Chapter 45
forty-five
Cash
My heart pounds in my chest like it’s ready to explode, and nausea spreads through me in a harsh, sudden wave. I push open Maisy’s back door and lean up against the siding of the house, filling my lungs with clean spring air and telling my body to calm the fuck down.
Too much coffee this morning and not enough food.
Plus the craziness of the last few weeks and the stress of being on the verge of going from college kid to pro football player in a matter of weeks.
The Hartnells are an anxious bunch, always have been.
I close my eyes and tip my head back against the house until, finally, my body starts to settle.
Then her voice sounds from the other side of the house, and the whole sick panic rises in me again.
Georgia.
It’s not coffee or stress or even Hartnell genes, it’s Georgia. Always has been.
She and Maisy are out in the driveway, Georgia about to get in her car and leave.
I try to block out the sound, but there’s nothing else to hear, only spring birds chirping and a little breeze that rustles up the white peonies planted against the house, and even if there were a train blowing past, I’d still hear her voice because that’s all I do.
Hear her voice, smell her skin, and replay the way her lips move when she says my name.
At some point I stopped fighting it, thinking if I let it all play out, eventually it would get old and fade into the distance, but so far, no luck.
Seeing her upstairs in her old bedroom and watching her baby blues roam my body isn’t helping either.
When I spotted her car parked in Maisy’s driveway, I knew it would hurt, but I didn’t hesitate. I’ll take whatever scraps I can get from her, even if she hates me while she’s offering them. I’ll never stop wanting more of her.
It’s been thirty-five days since we broke up.
I know the exact date because the night it happened, I remember thinking how wild it was that something so intense could complete its entire life cycle in three months.
That feels wrong, like some kind of mistake was made.
Maybe I have to count our beginning as that summer she came to stay with us—twelve years definitely feels more fitting.
Or maybe this is how life is, with no rules that make sense.
Which means I could walk into a room tomorrow and meet another girl even better than Georgia who I could fall right in love with.
But instead of bringing comfort, the thought repels me.
Nobody will ever be better than Georgia. I don’t want to love anyone but her.
The back door opens, startling me, and Maisy steps outside. “She’s gone.”
I shrug, playing it off—a pointless exercise in front of my sister. “Okay.”
She mimics my posture and leans back against the house. “That was hard to watch.”
“What was?”
“You and Georgia.”
What did Maisy see? I thought I was pretty cool about it.
Thought I did a good job of hiding that there are a thousand things left unsaid between us that I’ll go to my grave wishing I could say and hear.
That my apology last week didn’t even scratch the surface of what I want to tell her.
That my body’s response to Georgia hasn’t changed one iota, still straining to touch her and stand close enough to feel her warmth, that my brain just barely managed to hold on to the leash today and not immediately take her in my arms.
But maybe not. Because one brief look into Georgia’s eyes told me nothing has changed; the love and admiration and lust she feels still remain, except on top of the good stuff, there’s a layer of pain that wasn’t there before. And that’s my fault.
“Yeah, well,” I finally say. “Breakups are awkward.”
“That wasn’t awkward, it was painful. The two of you are oozing pain, Cash.”
“What do you want me to say?”
“I want you to help me understand why you’re letting this happen. God himself couldn’t have kept you from her the first time around, so why are you letting her slip away now?”
“I apologized,” I say. “I poured my heart out to her, I begged for forgiveness, and I failed. What more can I do?”
As this hangs in the air, Maisy drags two plastic chairs out from under the awning and gestures for me to sit.
“So how is she?” I ask, sitting down and fixing my attention on the neighbor’s yard that backs up to Maisy’s. Two black labs run and chase one another in the green grass, trampling a bed of yellow and pink tulips in the process.
“You know her better than I do. You know exactly how she is.” She doesn’t try to hide the accusation in her voice.
“And the house?”
“A whole bunch of stress. Mixed emotions.”
She loves that house. Who wouldn’t? “So she’s staying until it sells?”
“Probably not. It won’t take long to find a buyer, and she can do everything remotely. I think she’s ready to go back to where she came from.” Maisy says it casually, but then she turns to me like she knows exactly the gravity of her words. “Georgia’s leaving, Cash.”
I blink at her. Georgia’s leaving. Soon she’ll be back in New Jersey, and the house will belong to a stranger, just like before. All that beauty we created together, the place we fell in love, out of reach forever. “She could come back.”
“Why would she?”
“She’s gonna miss that house.”
“She’s going back to her old life.”
Like none of it ever happened; like we never happened. It’s all wrong.
She takes my hand and looks over at the dogs, now busy digging up the earth around the crushed tulips. “I decided I’m moving back home after all,” she says. “Just for the summer, and then come fall, I’ll be in my grad program.”
I look at her, confused. After she started her PHP, Maisy talked about going back to her original plan and telling Mom and Dad to stop pressuring her into helping with the business.
She takes in my expression and shakes her head.
“I know, I should pursue my own dreams, our parents don’t know how to look out for me, etcetera, etcetera.
Let it go.” She squeezes my hand. “You’re free.
You’ve spent twenty-two years teaching me that if I need you, you’re there. You can stop trying to prove it.”
“But I can still help you. Mom and Dad listen to me more than they listen to you, so if you need me to explain where your head is—plus, you know when they get their claws into you, it’s gonna be a fight to leave.”
“What I need is for you to trust that I can take care of myself and that when I do need you, I’ll tell you. I’m a big girl. Do you believe me, Cash?” She smiles, no irritation or anger on her face, only calm understanding.
I swallow. “Yes. But—”
“No buts.” She runs her thumb over the back of my hand. “You don’t want to have to worry about me, and now you don’t. It’s okay that Mom and Dad don’t understand what I need because I do. There’s someone else who needs you to take care of her now.”
Regret pricks at me. All those promises I made to Georgia—that nothing mattered more than her, that I’d never leave her alone—and how I broke them all the night I walked away from her.
Sweet Georgia, who only ever wanted me to be exactly who I was.
The girl I healed by being myself. The girl who needs me as much as I need her.
“I already fucked that up,” I say, shame clogging my throat. “She straight up told me she needed me, and I left her hanging. I did my same stupid shit: I made her promises I didn’t keep. Promises I shouldn’t have made.”
“Or…” Maisy turns to me with soft, knowing eyes that I only have to search for a second before I understand.
“Promises I should have kept.”
“You wouldn’t fuck it up again.” She smiles. “You are so in love with her, Cash.”
This hits me square in the chest, and I suck in a breath, squeezing the emotions inside me tight so they can’t get out.
“Yeah,” I manage to say. I hear exactly what she’s saying—that this feeling in my chest that hurts enough to take my breath away is what’s real, and that everything I said before were empty words.
Excuses. The childish belief that real love should be easy, when the truth is I’d burn down my entire life for one more chance with her.
Fear cracks through my regret, fear for myself at the idea she might be lost to me and for her at the idea of what she’s going back to. I pat my pockets and realize I left my phone inside. “Can I use your phone?”
She smiles, knowing she won. “Nope. Go get yours.”
“Why not?”
“I don’t want her picking up thinking it’s me calling when it’s you.”
“Just give me your phone. It’s not Georgia I need to call.”