Chapter 70
SEVENTY
CALLUM
- Present Day -
H er words hit me like a ton of bricks, shock washing over me as I try to process everything she’s just told me- the missing pieces finally falling into place at her unguarded revelation.
That night, the party, when I drove back the next day after practice to talk it out with her, and she was just gone.
The ranch -
Her parents telling Lena and I that she had had an “unexpected opportunity” to go to a theater camp through NYU that neither one of us had ever heard of.
Not being able to reach her by phone or email.
She ghosted me. . .and I could never figure out what had happened between us.
I mean, I know I screwed up, but we had always, always come back together to talk it out.
But that time had been different. Something pinnacle had shifted in the dynamic of our relationship without me even realizing it at that moment, and then she was just gone.
“ God – Sutton. . . Why didn’t you tell me? ”
My voice cracks, and I feel like I’m drowning, my emotions threatening to overwhelm me. Hurt and confusion war within me, but I try to remind myself that this isn’t about me. Still, as her words sink in, it’s hard not to allow those emotions to take over. And then, there’s the guilt.
How could I have not known that something so monumental was going on in her life? It’s not like this was an overnight thing; it couldn’t have been, so how did I not see it? There had to have been signs that I’d missed.
God, how could I have fucking missed them?
Why wouldn’t she tell me when she was in the hospital, or when she was admitted for inpatient treatment? I don’t understand. Sure, I was away at college, but by that point in our relationship, we told each other everything - at least when it came to the important things.
Or I thought we had.
After everything we had been through, everything I -
“I wasn’t going to do that to you, Cal. Was I mad? Sure. Obviously, I was hurt after what happened but I wasn’t going to let you ruin your life, your future . . . not for me.”
Blinking away the moisture in my eyes, I frown at her words, confused. “I don’t understa-”
“Ohmygodofcourseyoudon’t” Her words come out in a rushed jumble and she blows out a shaky breath. “Look. Where were you in the spring of my senior year?”
I shake my head, not understanding where she’s going with this. I mean . . that would have been my junior year. . .
“Cal, that was your junior year. In April .
You were getting ready for the playoffs.
You had a ton of recruiters looking at you.
You were a freaking draft prospect that year.
After that party, when I crashed out, I spent weeks in the hospital because of how messed up my kidneys were, before being sent to inpatient treatment at the ranch.
And then, I spent months in treatment before I was able to transition to an outpatient program, and finally head to college for the fall term. And only then, with strict requirements for continuing therapy and check-ins with various doctors. I missed my high school graduation, Cal.
I missed my eighteenth birthday, basically the end of my senior year and my entire summer after graduation. From the time all this started, it ate up months of my life just to get to the point where I could find any kind of normalcy again.”
“Still I -” She cuts me off before I can say anything else.
“Cal, I know you. If you had found out I was in the hospital, that I was basically killing myself, you would have dropped everything to be there for me. And I love you for that.” My heart skips a beat at her words.
“But if you had been, well – you , then you would have missed the playoffs, or at the very least been in a terrible headspace at the time, and who knows how you would have performed, if you would have made the draft? It could have messed up your entire career before it had a chance to even really start.”
Her words break off, tears now spilling down her face and my chest cinches. Oh. Shorty. “Sweetheart, there’s no way to have known that. I mean, if I had missed that opportunity there’s always next year. You should have told me -”
“Cal, what if you got hurt because of me? What if you played in the playoffs and were so distracted that you got hurt? Potentially had a career-ending injury? I absolutely could not do that to you. Not after everything you had done for me. For years, you’d looked out for me, been my friend, my protector.
I couldn’t let you risk your career for me too. Not for something like this.”
She’s shaking now, not just her head in disagreement, but her whole body is shaking as she fights back the tears and that dam that had been slowly cracking inside my chests finally bursts open, broken fragments crumbling like the tears that now stream steadily down both of our faces.
“ Sutton. Sweetheart.”
I can’t help it, I pull her into my arms, holding her tightly, kissing her head as the sobs wrack through her. “I’m sorry. I’m so damn sorry I wasn’t there. Shhh. I’m so damn sorry. I -”
She lifts her tear-stained face and opens her mouth to protest but I can’t fight it anymore. I’ve missed her too damn much.
Love her too damn much .
Brushing away the damp trails with my thumbs I caress her face as I lower my mouth to hers.
I pour everything I have into the kiss. All the love and longing, the years of confusion and regret and bitterness over her disappearing from my life, never knowing she was fighting for her life .
I try to show her now just how much she means to me, how much she’s always meant to me, even before I knew exactly how it was I felt for her.
And then she opens for me and for one moment, one fucking perfect moment, it’s just us. It’s her and me; right here, right now. Just this one perfect moment, and the two of us, the way we were always meant to be.