Chapter Twenty-Five Barrett #3
In the background, I heard Griffin say something, and the kids nodded. “We’re gonna go out to dinner, Dad. We love you.”
“Love you too,” I told them. “Don’t forget to call me every once in a while.”
“We won’t,” Bryce said. “We know how bored you’ll be without us.”
I smiled faintly. “Bye, buddy.”
As I set the phone down, I kept my gaze firmly on Lily’s back. She finished drying the skillet and bent down to open the bottom cupboard where they were stored.
When she was done, she set her hands on the counter and let out a heavy sigh, her head hanging down. Defeat was written all over her posture.
“Lily,” I said, aching to go over to her. But I wasn’t sure she’d welcome it. The chasm had opened back up between us—what I wanted and what she wanted on two completely different sides. There was nothing to bridge this gap except complete truth. Inconvenient truth. “Look at me.”
“If I look at you, I will forget why we can’t do this.”
The heartbreak in her voice had my hands curling into fists. “Talk to me.”
“Ask me why I always move around,” she said in a voice so quiet, I barely heard her. “Ask me why I can never force myself to stay.”
A panicky swell of emotion filled my chest, so big that it threatened to fill the room to the brim. “Why?”
Slowly, Lily turned. Her face was full of sorrow. Devastation was stamped in her eyes so deep that I felt it like a blow to the chest.
“Because I cannot—I will not—ever let myself love something so much that losing it will kill me,” she whispered, her eyes glossing over. “You and your children are not casual to me. I do not have the strength anymore to pretend like you are.”
I couldn’t sit still, not while I was watching her heart break right in front of me. “Lily,” I said urgently, “just talk to me. I can help.”
She held up her hand when I came around the island, and I forced myself to stop.
“No, you can’t,” she said.
Helplessness left me paralyzed. If I wanted to respect her space, I couldn’t force anything right now. And it was that impotence that had me raking my hands through my hair, tugging at the strands while I stared at her.
A reckless impulse took root, and I held her gaze as I weighed the risks of asking.
“How long has it been since you’ve seen your family?” I asked carefully.
Her face went pale, and her chin trembled. But before my eyes, I watched her gather herself. Pull up some internal reserve, an invisible well of strength that defied any explanation.
“Ten years.” She let out a slow breath. “Four months.” She closed her eyes. “Six days,” she whispered brokenly.
I said her name, but it felt like a plea more than anything. She backed away.
“I . . . I have to go to bed.” She strode around the other side of the island. “Guest room is down the hall, right?”
I nodded, my heart battered and weary as she fled at the first sign of emotional intimacy.
Wordlessly, I watched her grab the laundry basket. She paused at the end of the hallway and glanced over her shoulder. “Thank you for dinner.” Her smile was sad. “And for not letting me freeze.”
I waited until she was in the bathroom to pull the electric blanket from the linen closet and lay it carefully on the foot of the bed where she’d be sleeping.
Then I walked back down the hall and sank onto the couch, my elbows braced on the tops of my thighs, head in my hands as I sat in the silence of my house, thinking about how close she was.
Knowing she was within reach. Knowing she was completely unreachable.
The parts of her that mattered, at least.
Touching her body was only part of what I wanted. It was the glimpses of everything else that had my head and heart tangled up in knots. I wanted that too.
Blankly, I stared out at the relentless snow and wondered if I’d ever see it again and not think of her.
A couple hours passed. SportsCenter flickered on the TV, not really doing a good job of distracting me from any of this. But I couldn’t focus on anything worthwhile, and probably wouldn’t for as long as she was under this roof with me.
It was dark outside, finally late enough that it was acceptable to go to bed. As I turned off the lights, a noise came from down the hall.
I paused to listen and heard it again.
It was Lily, and when I strode quickly toward the room, I heard her shout someone’s name. I didn’t pause to consider the ramifications, simply opened the door to wake her.
She was already sitting up in bed, her face flushed, chest heaving, her hair tangled, and her eyes wide and frightened.
I crouched next to the side of the bed, reaching out to lay my hand over hers. “Are you okay?”
Her breathing came quickly, her eyes still clouded with sleep and terrorized confusion. I pressed my fingers along the underside of her wrist to check her pulse, watching her face carefully as I counted the beats.
“Barrett?” she whispered. Her chest glistened with sweat, as did her forehead.
“I’m right here.” I ran my palm up her arm. “You had a nightmare.”
Even though she was clearly still disoriented, she nodded, but her face crumpled, the first tear slipping down her cheek. She dashed at it with her hand, still breathing unsteadily.
“What can I do?” I asked. My chest ached with a force I’d never felt in my entire life, a bruise that spread over my entire skin, a hurt with her name on it.
She turned to me, eyes wide in her face, tears spilling over her cheeks. “Will you stay with me?”