Five Years Ago
ELLIE
It had been years, and the pit in my stomach hadn’t stopped growing. I didn’t know how to get it to stop. I felt like I was drowning, waves crashing over me with every attempt to move forward. They jerked me back, over and over and over again.
Until I was stagnant. Stuck.
I needed to do something. Needed to free myself.
Free us.
Even if the thought pained me like nothing else.
I’d been dreading it for months, but I was graduating this week. I’d waited far too long already, too afraid of saying anything aloud. Too ashamed of my thoughts and the way they tormented me when they shouldn’t.
“I think I might have…changed my mind,” I said first, even though it wasn’t really the truth. My mind had been changed for me, seemingly out of my control. And I hated it. I hated being scared and wishing I wasn’t. Wishing my brain and my body would stop sabotaging everything.
Sully was unfazed as he sat next to me on the couch in his college apartment. He probably thought I was talking about what we were ordering for dinner. “About what?”
“Having kids,” I forced myself to answer.
Sully’s hands faltered amidst stroking my hair. “What?”
I didn’t want to say it again.
Luckily, Sully didn’t make me.
“Well, that’s…” My insides twisted as I watched his face and the evidence of his dream shattering, even while he was trying to hide it from me. “That’s okay. We can talk about it.”
“You want kids more than anything in the world,” I said, unable to let him lie to me.
He didn’t need to lie to me. I knew it wasn’t okay.
I’d been preparing for the fact that it wasn’t okay.
“You have entire lists of name ideas. You created our future house in Sims. You constantly wonder if our kids will have my eyes or my hair. You have our entire future mapped out.”
I loved him so much, and nothing terrified me more than letting him down. Of not giving him the dream he’d always wanted. It felt like so much pressure for someone whose brain and body were not on the same page. For someone who was complicated. For someone who was high-risk.
I felt stuck.
But Sully didn’t have to be.
Sully didn’t have to have risks.
He swallowed. “Well, apparently things…change.”
He looked as devastated as I felt.
But was he holding on to me so tight because he wanted this with me? Or because this was the idea he’d had in his head since he was fifteen years old, and he hadn’t taken the time to imagine anything else?
“I’m sorry,” I whispered.
Sully shook his head. He turned his body to face me, giving his full attention. I could see all the crumbling lines in his face. “What happened? You’ve always wanted kids.”
“I…well, yes and…no,” I said honestly. “You’ve always assumed I wanted kids.”
Sully would paint pictures of our future, and I would lie on my back and listen to them. And I loved them. I loved the idea of them. I loved the dream.
But as I grew older, I wondered if that was all they were, when faced with reality. My reality, where everyone told me I had to be careful, and that thought had wormed so deeply into my brain that I couldn’t shake it.
“I—” Sully’s jaw dropped, like he was just realizing that we’d never explicitly talked about it.
Clarified it. He’d never asked me the question, “Do you want kids one day?” and I answered, “Yes, of course I do.” There wasn’t any of that.
Because when you meet at thirteen and fourteen, you think you want what’s around you. “You’ve never wanted kids?”
“I didn’t say that,” I replied carefully.
“But you don’t know?”
“I don’t know,” I confirmed.
“Why did you…never tell me?”
I sat with that for a second, not knowing how to respond.
Because the truth was, there hadn’t ever been anything to tell.
Not until recently. And I could tell him why, could explain what happened, but it was so much easier to say it was just something I wanted or didn’t want and not that it was something I was scared of.
Blaming it on a conscious decision than a fear I had no control over gave me just the tiniest bit of power back when I felt like I had none.
When I didn’t respond, Sully asked instead, “What do you want, then?”
“You,” I said. Because I couldn’t deny that was true. I had a feeling I’d always want him, and that was what was so painful about this. “That’s the only thing I really know.”
“I want you, too,” he said automatically.
“No, Sawyer,” I sighed.
“No?” His expression was incredulous.
“You want more than me,” I said softly.
His brows drew together, a frown tugging at his features. “Don’t put words in my mouth, Eleanor.”
“I’m not,” I argued. “I’ve heard those words come out of your mouth before. You can’t take them back now.”
“Well, it’s because it’s what I thought we both wanted. It’s what I thought…” He trailed off, as though replaying a thousand afternoons of lying in his bed.
“I think you should think about it,” I whispered. “I think you should really think about what you want, Sawyer.”
He was leaning toward me now, his body unconsciously reaching out. “You really don’t want kids at all?”
“I’m not certain what I want when it comes to kids,” I answered, picking my words carefully. “And I don’t want that uncertainty to ruin your dream.”
Sully stilled, as though he understood what I was saying for the first time.
“Eleanor.”
My throat tightened at his tone. The frantic way he said my name, like he knew things were close to unraveling. “I just want you to think about it,” I said, keeping my voice as measured as possible.
“No.” He was shaking his head now, eyes shoot up to the ceiling.
“I’m sorry,” I said, and he kept shaking his head, rejecting my apology. But I wasn’t apologizing for what I’d just revealed because I wasn’t sure there was anything I could have done differently.
I’d wanted Sully.
I’d wanted Sully and his dreams and his children.
And then there was an invasion. In my lungs and my soul, cutting off my air supply. And I never wanted to feel like that again. And there were people who told me I might, that it could happen, people who I suspected had been trying to scare me, who did a far better job than they’d probably meant.
“Natalie could use some help,” I said, trying to keep my voice calm. “With Chloe. And you know there’s good tech opportunities out there, in Boston.”
His gaze darted to mine as he sat up straight. “Excuse me?”
“I’m thinking I’ll go to Boston for a few months after graduation. Maybe I could get a good internship. Give those MIT kids a run for their money. Wait for you to finish up here.”
Wait for you to decide if you still want me.
I watched as anger and despair leaked into his expression, his body tightening with a flood of emotion. “I thought we weren’t going to do this again. I thought you weren’t going to leave me. I thought you’d wait. So we didn’t have to spend another year apart. Isn’t that what we decided?”
A knot tighten in my stomach. And I wondered at what point it would snap, or at the very least, become something that I couldn’t undo.
“Yes, but…” I forced myself to take a deep breath, to keep going. It would be so easy to give in and forget all of this. To stay. “I just think it might be a good time for you to…think. About what you want. And your head might be clearer without me in it.”
“Fuck that.” Sully was standing now, pacing. His hands shook as he dragged them through his hair. “I don’t fucking need to think.”
“I need you to,” I begged, trying to get him to understand.
“Why?”
He sounded so desperate, I almost gave in, almost told him how scared I was.
But I wasn’t brave enough for that.
And wasn’t quick enough, either.
“If you’re looking for a reason to go…” He shook his head, stopping in his tracks and facing me.
He crossed his arms over his chest, and they seemed to tighten with every word he said.
“You’ve always been one step ahead of me, and I don’t want to hold you back.
I know you could do so much better than this.
I know you stayed here for me. I know you could do so much more. I know—”
“Sawyer,” I cut in, forgetting my own rule about interrupting him. “That has nothing to do with this.”
“But it is true, isn’t it?”
I pressed my lips together.
“Isn’t it, Eleanor?” he urged, taking a step toward me on the couch.
“Of course I went here because of you!” I exclaimed, throwing my hands up. “Of course I wanted to stay close to home. Of course I had other offers from bigger, better schools. But I chose you. I wanted you.”
“Then why can’t I choose you, too?” he shot back. “Why can’t I sacrifice the things I want so that I can keep you?”
The idea of Sully sacrificing anything tore at my insides, but I lowered my arms and nodded. “You can. Of course you can. If that’s what you really want. After you graduate, you can come out to Boston, or I can move back here, or—”
“Jesus fuck. You’re not going to change your mind about going, are you?”
I fell silent.
Because no, I couldn’t really see myself changing my mind.
I didn’t want to say goodbye, but I wanted to give him the space to decide if that was what he needed.
And how was I supposed to give him space if I was here?
Where was I supposed to go? I couldn’t go home, couldn’t move back in with my mom, couldn’t let the walls close in on me again.
“Christ, El.” He dragged a hand down his face and resumed pacing. “Fuck, sometimes…” He hesitated, biting down on his lip.
“What?” I prodded.
He wouldn’t look at me. “I just—my dreams might be more than just you, but sometimes I wonder if your dreams even have me in them.”
What?
No.
“That’s not—”
“Stop, just stop.” He shook his head. “It’s fine, El. I’m not going to beg you to stay. You already stayed long enough, and that wasn’t fair to you. Besides, you’ve clearly already decided what you want, and it doesn’t include me. It doesn’t even include considering me.”
His stony expression was making everything inside me turn icy-cold, something I was so unfamiliar with when it came to him.
“Sawyer, you’re the only thing I consider…ever. And I just want you to have everything. I need you to have everything.” Because I knew I couldn’t, and I at least needed him to. “It’s what you deserve.”
“Holy shit, Ellie.” The look he was giving me was unfeeling now.
The emotion had slipped away, and he was wearing a mask, something he never usually did with me.
I’d seen him use it with other people. I’d seen him smile when he wanted to stay quiet.
I’d seen him laugh when nothing was funny.
I’d seen him curate a blank expression when he wanted to yell.
And that was what he was doing right now.
“Would you stop? Stop trying to convince me you’re doing this for me when it’s so painfully clear—”
He broke off when the mask slipped, and pain twisted his expression.
“You leaving will change nothing for me. I hope you know that. I will always want you. I will always need you like I need to breathe. But I won’t beg you to stay, and I won’t beg you to come back.
Because it’s clear to me that you don’t want that. ”
And then he looked at me like his heart was breaking, and his unspoken words hung in the air.
It’s clear to me that you don’t want me.
Which wasn’t the truth.
It would never be the truth.
But I needed to do this. I needed to give him a chance. And then if he still wanted me, I’d come back. He wouldn’t have to beg. This was temporary. This was a gut check that he wouldn’t take unless I left.
I’d come back.
He might not believe it now, but I would.
If he wanted me to, I would.
I always would.