13. “AND NOW I TELL YOU OPENLY, YOU HAVE MY HEART SO DON’T HURT ME” #3
Now, whenever they were in public together, people would be watching. They would be waiting to see what happened. It was hard enough trying to navigate this herself. If she messed up, she wanted to lick her wounds in private. But now they had an audience.
“Why don’t we go out? We can get pizza or—”
“I don’t want to go out,” she snapped. “I don’t want to be around people right now.”
“Including me?”
“Yes. No. I don’t know.” She couldn’t think. Her stomach was under a steady assault of butterflies. At the same time, her nerves repeatedly stabbed her in the heart with doubts.
What if he got tired of her?
What if she did or said something so disappointing, he couldn’t get past it?
What if she embarrassed him? What if the sky fell? What if? What if?
“Is this your…sensitive time? Do you need medicine or a heating pad?” Damn him for being so fucking patient and caring.
She pulled at her collar, feeling suddenly claustrophobic. “No, I just…want to sit here and think—in silence.”
His expression blanked, then he said, “I’m taking King for a walk.”
“Fine.” Maybe they needed a little space.
As he leashed up the dog, Cordelia grew extremely jealous, so Soren took both dogs. When she was finally alone, her brow furrowed.
Maybe she should just tell him.
But telling him that she loved him felt an awful lot like willfully walking into a fire.
When Soren and the dogs returned, she apologized, mostly because she had no right to snap at him and this was her own damn fault for being a basket case of her own making.
She needed to get a hold of herself. Her head was a mess, her characters were fighting, and she promised her editor the first twelve chapters yesterday, which she hadn’t delivered because only eight were written.
Dating was clearly starting to negatively impact her life.
“Feeling better?” he asked, coming to sit beside her on the sofa.
“A little. Soren…” He looked at her in that expectant way he sometimes did. “I have to tell you something.”
He shifted to fully face her. “Okay.”
“I…” She chickened out and ran for her fictional world like a shelter she desperately needed at the moment. “I need to work.”
“Now? It’s Friday night.”
“What difference does that make? When I need to write, I need to write.” Distance truly felt like the safest call right now. “I just need a little space.”
The second the words left her mouth, she wished she could call them back.
“Do you need space or do you need to work, Jocelyn? Which is it?”
She shrugged, unsure. “Both?”
His nostrils flared as he scowled at her. “What’s going on? This can’t just be about the newspaper.”
“Nothing.”
“Bullshit. You’re pushing me out on purpose, and I deserve to know why.” Knowing Soren, he wouldn’t leave without an explanation. “What happened?”
“Nothing happened. I just want some time to myself.”
“Okay, fine. How long?”
Her shoulders lifted to her ears as tension wound tighter and tighter through her back. “As long as it takes.”
“As long as what takes? What aren’t you telling me?”
“Nothing. I just—why are you making this so difficult?”
“Because I’m trying to understand you. We were fine, and now you’re trying to shut me out again.”
“No. I’m not—”
“Sure as hell feels like it.”
Maybe she was, but she didn’t mean to. She just wanted to protect herself, even if it meant self-sabotaging the shit out of herself to do so.
“Don’t do this, Jocelyn. Just talk to me about whatever you’re feeling. We can work through whatever it is together.”
Everyone thought her directness came fully stocked with a combative attitude, but the truth was, she hated confrontation. “I’m sorry,” she said softly, and his head lifted, stark alarm clear across his face.
“No—”
“Soren, just listen to me—”
“No!” he yelled, on his feet and pacing. “You want to fight? Fine, we’ll fight. You want to yell at me about something? Come at me. But you do not get to pull this bullshit where you shut me out, Jocelyn. We’re past that!”
But she didn’t want to fight with him. She hated that she was even hurting him. “Please stop yelling at me.”
“Then talk to me.”
“I can’t. I don’t know how. Maybe I’m just bat shit crazy! I warned you something like this would happen.”
“No. You don’t get to push me away and blame it on a character flaw. I deserve better than that.”
“You do,” she agreed. He was too much. Too confident, too aware of her flaws, too important to her, and everything he made her feel was too intense. It was killing her. “Please, just go.”
“Jocelyn, don’t do this.” She hated the flash of doubt that flickered in his eyes.
Her heart pounded hard and fast. Blood rushed to her head, and she felt like she could vomit.
“I can’t believe you.” Brow tight, he picked up King’s leash.
Both dogs came running the moment they heard the clink of metal.
“Cordelia, you’re not going anywhere.” Jocelyn’s voice sounded small and waterlogged, strained under the pressure of coming tears.
Soren hooked King and led him to the door. “Call me…” He hesitated. “…When you’re ready to talk.”
Twin tears tripped past her lashes as the door closed. She angrily dashed them away. He did what she asked and gave her space, but how did getting her way feel so much like losing?