Twenty-Eight
Kaleb
I don’t see Avery for the rest of the day, which is both a relief and unsettling at the same time. While I needed time to cool off from the encounter with his father, I would’ve thought the two of them wouldn’t be more than an hour or so, and maybe he’d be back in time for dinner. Even with Colin giving him the day off to spend with his dad, I assumed he’d figure out some way to cut it short. But as evening bleeds into night with no sign of him, worry has long since slipped in.
After everything his father’s done, and after all the work he’s put in to overcome it…
My jaw tightens as I stare at my cabin door, and I force myself to reroute my line of thinking. Because my worry isn’t just for Avery alone. It’s also for me, for this.
I’m fucking terrified of who I’ll be getting back after he spends the day around dear old dad. Especially after the way he recoiled from my touch earlier.
Thankfully, I don’t have to wait much longer before the sound of footfalls on the cabin porch outside have my ears perking up. There’s a soft knock before the door opens seconds later, revealing Avery.
He’s still dressed in a pair of jeans and long-sleeved Henley he must’ve changed into before leaving camp for the day, and I have to admit, he’s edible in it. Although, he’d look a helluva lot better with it on the floor.
Our eyes lock instantly before he whispers a soft, “Hey.”
There’s a smile on his face as he steps through the doorway before allowing it to fall closed behind him. It’s the same one he’s been giving me for weeks, and fuck if it isn’t a sight for sore eyes. I hadn’t realized just how anxious his absence was making me today until now.
Now, I feel like I can finally breathe again.
“Hi.” The word comes out on a sigh, and it causes his grin to widen. “How was your day?”
“No, no. I wanna hear about yours,” he says while dropping onto the bed beside me. “How much hell did you have to manage all on your own?”
“Eh, it went fine, I guess. The kids were menaces for the most part. Elijah wouldn’t stop asking where you were, and I swear, Liam is gonna end up putting one of the other kids in the hospital with his fishing pole one of these days.”
An airy laugh fills the cabin. “So, all in all, it went exactly as expected.”
“Pretty much, yeah,” I reply with a soft chuckle. Raking my fingers through his blond locks, I allow the warmth of his body and presence to let something deeper slip out. “Wasn’t the same without you, though.”
Avery shifts beside me, and when I glance down, I’m met with a devious glimmer in his blue eyes. “Dare I say it, but it sounds like you missed me, LaMothe.”
“You can say it. Doesn’t mean I’ll admit it.”
My denial only makes his grin spread wider, and he rolls until he’s hovering over me.
“Mmm, I’ll try not to let that go to my head.”
“I honestly was beginning to think your dad kidnapped you,” I say, my feeble attempt to make a joke. “Maybe he took one look at where you’d been staying and decided you’d faced enough punishment. Pitied you, told you to pack your shit and head back to the city.”
Avery pulls back, and from the way his smile falters, I can tell there’s something he hasn’t said.
The light, playful teasing that charged the air with electricity is gone, replaced with the same gut-wrenching worry from earlier when I whisper, “What’s wrong?”
“Actually, I do need to talk to you.”
A sense of foreboding hits me, along with a wave of nausea. Any variation of “we need to talk” is anxiety inducing at best, and his face does little to assuage it from ramping up even higher.
“What did he say?”
Avery shakes his head as he drops down on the mattress beside me, his face contorted in a grimace.
“Um…in short? The plan may have already worked.” His eyes lift to mine, the blue pools swirling with mixed emotions. “Elijah must’ve told his father about me when the kids got to do their calls home earlier this week, or maybe Colin said something after he did our check-ins. I’m not sure exactly, but the dean called my father and set a meeting for us to” —he lifts his hands and forms air quotes— “‘see what we can do’ about my expulsion.”
Relief floods my bloodstream, and I smile. “Well, that’s good news, right?”
After all, getting back into Foltyn is exactly what he wanted; the main reason Avery was here at camp in the first place. And while I hated the idea in the beginning— loathed being the more operative description—I’ll be happy if this ends up working out in his favor.
Avery nods and murmurs, “Yeah, I guess. My dad is confident it’s a done deal anyway.”
His lack of enthusiasm, paired with the frown on his lips, causes me to take pause, but I do my best to lighten the mood. “Then what’s the look for? We should be celebrating. Naked, preferably.”
I know the reaction he’d normally have to that offer: his expression would perk up instantly, gaze heating to a low simmer as his mind shifts to filthy, delicious places. Instead, all I get is a deepening frown until a line creases his forehead, and two sullen, lifeless eyes staring back at me.
“He wants me to go home.”
He drops the bomb so subtly, it takes a minute for me to register the damage it causes. But once I do, it’s like the rug has been ripped out from under me at the same time a linebacker slams into my stomach.
Like all oxygen has left the atmosphere, and I’m flailing in freefall.
The look on my face must portray my every thought—all the fear and disappointment consuming me in waves—because Avery moves to take my hand in his.
I don’t let him.
His jaw tightens, eyes shining with fury or sadness or maybe even both. “Kaleb…”
“He wants you to leave. Before camp is over?”
I don’t bother to keep the incredulity from my tone, causing Avery to wince before he nods. Frustration slams into me the moment he does, and I shove off the bed to walk across the tiny room.
“Why?”
Shaking his head, he offers up the most bullshit explanation ever. “He doesn’t think there’s a reason for me to stay. I did what I came here to do, and now I should enjoy what’s left of my summer back in the city before classes start up again.”
Of fucking course.
I scoff, crossing my arms. “And you said yes.”
It’s a statement, not a question.
We wouldn’t be having this conversation at all if it were a question.
A helpless expression paints his face, his gaze imploring me to understand when he murmurs, “He didn’t really make it seem like I had much of a choice.”
“Of course there’s a choice!” I snap, tossing my arms out to the side. “You’re an adult, Avery. You can do whatever the hell you want. He may be your father, but you aren’t beholden to him or his commands.”
“You know it’s not that simple.”
I can’t help it; I laugh. One of those maniacal, sanity-hanging-by-a-thread laughs, because this has to be some sort of joke.
“Except it is that simple, Avery. You’ve spent this entire summer here, with me, taking back the parts of yourself that were mangled and ruined by shame. I’ve watched you struggle to push past all that damage, and now you’re about to willingly walk right back into the lion’s den and hand yourself over for slaughter.”
He clenches his teeth, and I can see the anger slowly coming to a boil inside him while he grinds out, “Is that how little you think of me? That I’ll roll over and submit all over again?”
“Isn’t that exactly what you’re doing right now?” I counter, standing my ground. “If you’re this easy for him to control, what’s stopping you from slipping right back into the same suit of armor you’ve been wearing your entire life?”
“Because I don’t fucking want to!” he seethes, rising from the bed and crossing the room to me. “I don’t want to go backward anymore, and I sure as hell don’t want to hide. That’s why I know I won’t go backward.”
“Then why did you flinch earlier?”
The question extinguishes all the fire in his eyes instantly. Gone is his anger, replaced with something I’d recognize as easily as my own reflection.
Shame.
“Kaleb…”
“I barely touched you, and you fucking flinched. So tell me again how you’re not gonna go right back to the person you were before, when it took all of five seconds in your father’s presence to have you recoiling from me.”
An animalistic noise leaves me—some mix of a growl and a whimper—the memory of him pulling away slicing through me like a blade.
From the way he winces, I’m not the only one pained by it.
“It was an accident,” he whispers, almost pleading.
“It was instinct, ” I correct, snarling out the word. “It was fight or flight, and you fucking fled.”
His father is the only one who can pull that impulse from him. Ironic, since he’s the one Avery needs to fight the most.
“He took me by surprise. I didn’t have a clue he was gonna be there waiting for me! Give me some fucking credit.”
“If you want credit, then earn it.”
“I’m trying! This is me trying,” he snaps, motioning between the two of us.
“Not from where I’m standing.” My gaze drags over him, and I shake my head. “You’re still doing what Daddy tells you. You’re still taking the easy way out.”
“That’s not what this—”
“Of course that’s what this is! God, Avery. How can’t you see what’s right in front of you? He’s handed you poison instead of water every fucking moment of your life, and you keep drinking it!”
I’m shouting now, but I don’t care. Let the entire camp hear us screaming at each other. Maybe if he has an audience to witness this, reality will sink into that thick skull of his.
His lips pull into a distorted grimace. “I didn’t know any better. Not until I got here and you showed me another way.”
“Yes, you did. Deep fucking inside you, you knew.” My lips pull back in a sneer as I stare at him. “At a certain point, you’re no longer a product of your environment. The responsibility eventually falls to you. To correct the way you choose to operate, rather than fall back into the comfort of what you’ve been taught.”
Any and all arguments he has die on the spot, either too afraid of or too stunned by the guillotine of words hanging over us. I know it was harsh, but it needed to be said. Responsibility doesn’t fall on him for his trauma, but healing it, reworking his way of thinking, and changing the things he can control, all do.
The worst part is, this whole time, I thought he was doing exactly that.
Clearly, I thought wrong.
“When?”
The single word comes out like it’d just been pulverised with a hammer. Avery’s response doesn’t fare much better.
“Tonight.”
My eyes sink closed. Of course.
No doubt his father wanted him out of here as soon as possible.
Avery must read something in my expression, because I hear the floor creak under his weight, only to open my eyes and find him approaching slowly.
“It doesn’t have to end like this.”
A sharp laugh leaves me as I step away again. “Oh, really? Enlighten me, then. What happens when you go home? When you get back into Foltyn and classes start again?”
I throw every question in his face—all the ones I’ve been struggling with myself—to see what his answers might be. Because I know mine now; I’ve known them for a while, I think.
Don’t betray your heart.
But what am I supposed to do when my heart betrays me instead?
A helpless look crosses Avery’s features, eyes pleading as they lock with mine before glancing around the cabin. Searching, like the answer is written somewhere on the wood inside these walls rather than the organ beating in his chest.
“I don’t know what happens,” he whispers, shaking his head. “I haven’t even thought about that yet. I thought we had more time.”
It’s on the tip of my tongue to tell him that we could. If he’d just stay, we could. But I don’t say it. If that isn’t an obvious option to him, then do I really want him to stay?
My teeth sink into my cheek for a moment before I mutter, “Well, the clock’s just run out. The bubble’s burst, and it’s time to head back to reality.”
“Don’t say it like that.”
“Why? It’s true.” I motion toward him, despair taking hold. “You’re leaving, right?”
He gnaws on his lower lip, the way his eyes fall to the floor making it clear he is, even if he doesn’t want to admit it. And as I stare at the guy who I’ve spent weeks with, laughing and smiling and fucking and healing, I don’t recognize him.
Maybe Cole was right after all.
Sleeping with him didn’t mean I knew who he really was, it only made me blind to the parts I didn’t want to see. It let me fall for an illusion; the fantasy of the man I thought him to be.
Right now, he’s showing me who he really is.
A fraud, a coward, a liar.
He’s proving he hasn’t changed.
If I can fall in love with someone like that, then what the hell does that say about me?
The thought takes me off guard, knocking the wind out of me like a gut-punch. I thought I was fighting against the emotions he was pulling out of me; pushing back and shoving them away to save myself from the possibility of feeling like this. Yet it seems he snuck past my defenses anyway.
I don’t have long to linger on the revelation, because Avery takes a slow step toward me, snapping my focus back to the present. My immediate reaction is to move away again, to put distance between myself and the thing causing me pain.
And I fucking hate that his tortured whisper only makes me feel it more.
“I don’t know what you want me to do.”
To stay, to fight, to scream.
To do fucking anything other than lie down in submission, yet again.
On some level, I always knew it would come to this. He’d be placed in a situation where he’d finally have to show himself—his real self—to his father. And while I’d hoped he’d be up to the task, it’s obvious now that he isn’t.
Maybe he never will be.
And here I am, in love with him anyway.
My teeth grind together so hard, I’m liable to crack a molar. At least it’ll pair well with the broken heart struggling to beat in my chest.
“Go,” I whisper.
“What?”
“I said go, okay? That’s what I want you to do.” The lie is bitter on my tongue, but I swallow it down anyway. “Go and don’t fucking look back.”
“Kaleb—”
“Go!” I snarl, the word cracking and shattering as it leaves my lips.
I’m barely hanging on now, and if he doesn’t get out of here, there’s no telling what might happen. Will I drop to the floor and beg? Scream at him some more? Say something I shouldn’t…or maybe something I should?
Tears well in his eyes, threatening to spill over, but he quickly blinks them away before crossing the room. With every step he takes toward the door, a piece of what we’ve built here dies, only to become dust beneath his feet.
My stomach rolls when the sound of the door hinge creaking greets my ears, but just when I think I’m in the clear, he stops and clutches the door frame.
Baby, please. Go. Don’t make this harder.
He doesn’t turn around, though, just stands there, shoulders slumped in defeat before whispering out into the darkness.
“I’m a different person than I was when I got here. You’re a big reason for that.”
My jaw clenches as I try to rein in my emotions threatening to spill to the floor, joining the remains of my mutilated heart.
“From where I’m standing, you’re exactly the same.”
My vision blurs as I slam the door closed, flick the lock in place, and press my back to the wood for support, only for my knees to give out and I drop to the floor. The throbbing ache in my chest has its own pulse, like a blade stabbing the stupid organ that resides there with every beat it takes. Reaching up, I rub the spot, as if it’ll be enough to ease the pain.
As if it can erase the facts.
The bubble burst, and just as I feared, devastation is left in its wake.
But it doesn’t feel real. Not until the next morning when Elijah comes up to me at the breakfast table and asks, “Where’s Avery?”
I don’t have it in me to meet his gaze when I answer with a single, heart-wrenching word.
“Gone.”