15. Chapter Fifteen #2
He’s silent for a long moment, his spine straightening. “Then I would return you here.” A deep breath. “I would not keep you against your will, Maven. Never that.” But he’ll stay here against my will.
Though, is it really ever against my will if some part of me wants it?
The sincerity in his voice makes something twist painfully in my gut. He believes what he’s saying—believes in me and us. He’s spent centuries waiting for me, lifetime after lifetime, rejection after rejection.
And what have I done? Moved to a million cities, a new job each time, never settling into a permanent routine. I’ve not once connected to anything or anyone, always running from something I don’t deserve. Always feeling like I was searching for something just beyond my reach.
What if that something was him?
And if he’s wrong…if this is all some elaborate delusion or manipulation…then I’ve truly lost everything, including my grip on reality itself.
I can’t breathe. The walls of the apartment squeeze my throat, the air too thick to pull into my lungs. My heart hammers so hard I feel the throb of it at the base of my neck.
“I need air,” I gasp, heaving myself up from the floor. My legs shake beneath me, threatening to give way. “I need to think.”
Ash rises in one fluid motion, concern evident in the tilt of his head. “Maven—”
“Don’t,” I cut him off with a raised hand. “Just—don’t say anything else. Please.”
He nods, stepping back to give me space. I move past him on unsteady legs to the hallway. Instead of reaching for the stairs, I aim for the door that leads to the roof. I need sky above me. Perhaps the cold will shock my system back to something acceptable.
The stairwell is freezing, though it doesn’t stop me. Nor do the icy metal steps against my socked feet. I didn’t grab my coat or shoes, but I barely notice the cold. My mind races too fast for physical discomfort to register.
Is this what I want? To wake up each day to the same emptiness, no matter where I am, and feeling the same sense of wrongness that has followed me since childhood. I swallow pills that don’t help and see therapists who can’t understand.
And now this—him.
I can’t tell if he’s made everything worse by baring his truth or just made it all clear to me.
Either way, it’s too much. All of it. I’m so fucking sick of the constant effort of pretending to be normal when every interaction feels like speaking a language I’ve never learned. It’s so unbelievably exhausting to fight against the current of my own thoughts day after day.
I’m. So. Tired.
The door to the roof groans from rusty hinges. Tears stream down my face, freezing against my skin so quickly that mounds form on my cheeks.
I can’t breathe, I can’t think.
What kind of life is this? Not one worth fighting for.
I shuffle to the edge of the roof, where the low wall rises just a few inches above the surface. One small step and there would be nothing between me and the six-story drop to the pavement below. One moment of courage—or cowardice—and this particular version of Maven Talmay would cease to exist.
I mean, if Ash is right, I’ll just be reborn again. Another chance at a life that might be better, might be worse, but would at least be different from this endless cycle of emptiness and pain. And if he’s wrong, if death is truly the end…
Well, that would be a relief too.
This will be the best decision I’ve ever made, I tell myself as I come flush to the edge. The right decision. Probably the only thing that’s ever made sense.
So why does it hurt so much? Why does my chest feel like it’s being torn open, my heart ripped from its cavity? Why do the tears keep coming, hot and fast, blurring my vision until the city lights below smear into streaks of color?
No, I know why. Because no one will miss me.
I’ll disappear from this world without leaving a mark, and no one will notice I’m gone. Even in this moment—this final, desperate act—I am utterly, completely alone.
Except I’m not.
I feel him before he speaks, his presence a beacon. Familiar now, almost comforting if I’m being honest. The one constant in my life these past weeks.
“What do you think you’re doing?” His voice is tight with an emotion I can’t identify, something between fear and rage.
I don’t turn around. Can’t bear to see whatever expression hides behind the veil. “What does it look like?”
“It looks like you’re making a terrible mistake,” he says, and I suck in a breath at his closer voice. Heat radiates from him, a stark contrast to the freezing air. “Maven, please. Step back from the edge.”
“Why?” I ask, my voice cracking on the single syllable. “What difference does it make? If what you say is true, I’ll just be reborn again. And if it’s not, then none of this matters anyway.”
“It matters to me. You matter to me. More than you can possibly understand.”
A sob tears from my throat, the sound ugly and broken in the quiet night. “You don’t even know me.”
“I know every version of you that has ever existed,” he counters, moving closer still.
He’s just behind me now, close enough to touch if either of us reached out.
“I know the shape of your soul better than my own, and the weight of your longing. I have watched you live and die a thousand times, Maven, and each time it tears something from me I’ll never recover. ”
“Then you should want this.” I gesture below. “One more death, one more rebirth. Maybe the next version of me will be better. Happier. More worthy of whatever devotion you think I deserve.”
“No.” The word rings with power, vibrating through the air between us. “No more deaths. I am done waiting—I cannot bear to lose you again, or watch your soul slip away and begin the cycle anew. Please, Maven, come with me instead.”
“To your world?” My answering laugh is humorless.
“Yes,” he says. “Where you will never shed another tear from sadness. You will never again question your place or your purpose. My flower, there will be no doubt how loved and wanted you are.”
“Loved,” I repeat, the word a foreign thing on my tongue. “As if you know what that means.”
“I have loved you for centuries.” The deep register of his words bypasses my ears and speaks directly to something deep inside me.
“Through every lifetime and every rejection. I have loved you when you were joyful and even more when you were broken. It never mattered that you’d forgotten me or cursed my name when you were scared.
I have loved you through every torturous moment of waiting—watching—and hoping that this time, this life, you would finally come home. ”
Tears flow faster now, blurring my vision completely. “Stop,” I whisper, but there’s no force behind it.
“I love you, Maven.” The man is relentless in his honesty. “Please don’t do this again. Please don’t make me watch you die knowing I could have prevented it. Let me show you what it means to be truly seen.”
I believe him. That’s the worst part. Standing on the edge of a roof, one step away from death, I believe him. He sees something in me worth that kind of devotion.
And that’s exactly why I need to jump.
Because he deserves better. Someone whole and capable of returning that kind of obsession. Not this broken shell of a person who can barely remember what smiling feels like.
“You deserve better,” I echo my thoughts as a sob catches in my throat. “Even if everything you say is true, you deserve better than what I am now. Maybe in another life, I’ll be worthy of what you’re offering. But not this one. I can’t be enough for you like this.”
“Maven—”
“I’m sorry,” I cut him off before taking that final step onto the low wall. The city stretches below me, a dizzying drop that makes my stomach lurch. “I’m so sorry.”
And I step off the edge.
For one endless moment, I’m falling. The wind rushes past my ears, my stomach drops, my heart pauses mid-beat. This is it. Finally, I’m free.
Until strong arms wrap around my waist, yanking me backward with inhuman strength. We fall together, my back against his chest, his body cushioning mine as we slam into the concrete roof with enough force to drive the air from my lungs.
“You are mine,” Ash snarls against my ear, his arms still locked around me like steel bands. “You do not get to leave me again.”