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My heart feels like someone is taking a triple blade razor and scraping it over my heart, again and again. Why would Beckett lie to me? If he told me the truth then maybe things would have been different.
If he was in love with her and told me that day, instead of acting like he was helping me, I would have given him the chance to be with her. He was my world because I didn’t know what I was missing without her yet. How Vanessa and I would talk on the phone for hours about nothing. Or the amount of time we would play hide and seek with other kids in our neighborhood. I hadn’t kissed her lips or tasted her tongue or lost my virginity to her.
“I straddled his motorcycle, facing him. I put my hands on his face and said ‘Beckett, you don’t mean that. Why didn’t you tell me? You can’t. Please don’t.’ But then a single tear fell down his cheek and I knew he meant it, so I… I….”
Struggling to finish her sentence, I do it for her. “Kissed him.”
She affirms with the simple flatlining of her lips and the twitching of her nose.
“I begged him by kissing him. To everyone else it looked like a passionate kiss that could turn into more. And it was passionate because I put everything I had into it. We couldn’t lose him. I was hoping I could snap him out of it.”
I pull her legs over mine, bringing us closer. “Then I pulled up with my headlights shining on his bike and saw the girl I had spent six years loving, being the best boyfriend that a girl could ask for, kissing my twin. I sat there for a minute before it registered. He pulled his head back and gave me a smirk. Then his arms pulled you closer and you sank into him.”
It’s a fucking terrible memory. It ranks up there as one of the worst moments in my life. If you take out my time in Afghanistan, it is the worst.
“I’m so sorry Beau. I was trying to keep him alive. ”
This time, she kisses the salty drops traveling down my face. “He wouldn’t have.” I shake my head back and forth.
“I couldn’t believe what I was seeing that summer night, after Beckett and I just had a fight. I showed him the engagement ring I planned to give you on the day I graduated from basic training and asked him to come. I told him no matter what happened to cause a shift between us, that I loved him and wanted him by my side on the day I asked you to be my wife. He jerked the box out of my hand and threw it. It took me a while to find the ring—it fell out of the box. That’s why I was late and found you locked in his arms.” I pause, attempting to regain my composure. “He wouldn’t have committed suicide. He wouldn’t have gone through with it.”
She takes in my words with her gaze trained on me. Tears sit in my lids but don’t fall.
“He would. He tried before.” She grips my face hard and makes me look into her eyes. “Do you remember that night I was in the bathroom crying because you didn’t come straight from practice?”
“He would have. Because the night I was crying in the bathroom, I wasn’t crying over Bobbi Jane, I was crying because Beckett had taken razor blades to his wrists and had cuts all the way up to his elbows. He was bleeding all over the place. Beau, it was awful. Blood was dripping all over the floor. It was everywhere, but it was the vacant sadness in his eyes that haunted me. I tried to comfort him, placing his head in my lap after I cleaned him up.”
“I should have realized you were being untruthful. For four long, fun-loving years, neither of us had ever accused the other of cheating, until that day you accused me of being with Bobbi Jane. But then I saw you cheating with my brother.”
“I wasn’t cheating. The first question that crossed my mind was what would Beau do to keep his brother alive? And my first thought wasanything—he would do anything for Beckett. So, I did what I thought might keep him from doing something we could never undo. Something I could never apologize for if I didn’t try. A weight that would have been so heavy around my heart that I might not have survived either.”
Her hands skate around my neck and she buries her head in my arm. Wetness covers my skin.
“Babe, why didn’t you tell me about the night in the bathroom? Maybe I could have helped.”
She whispers in my ear, “Because I was selfish, and knew you would break up with me.”
We sit on a pile of our memories and cry together. Over what we lost. Our relationship. My relationship with Beckett. My parents drove themselves crazy trying to help Beckett be happy but nothing worked. She’s right, I would have broken off our relationship, at least until he was better. Vanessa Barron knows me inside and out.
Every nerve in my body is numb. I can’t even feel her touch. I’m lost—the person I grew with since conception, shared our mom’s fluid, and food, could ever feel like the only option was to end his life.
“Did anything happen after I left?”
She makes me look at her. “Yes. We went down to the creek and talked for an hour. I was scared to let him out of my sight. But he promised me he wouldn’t do anything that night. He said he wanted time to think about the kiss we shared. He drove me home, and as far as I know, he left the same day you did and hasn’t returned.”
“I should have heard you out. Should’ve gone to your house and demanded answers. I should have fought for the person that I loved. I was crushed.”
“Beau, when you peeled out, I knew my life had changed forever.”
Caressing her arm that’s covered in red splotches, I respond, “Our lives definitely changed. Despite it all, I hope he’s found happiness.”
ChapterTwenty-Three
VANESSA
An unfamiliar alarm rings, and it takes me a while to get my bearings. I roll onto my stomach, smelling the woodsy musk scent of Beau but I must have dreamt the whole night. When I open my eyes, he’s not beside me but the loud beeping is still there. Is it the fire alarm?
I slide on my sandals, touching the door with the back of my hand and it’s not hot. I step into the hall looking left and right for smoke. I run downstairs and see the smoke coming from the kitchen.
