Chapter 21 #2
I don’t know how I dragged myself down to rugby training, and I have even less idea how I’m going to get through the next hour and a half on the pitch in the drizzle.
Mr. Cormack’s in a bad mood, Valentine’s not holding back with the dumb wisecracks, but I don’t care.
I just want to get back to my room, to my bed, to sleep and not think about anything until the chaos that’s my life lately has miraculously sorted itself out again.
Running with Emma seems to be over for good.
We haven’t discussed it, but it’s obvious.
At the Tuesday-morning run, we each do our own thing.
I still haven’t spoken to her. And the longer I leave it, the more wrong it feels to go up to her and say, Hey, I dumped Grace, how about us getting together now?
I know what that would look like. Like the kind of heartless bastard who just hops from one girl to the next.
But it’s not like that. Fine, if I’m brutally honest with myself, I guess Emma is the reason I split up with Grace.
But she’s not the only reason. It was already inevitable that we’d break up.
Emma wasn’t the cause; she was the final straw.
She showed me that there is more. That majorly intense emotions like these can be terrifying.
And I want majorly intense emotions. But not this crappy despair.
Although maybe that’s just part of it. At least it proves I’m still alive, doesn’t it?
Mind you, I didn’t think about what would happen next.
What comes after I’ve done the thing I was most afraid of?
Not relief, that’s for sure. It’s shit. I want to say so much to Emma, but I don’t dare.
Maybe we both need time to understand what happened in Glasgow on Friday.
What that means for us. Yet at the same time, all I want is to go to Emma and ask her how she’s doing.
How she’s coping now that she knows who her father is.
I think back to that moment when we walked into the pub and she saw him.
I remember Emma’s frozen expression and motionless body, the disappointment and pain on her face when she walked out of that restaurant without him and he let her go.
But I don’t ask Emma how she is. I watch her from a distance, pissed off with myself that she’s avoiding me. But I have to accept that she doesn’t want to talk to me. Because that’s obvious. Even though it’s driving me crazy.
After chemistry, I’m putting away Sinclair’s and my equipment when suddenly she’s standing right next to me. Emma, in a white lab coat that’s way too big for her, Bunsen burner still in hand.
I can’t move. Apparently, neither can she. My head is suddenly full of words, but my tongue’s been struck dumb. I can hear voices, scraping chair legs, the usual end-of-lesson sounds. I can feel my heart pounding in my throat.
I only come back to life as Emma’s eyes wander past me. To the cupboards, which I’m blocking.
“Can I . . . ?” she begins, and I immediately step aside.
“Yeah, sorry.” My heart racing again, I stay beside her. I’ve got this nervous dizziness because I know I’m going to have to say something. More than sorry or even I apologize, although those are the only things that feel right. How are you? Could we talk? Something like that would be appropriate.
“Emma?” My voice sounds rough, and it has some effect on her. I can see that, and, no, I’m not so desperate that I’m imagining it. Emma jumps. The beakers rattle as she puts the burner into the cupboard.
“Be careful with the equipment,” Ms. Ventura says sharply, but I don’t think Emma even hears her. Her whole body is tense as she turns away again.
“Could we maybe—”
She cuts me off. “What? What, Henry?”
It’s the first time she’s looked me properly in the eye.
And I can see all her pain. Eyes like fire, burning with reproach.
Because I’m not doing anything, just staying so bloody passive.
At this moment, I wonder if I’ve waited too long.
Or if I should have kissed her, regardless of Grace.
And in the same second, I hate myself for thinking that.
It’s just a heartbeat. A missed chance, then Emma turns away. I want to grab her arm, but my hands are like lead.
She walks back to her place.
Emma
No way he’ll be there, Emma.
Why did I know that wouldn’t be true when I let Tori convince me to come to the midnight party?
Did she and Sinclair take it upon themselves to lure Henry and me to this place, to force us to have a conversation?
If so, it was a seriously crappy idea. I see him the moment I follow Tori into the old greenhouse, and my first impulse is to turn on my heel and leave.
I stop in the doorway, and Salome crashes into me.
Tori looks apologetically at me over her shoulder.
I ought to make a run for it, but I stay put when Henry glances in our direction.
He looks exhausted, but he’s still gorgeous, and I hate it.
I hate that I instantly forget everyone else in the room when his eyes rest as heavily on me as they are now.
I hate that I’m boiling hot despite the pissing rain outside.
I hate that I can’t help thinking about Glasgow.
About Henry, who spent so long waiting for me.
His hands on my arms, his face so close to mine.
I don’t know why I keep subjecting myself to this humiliation in memory form, but I can’t wipe away the images. I have to get away from here.
“Oops, I didn’t know . . .” Tori begins as I catch her eye. She really does look sorry, but I just shake my head.
“Nice one, Tori,” I mumble before I turn away.
Henry
Gideon cracked some joke, Sinclair’s laughing loudly, and I’m swigging out of this bottle again because everything’s pointless. I don’t want to be here, but of course I came anyway because I kind of hoped Emma might be.
She isn’t. I look toward the door every time anyone walks into the greenhouse, but it’s never Emma. And if it was, I don’t know what I’d do. Ask her if we can talk? Here, at this party? Great idea. She’s sure to be in the mood for that.
“Hey.” I feel Sinclair’s hand on my shoulder and raise my head. He gestures toward the door.
It’s her. I stand up, and the ground sways beneath me.
I put the bottle down, not looking. I only have eyes for Emma.
Her ash-blond hair, fallen across her face and slightly damp from the rain.
Her eyes flick over the greenhouse and she spots me right away.
I jump as we gaze at each other. I know I mustn’t wait a second longer.
We have to talk. I have to apologize, explain everything to her and find out how she’s doing.
Sinclair steps aside, unasked, to let me through and says nothing when I have to grip his shoulder. Maybe the alcohol wasn’t such a good idea, but I can’t change that now.
Emma’s outside again, and I wonder if I imagined things just now.
Tori’s expression is hard to read as she stares at me, while Olive glares murderously as I leave the greenhouse.
My eyes take a moment to adjust to the darkness.
Then I make out Emma’s silhouette a few feet away.
She’s wrapped her arms around her body and is on her way back to the school buildings.
I start to run.
“Wait!” The crunch of my feet on the gravel is the only sound in the night. I’m afraid she might start running too, but Emma just walks steadily on. Which might mean she’ll hear me out. I dare to hope a tiny bit. “Emma.”
She whirls around as I touch her shoulder. “What?” she snarls.
“Emma, I’m so—”
“Have you been drinking? Henry, are you kidding me? What’s going on here?”
“I hoped we could talk,” I begin, but Emma laughs at that.
“Talk? What about? Grace?” She shakes her head. “So it’s true?” She stares at me, and suddenly it’s like I can’t move my tongue. I can’t speak, yet she deserves an explanation.
“Shit, Henry, is it true? Did you break up with Grace?”
Her eyes bore through me, and suddenly, I’m livid. With Emma, with Grace, but above all, with myself.
“What if I did?” I snap back.
“Did you break up with Grace?” she repeats, even though she’s apparently known for ages.
“Yes, yes, for God’s sake!” I blurt out. “I broke up with her. You heard right.”
“Why?”
“Why what?”
“Why did you do that?”
“I don’t know,” I snarl.
“Don’t lie to me!”
“Being with Grace wasn’t enough anymore. It was just better this way.”
“Are you out of your mind, Henry? God, you two were perfect! You’ll regret this, you’ll—”
“You have no idea!” Suddenly, we’re both yelling. “You want to know why I broke up with her? You really want to know, huh?” I’m drunk; I have to stop this. But Emma doesn’t flinch as I take a step toward her. “Why do you think I did it?”
“Because you’re an arsehole,” she whispers, and I get it. Because I’m no better than her shitty ex-boyfriend or her disappointment of a father. The men in her life who play with her and drop her as soon as things get tough.
“Do you think it was fun for me?” I snap. “Do you really think I wanted to be that guy? The guy who hurts Grace and throws away what we have? Shit, Emma, three years, three shitting years. I hate being the arsehole, but you gave me no choice.”
“No.” Her index finger jabs my chest. “Oh, no, Henry Bennington. You take that back. I’ve got nothing to do with this. You chose, not me. I never fucking asked you!”
“Didn’t you? Didn’t you? So you didn’t look at me like that, and tell me all that stuff, and think it wouldn’t bother me?
For God’s sake, I didn’t want this! I thought things were perfect with Grace, but I had no idea that that wasn’t love.
That there’s more than that. I didn’t plan to fall in love with you, Emma Wiley, but I’m only human.
And you know it. So don’t ask me why I did it.
We both know.” I take the last step toward her.
“I did it so that I could finally do this.”
Emma