Chapter 14
fourteen
CAMILLA
8 YEARS EARLIER
I love you. Tears streamed down my face as Julian’s voice echoed all the way up the stairs, where I heard commotion from my parents’ room. I wasn’t expecting my dad for another week, but it wasn’t a surprise hand my mom were already fighting. I slowed my pace up the steps so I could stay undetected while listening through the cracked door.
“If you’re already packing for another business trip, at least have some goddamn decency to spend time with your daughter before you go.”
“What do you want me to do, Liv? You never wanted to worry about money, and this is how I do that.”
“Just come out and say it already, Jeremy. We both know you’re not really leaving for work.” You could suddenly hear a pin drop.
“You’re fucking crazy,” he gritted out. I didn’t stick around because I’d heard it all before. Every time he left town, they called each other every name in the book, and he’d still end up leaving. My parents knew I was aware of their problems, but they didn’t know I knew everything . When I was ten, I accidentally eavesdropped on a conversation my dad had with his mistress about baby names. It shattered my entire world and everything I thought I knew. Every time my dad kissed me on the forehead to leave out of town for work , I knew where he was really going. Despite her suspicions, I didn’t know if Mom knew, so I lived with the secret he’d been juggling two families for years.
For a long time, I thought that was all love stories ended up with—secrecy, silent dinners, screaming matches, no laughter. It made the idea of falling in love a terrifying concept. I found comfort in reading fictional love stories because I could live vicariously and never run the risk of ending up like my parents. They were good to me but fucking terrible for each other. Sometimes, I wished they had never crossed paths and lived happy lives, even if it meant I never existed.
I shut my door and escaped their noise by climbing out of my window onto the rooftop. When I couldn’t make it down to the cove, the view from up there sufficed.
I only had Julian on my mind when I looked out at the cliffs just out of reach when I needed them the most. Tears fell down my cheeks as I replayed our fight, how I ruined what should have been a perfect moment. He was right when he said I bailed. Mom always told me she and Dad fell in love young, and I saw how they despised each other, constantly throwing digs about the life they could have had if they’d never met.
I refused to be like them, and the only way I prevented that was to stay away from relationships altogether, but I couldn’t stay away from Julian. I might’ve been able to at one point, but he’d snuck his way into my heart and found a way to unlock my soul. For the first time in my life, I knew what love was supposed to be like.
I felt like my life started the day we were forced to be partners on that writing assignment, whether I wanted to admit it then or not. He made me feel seen, even when I didn’t want to be. He brought out a version of me I didn’t even know existed and taught me to love it. He made me feel at peace in a place of chaos.
When things got real, I ran, but not because I didn’t love him. I ran because I did.
* * *
“Camilla, you’re up next.” I froze when Miss Knowles turned to me. I’d been so busy rotting in bed all weekend, I’d forgotten about the homework for English class. We’d been learning about Edgar Allan Poe, so the assignment was to write our own poem. I had to write mine ten minutes before the final bell rang that morning, so I wasn’t confident it was any good, but in true poetic fashion, it was my raw emotions of everything I’d felt over the weekend.
I took a deep breath and walked to the front of the class, my hands shaking as I grasped the wrinkled piece of paper. I found Julian’s lost eyes and almost broke into tears, but I refused to be remembered as the girl who cried in first period English.
I swallowed the lump in my throat and read with a shaky breath. “She finds it hard to trust, the same way the ocean struggles to hug the shore no longer than a few seconds, before she begins pulling herself back. When she feels safe enough to be still, she’s pulled by the gravity of his words, tainted by the love she’s always known. He’s somehow stronger than the waves crashing onto the shore, and she finds herself willingly swimming into his arms. Why? Who are you to even do such a thing?” I looked up and found only his brown eyes to try and tell him everything I couldn’t say days before. I always found it easier to put my feelings onto pages rather than speak them out loud, and I’d meant every word. I just hoped it wasn’t too late.
* * *
My spot was the only place I wanted to be after school that day. I sat inside the hollow cave, rubbing sand between my fingers as I looked out at the ocean and remembered when I’d shared the peaceful place with Julian. The question lingered whether I’d lost him, and I couldn’t stomach how, if I did, I only had myself to blame.
“I figured you’d be here.” I sighed with relief when his deep voice rang from behind me. “Lucky guess.”
He sank into the sand next to me, and we stayed quiet for what felt like hours, looking at the surfers in the distance. I was the one who screwed up, so I decided to bite the bullet first. “You were right about me. I got scared and ran, but not for the reason you think.” I knew without a doubt I loved him. He had me, so there was no going back. “I didn’t grow up with the best example of how love is supposed to look, Julian, and i’ve spent my entire life trying not to be like my parents. When you said those words, it felt real, which meant we could turn out the same way. It scared me.” I let out a heavy breath once the weight was off my chest.
He turned to me and took my face in his warm hands. “Mila, you don’t have to explain yourself. It was selfish to tell you that. You can say I love you tomorrow, a year from now, five years from now. I don’t care. I still love you. You had me the second I saw you with the green ribbon in your hair in kindergarten. I knew it was you. It’s always going to be you.” With his thumb, he wiped the single tear that slid down my cheek. He was so gentle, and his eyes were filled with passion and tenderness that made the next words easy to say. “I love you, Julian. You have my heart, so don’t break it.”
He rested his forehead against mine. “You can do whatever you want to mine.” I ran my fingers through his wavy hair and kissed him deeply enough to tie our souls together.
“I liked your poem.” He smiled against my lips.
“I thought I lost you.”
His laughter vibrated in my chest before he pressed a kiss to my forehead. “You can’t get rid of me that easy, Vega.”
And that was it—I was a girl in love.