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She looks around the room, pulling her dressing gown tighter. “You’ve not been to sleep yet?”
I frown and tilt my head, noticing the dark circles under her own eyes now she’s free of her makeup. “Have you?”
“I work shifts. I don’t sleep like I used to.”
Me neither.
Our eyes settle into a knowing, forbidden stare. “Have you taken your pain medication?” she asks.
I glance down at my leg, having forgotten about the pain there. I rub at my chest. “Not yet. I’ll head down—”
“I can get them.”
She leaves the room without another word.
I fold up the letters and place them in the bedside drawer, then slump down in the bed, my hand running through my hair in what feels like defeat.
I need my leg to heal. I’ll sleep better then, especially if I can burn off this frustration in the gym.
I miss that. Running on the treadmill when things got too much, forcing my heart to race in a rhythm that couldn’t remember her name.
Anything to forget for a while.
Scarlet
He isn’t sleeping.
I knew it.
I chew on the inside of my cheek as I stand in the kitchen, knowing I should take the water and pills back to his room and then go back to bed myself.
But he isn’t sleeping.
When I walk back up the stairs and into Lance’s room, I don’t think past the tired, defeated look on his face as I set down his water and pills and walk to the window.
I pull back the curtain an inch, illuminating the room.
And then, I sink down into the chair below the now visible full moon and stars.
“Scarlet,” Lance says with a frown, watching me.
I close my eyes, not wanting or needing to look at him. “Get some sleep. She’ll be up at the ass crack of dawn to walk the dog.”
Lance doesn’t answer me, but I feel his eyes on me for a long time before my body relaxes into the chair, and I fall asleep.
SIXTEEN
Lance
Lance,
You’re not reading my letters. I realised it weeks ago, knowing if you knew what was written in them, there’s no way you’d ignore me. It’s sad. I want you to read them in some ways, but then again, it feels freeing knowing you’re not. Like I can write absolutely anything, like I do with Mum, because no one is going to see them.
I never had to be honest with you when you were here. You’d look at me and see anything heavy I’d dare try hiding from you. Every single time you’d pull me up by the straps of my dungarees and love me in that way you did. Everything always seemed to be okay by the time you’d ride off the next morning.
It’s the same reason I know that you’re afraid right now. That you need me to move on with life and not wait for you.
It’s love—the real kind. The kind I’m not sure every person gets to experience in life.
