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“Jer, no, that’s not—no?—”
“And then not even twenty minutes after your lips were on mine, you…you touched my cheek, and you begged her to come back.”
At his words, my stomach drops. My brain whites out. Images surge forward—a room and eyes that aren’t quite right. Izzy… drawing. A lucky scrunchie she never had.
I was dreaming…
I’m shaking my head. “I was out of my mind. That had nothing…nothing to do with the kiss, J. I-I didn’t know what I was saying. I just… I felt warm, and—and safe. And tired, so tired. That’s what I remember.”
He screws up his face, his eyes brightening even more.
“I know how that sounds. But I was just—I knew when I woke up, that everything would be different. That…that would be it. There would be no going back, and I was just… I just needed one last second to-to feel her and miss her. Not just as my girlfriend, but as…as Izzy.” My voice breaks. “I thought it was in my head. I thought I was dreaming. I didn’t know I actually—I didn’t know I touched you. Said that to you. Not until it was too late.”
He sucks his cheeks in, working his jaw side to side like he’s fighting to keep himself calm. “You were looking right at me,” he whispers tightly. “Right into my eyes. You’d never looked at me like that before.” His voice grows louder, cracking painfully into the night. “No one’s ever looked at me like that.”
My eyes fall shut.
“It fucked me up.”
“I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry.”
Several seconds pass. “You know, my own parents even struggle to look at me sometimes,” he goes on. “Same with Waylon. And I know… I know it’s hard for you too?—”
“Jeremy—”
“Don’t deny it. It’s true and we both know it. I’m a constant fucking reminder of what we all lost. Hell, I can barely look at myself in the mirror sometimes, because it’ll be her I find staring back at me.”
At that, my eyes fly open, locking on his. Emotion wells in my throat, and I shake my head. Remembering what he said so long ago, about his eyes…
“Of course you do. They’re hers.”
It caught me off guard.
I should’ve said something…anything…
I should’ve went after him.
But I didn’t. Because he’s not totally wrong. When I look into his eyes, I am reminded of what I lost. Not just Izzy, but who I was before everything went to shit.
“That’s how I know this isn’t real,” he goes on thickly, tightly, his voice on the verge of breaking once more. “It’s just a-a symptom of our grief. Because of how much you’ve come to depend on me, and how much I’ve enabled it.”
And I shake my head harder, tears clogging my throat, stinging my eyes. “No. No.”
It’s not true. It’s not.
“Because…because you and I both know that if she were here, I wouldn’t even be an option.”
And with those damning words, my shoulders slump.
“Jeremy…”
“I can’t do this anymore,” he tells me.
Blinking against the tears rapidly forming, I say, “Do what?”
He gestures roughly between us. “This. Us. I’m done.”
“Wha-what? Wait. We’re still friends. We?—”
