Chapter 34
THIRTY-FOUR
Time can be so strange sometimes.
It took thirty years for me to get here, to this night of staring up at the moon and hearing the wildlife stirring in the surrounding forest. Arguably, not a single day of those years I ever stopped to figure out who I even am.
Emma Seaborn.
It doesn’t fit now, a name given to me by a man that I should never have let dictate my life.
My maiden name feels like a ghost at this point, something so disconnected from me that I don’t care much to consider it.
The Emma I was before feels so two-dimensional to me now.
A woman created by men, for men. Sometimes even created by women for men, if I count my mother.
So much focus is placed on them and I’ve yet to see many that earn it.
So, anyway, now I’m just Emma. Scrap the last name, shred the past. It’s a jagged hole I wish I could remove from my timeline. What if I just skipped from being a young girl—before anyone felt the need to train me to be pleasant and sweet—and jumped right to now? This night?
Who would I be then?
Molly startles at the sound of the sliding glass door behind us and I peek back to see Bo watching us. That sad tilt of his brow seems permanent now.
I reach my hand up and he walks over to take it, interlacing our fingers and lying down beside me in the grass. A nearby cricket starts chirping again when we fall still, the only other sound is our soft breaths puffing in the air.
“It’s fucking freezing out here, Em. What are you doing?”
I snuggle closer and throw the fluffy blanket I’ve dragged with me onto him. Molly walks into the divot between our bodies and settles herself into it, the vibrations of her purrs tickling my hip.
“Sometimes it feels claustrophobic inside.” It’s not bad out here, once the blanket takes on our body heat and the stars go on forever.
It makes me forget that the rest of the world exists beyond this cabin.
Nothing shrinks my pain more than looking at a constellation that’s hung in the sky for eons.
That is what permanence looks like, and my issues are nothing in comparison.
He sighs. “Yeah, you’ve been muttering a lot in your sleep lately. The dollhouse keeping you up?”
“Kinda, but I’ve been handling it okay. Coming out here helps. You sleeping with me at night does, too.” I rest my head on his shoulder, squeezing his hand. “But if you wanted to go back to sleeping with Jesse, you know I would understand. I’ve been…clingy.”
Rolling to his side, I do the same so that we face each other and I notice all of the little ways his expression screams something is wrong.
“It’s not that, Em. I’m glad to be that for you, always. It’s one of the only good things I’ve done in my life, and I’m proud of it.”
His words are unsettling. “It’s not your job to be strong.” I try to laugh, but it sounds stilted. “That’s Noah’s thing, you know.”
A hollow smile matches mine, pacifying me. “He is. But he’s got you, Em, and that’s what matters. I can tell he’s going to do whatever he can to make sure you’re okay.”
My hand tightens on his, as if I’m losing my grip on him.
But I’m not, he’s right here. Tears burn, threatening to fall, but if I cry then once again it’ll be him trying to be strong for me.
“You’re just as important to me, Bo. I know that things can be—different with all of us, but you know that I love you.
Yeah you're my best friend, but it’s more than that. ”
I search his eyes and almost continue rambling just to fill the empty moment but his hand comes to my face, holding me softly as his lips meet mine.
There’ve been electric kisses and sweet kisses. Shy ones and tentative explorations when we’ve been emboldened by the cousins asleep upstairs.
This one feels like a promise, but I can’t tell if it’s one I want or one I want him to break just as quickly as he’s made it. His mouth moves steadily against mine, a wall that I break against because it feels like a goodbye.
He bites my lip and I gasp, not expecting the bite of pain. My eyes blink open to catch his watching my reaction. He sucks his bottom lip for a moment and then closes his eyes, shaking his head. “Sorry. I don’t know why I did that.”
“It’s okay, Bo.” I sigh, rolling onto my back once more. “You don’t need kid gloves with me.”
“You’re stronger than me, I think. You probably always have been,” he murmurs, sitting up and adjusting Molly before tucking the blanket back in around me.
“Going back to sleep?” I ask, hoping he’ll climb into bed with Jesse and that it will somehow make him feel more like himself.
He crouches over my body, circling my neck with his warm hand as he slides his thumb softly up my throat. Sad blue eyes watch me swallow and my breath catch. A wry smile is all I get in return. “You should come in soon. You’ll freeze to death, and then what will they do?”
I huff, burrowing in. I could pass out here, to be honest. Maybe I will. “They’d be just fine. It’s what Noah gets for suctioning to my back and waking me up.”
Standing, he looks back at the cabin and then out at the woods. It’s obvious he’s struggling tonight and I let him take in our surroundings the same that I have, though they don’t seem to be reassuring to him like they are for me.
“Hope you feel better, honey. Love you.” He winks at me, and I smile as he turns back for the door, and disappears inside.
I almost follow him, his mood weighing heavily on my heart. But like Jesse told me, everyone heals differently. After all, Bo’s already been through this before—with Eric when he was a kid. He’s got experience trying to get his life back together after men have done their best to ruin it.
He can have tonight. Jesse won’t be able to hold off any longer on giving him his space and we can all see it’s killing him to see Bo like this.
These men…they’re doing their best, too. Wanting to fix everything for us and knowing there’s no way they can repair what’s been broken.