Chapter 64
Chapter sixty-four
Hendrix · Now
Dial Tone – Catch Your Breath
The sound of wheels against concrete greets me when I trudge through the tree-lined path. Floodlights flicker, heavy metal crackles through a phone speaker, and the clink of ramps has my shoulders drooping.
Nobody comes out here anymore. There’s a newer, better park a couple streets away. This place was left to rot, tucked away in the memories of those of us who frequented it as teens.
I follow the familiar noise, stopping just before the quarter-pipe when I see a blur curling the bowl.
He’s as fluid on that board as he was the first day I saw him here all those years ago. The same day I knew Cole Hayes wasn’t just any boy to me. He was the boy for me.
He does an ollie and my heart pitter-patters, a soft laugh spilling from my lips. “You know, I’m still pretty shit at one of those.”
He drops back onto the board, kicks it up with his heels, and spins to face me. “That’s because you never paid attention to your teacher.”
“He was very distracting.” I shove my hands in my pocket and rock back and forth.
A smirk curls one corner of his mouth. “Is that so?”
I fight the urge to step closer.
Cole doesn't move an inch.
“What are you doing here?” I ask him.
He lifts a shoulder. “I heard my girl was facing something pretty heavy today. Figured she might not want to do it alone.”
My stomach twists. “Did Riley tell you everything?”
“Just that you were going home to see your parents for the first time in ten years.” He shakes his head, eyes dull as they flicker over me. “Ten years, Rixie. It was pretty easy to deduce the rest when I walked into that house.”
A lump forms in my throat. “How much did you hear?”
“Enough.” His grip tightens on the board.
“I was going to tell you.” I swallow as a low pulse starts in my temples. “After I spoke to my dad. I was going to come home and tell you everything. I just…” Shame coils in my gut. “I didn’t know how to tell you and not have you look at me differently.”
A bitter laugh escapes him. “Who do you think I am, Hendrix?”
Pain spears my chest at my name on his lips. I can count on one hand the amount of times he’s used it.
His board falls to the floor with a thud before he closes the distance between us.
A hand slides into my hair, tipping my head back as he drops his forehead to mine. Laboured breaths blend with mine.
“Who do you think I am?” he repeats.
Air lodges in my lungs when his eyes lock on mine. His pupils are blown, the hazel distinguished in the depths by the stark black staring down at me. My lips tremble.
I open my mouth but words fail me.
“When did I ever give you a reason to think I could look at you differently?” His lips ghosts over mine and I close my eyes.
“You left the house,” I breathe.
“Seriously? You think I left because I can’t handle your demons?” He releases my hair and steps back. “Fuck me.”
A tear falls. “So why did you?”
“Because you gave up on yourself for me!” he blares. “You gave up your dreams, your plans, our family all for me. And for what fucking reason?”
My voice shakes. “I couldn’t be the reason you didn’t get to have everything.”
“That wasn’t your choice to make.” He rakes a hand through his hair as rain slicks it. “You threw away ten years for nothing. We were gonna make it. We were always gonna make it. You just didn’t believe in us enough. You didn’t believe in me.”
Ice sinks into my veins and I clench my hands at my sides. “You are the only thing I’ve ever believed in.”
He sucks in a harsh breath, his face falling.
“Then why, Rixie?” His words ring out like a plea in the air. “Why did you make me let you go?”
“Because I didn't know how to hold on and not drag you down with me!” A sob rips from my lungs.
I wrap my arms around my waist, fingers curling into the black cotton that smells of him.
“The two people who were supposed to love me unconditionally reminded me every single day that I wasn’t worthy of the life I was living. That if I just disappeared, everything would be better.”
His eyes slam shut, his breath ragged. “You never told me.”
“I wanted to.” My knees shake. “But you were always so … free. I just wanted to be free with you. I thought love meant resentment. That’s all I’d ever known. Until I met you.”
I move a step forward.
He takes one back.
“You made my world a brighter place by just existing,” I tell him. “I didn’t want to be the person that made your world darker.”
He widens the gap between us with another step. “But you did. Don’t you get that?”
I root myself to the spot, ignoring my tugging heart.
“Did you honestly think that I’d just forget you and everything would be sunshine and fucking rainbows because you weren’t around anymore?” He barks a brittle laugh and shakes his head. “Ten fucking years.”
Ringing pierces my eardrums, rain falling heavier around us as he spins and snatches up his discarded board, shoving it beneath one arm.
He glances at me over his shoulder. “Ten years lost, Rixie. And for what?”
That’s the million-pound question, isn’t it?
“I waited, you know,” I tell him, my face crumpling when he turns his head from me. “I kept waiting for the day you’d show up, curse me out and tell me I was wrong. When you didn’t, I convinced myself it was because I’d done the right thing.”
He takes another step away and the words fall out of me, desperate and pleading.
“Because you never came back. And if you weren’t happy without me, you’d have come back, right? You’d have told me you hated me, that I’d made the biggest mistake of my life, that you couldn’t bear to look at me because you resented me.”
His shoulders tense as he keeps walking.
I cling to the metal railing on the quarter-pipe. “You never came back!”
He freezes.
Rain crashes around him, bouncing off the metal ramps. I expect him to turn. To look at me and hear what I never dared tell him all those years ago. But he doesn’t.
For a long moment, only the roar of the wind fills the silence between us.
Then, I hear it.
His voice, so soft, so splintered, slices through the air, and tears down the final wall I was clinging to.
“You never asked me to.”