Chapter 27 OLIVIA #3
"I can’t even remember why I did it, Trace.” My tone is steeped in sorrow, feeling the betrayal of my actions shroud me. "But it was one kiss," I declare knowing that it probably isn’t enough. I try to turn away from him but he holds me here, my elbow tight in his grip.
“Was it just one kiss?” he asks and I snap my head back to him, locking our eyes together.
He doesn’t even blink, but my heart is sprinting.
I dip my head. I don’t mean to lie to him.
I don’t mean to hurt him. But the first kiss was seemingly out of my physical control.
I can’t remember how or why it truly happened.
Only having recollection of it now. But the second time .
. . the time that, until now, I thought was our first kiss, was truly a mistake.
One that I intentionally tried to block out and severe regret lights my veins, causing my heart to tear apart even more.
“How do you know about that?” I lower my voice, shame coating my tone.
His eyes bleed with the only kind of pain that can be associated with irrefutable proof. He had to have seen it, witnessed me yet again, betraying him. But if he truly did see it, he’d know that it was a mistake. He would have seen that I didn’t initiate it and that I was the one who stopped it.
Trace turns around, giving me his back as he runs his fingers through his hair. I don’t know what to say that will make this better, so I just decide to start with the truth. I close my eyes, lowering my voice and hoping he’ll listen to my words and hear me out.
“You hadn’t answered my calls or responded to my texts.
You didn’t even come to the hospital to see me.
I felt like you were avoiding me and I couldn’t understand why.
It scared me. At first, I wondered if maybe you were also dead and your body was still out there, or if it had been claimed and I just didn’t know.
But then I was questioned by the detectives about what happened that night and I just couldn’t seem to remember anything.
That’s when they told me that it was suspicious, that because I couldn’t remember, it was an admission of guilt or of knowing something and protecting someone.
I didn’t know what was going to happen to me and I thought maybe you might have heard and thought I had something to do with it.
But I needed you, so a few days after I had gotten out of the hospital, I went to your house to find you, Trace. "
I stop there, hoping he's listening but not fully wanting to relieve that night and my gravest lapse in judgment. At least one that I can remember. Those days between finding my brother’s body and realizing Trace had left me behind, I felt the worst case of depression I think I’ve ever known.
Sometimes, I feel like I can’t even really tell those days apart anymore because they all just kind of blend together.
“I wasn't home” he says calmly, his back still to me.
I want to step up to him and wrap my arms around him. I want to kiss the scratches on his back and trace his tattoos with my fingers again. I want to hold him. But I can’t seem to move and I'm not sure he'd want me to. So I stay.
“Your bike was gone, the lights were all off.” I close my eyes again, going back to that moment.
Remembering the emptiness I'd felt as I walked up to his house when I realized that no one was home. “I wanted you to be the one to comfort me. I needed you to help me understand, to help me through everything. I wanted to be there for you and you just weren’t there. You left and never came back.”
When I open my eyes this time, all of the lights are off and the house is dead quiet. Silence greets us and I feel the eeriness that lowers around us, like something is lurking. The haunted house is absolutely still, and that's when I realize everyone has left and now it’s just him and I.
Trace turns around to face me, but I can barely make him out in the dark.
I wrap my arms around myself, starting to feel a panic bubble in my chest, wondering what he's thinking or what's going to happen next with us.
I just gave up every last bit of control I had to him and I'm displaying that very result right now.
If he wanted to break me, he could. But I won't give up this moment without trying to fix what I can between us.
Trace focuses his eyes on me and I wait with bated breath for his response.
“I did come back, Olivia," he starts and my heart plummets. "You’re right, I was avoiding you. I had just lost my fucking sister and I was still struggling with the fact that you had kissed Jensen the first time. But the day after you were released from the hospital, there were so many things I wanted to say so I went to your dad’s house. That’s when he told me what happened to you, about your memories and…
” he trails off, reaching for my arm and I shiver.
“And what, Trace?” I ask, patiently letting him form his next thoughts.
“Your dad is the one who told me to leave you alone,” he admits and my heart drops.
I mean, I know my dad never really was too fond of Trace, but that's just because he was bad boy, and he had a sour taste in his mouth after finding out what his parents were into.
And to be fair, he didn't love Seren either.
But even my dad knew I needed Trace after everything.
I remember damn near begging him to let me find him before I attempted to do so myself.
I remember telling him and the detectives that my memory with Trace was one of the only ones I'd been able to recall, not that I detailed it out for them.
But now, I feel hate sink into my bones.
“Why would he say that?” I ask, wondering if he might have given a good enough reason to justify that request.
“He told me that I might trigger something that could do more damage," he admits and it infuriates me because I know that…
It hits me. The second kiss that Trace witnessed, the one that I thought was our first. But if he's saying he came to my house and . . . I look up to find Trace analyzing me, watching me as I put the pieces together.
"I stalked around to the back of the house to your bedroom window. That’s when I saw you and Jensen on your bed. That’s when I realized that I had already fucking lost you, Olivia.”
“Did you even stop to consider the situation, Trace? Did you stick around long enough to see that I pushed him off me? That I wasn't interested?”
“I shouldn’t have had to, Olivia. You made a promise to be mine and you’d clearly forgotten that. Twice.”
“The first time was out of my control. I can't truly explain that, Trace, and I'm so deeply sorry. But that second time, Jensen came to my house to check on me after I got out of the hospital. He comforted me. He showed up. I accepted his concern as friend but I was so fucking distraught, I can see how he might have misread my needs and kissed me but it didn’t last for more than a second, Trace and then I pushed him off. That’s what happened. I was angry and hurt because I needed someone who wasn’t showing up for me.
If you would’ve just fucking shown up for me…
” I let my words trail off, hearing the pain drip from them.
“He took advantage of me and instead of being a fucking man and approaching me about it, you just left?”
“You claim he took advantage of your emotional instabilities, Olivia, yet you still proceeded to date the asshole for years after. Do you have any idea how fucking hard that is to swallow?”
“I needed to do something to get you out of my head. You were gone and he was always there for me. Everyone in this town has made me feel like I'm fucking delusional for what I can't remember that night and he never made me feel that way."
"Oh, should I be fucking thanking him then?
Thank you, Jensen for taking advantage of my emotionally unstable girlfriend.
Thank you for swooping in and saving the day.
Thank you, Jensen for fucking the girl the only goddamn girl that I have ever been in love with while I watch her slowly fade away. Is that what you want, Olivia?"
I hate the way this feels. I hate knowing that all of this . . . this misunderstanding, has led to his pain. I can feel it deep in my core just how broken he is. It makes sense why he transformed into someone who craves pain, forged by my deceit.
I take a step back, feeling defeated. I know nothing will make up for the suffering he'd been put through. Not just because of me but because of the death of his sister too. But what about me? It's clear we both needed each other and I was just forced to deal with it alone.
"I called you and I texted you, every single day," I say, threading the desolation I still feel while thinking about it into my words.
"I was going crazy trying to come up with answers, dealing with Deck's and Seren's death, wondering why you left. I even went up to the college a few weekends after everything just to find out that you had dropped out. You dropped everything, Trace. Your football career, your academics. You moved off campus and didn’t leave a forwarding address. You left everything behind because-”
Trace stalks toward me, my eyes barely being able to adjust to the darkness. But he steps into me and wraps his hands around my face with his heated and possessive grip.
“I didn’t leave everything behind, Olivia. It was fucking taken from me.”
I gasp, anchoring myself to the passion I still see exuding from his hazel eyes.
He sighs as he lets his hands drop, a sign of defeat that makes me feel like my heart my combust in the worst way.
“I can't. I need you to remember,” he tells me, defeat layering his tone and I feel a tear start to fall down my cheek once more.
“Tell me what the that means, Trace. Please.” I know there's more. There has to be.