being abandoned by my parents, and more recently, equipping me with tips on how to prevent and manage my anxiety and fear of flying and the aftermath of what happened.
I’m not on the plane. I’m in the kitchen in our condo in Vail.
I glance around the bright room, cataloging the black granite countertops and the white French country cabinets.
“Leighton, are you okay? You don’t have to—”
“No. I want to. I have to. I just need a minute. I can do this.” I straighten my spine, place my hands flat on the table, and look him in the eye. “The plane had to make an emergency landing. It was an engine malfunction or something like that. I kind of blocked out some of it. The cabin lost pressure.”
With a whoosh, my stomach sinks to my toes at the memory. “We dropped several hundred feet in what felt like the blink of an eye. It all happened so fast.”
“You must have been freaked out.”
