16. Chapter 16
Me
Do you want chicken pesto or margherita today?
Willow
I don’t think I’m coming in today, sorry Oakley. I’m on a roll, so I’m going to stay in and try to get as much done as possible. I only have about a week to finish the book.
I rest my forehead on my desk and take a deep breath, trying to calm my raging anxiety. It’s been like this all week. She’s been avoiding me, and I know she has every reason to, but it’s still tearing me apart inside.
I know I fucked up. I told myself not to take my bad mood out on Willow, and that’s exactly what I did. She didn’t deserve the way I treated her. She may have acted like everything was fine, but I saw the hint of tears, the dejection on her face.
Hell, that’s the exact reason I can’t want more with her. Look what I did when there weren’t real feelings at stake.
Keep telling yourself there aren’t real feelings at play, buddy.
And that’s the problem, isn’t it?
I’m already too far gone with her, but I’m not in a place to be what she needs as a partner. And the way I treated her when I showed up to her house? I’m so ashamed of myself. There’s no excuse and certainly no reason she should forgive me, even if she does hear me out.
And I don’t feel right just barging over to her house to apologize. She’s working and doesn’t need me to interrupt her with an apology she may or may not want.
A knock at the door startles me, and I look up to see Brittany at the door.
“Hey, I’m about to head out. Do you need anything? I can stay,” she offers, and I feel like shit. She’s been picking up the slack this week since my head is noticeably elsewhere.
“Nah. Thank you, though. Go home. Enjoy your afternoon.” I get up to head up front with her.
The front door dings as we make it to the counter, and I wave Brittany off as Ledger comes in.
“Hey, long time, no see. How are things going?” I ask, trying to not ask anything about how Willow is.
“It’s busy as fuck, man. Ainsley’s been working nonstop, so I figured I’d stop in here, and grab her favorite sandwich and coffee to slow her down a bit.” The pure love in his eyes would normally have me rolling my eyes. But now? I wonder if I have that look in my eyes when I think about Willow.
“I’m on it. Anything for yourself?”
“Yeah, I’ll take my usual.”
I nod and get the sandwiches going before turning to the espresso machine. “So, how’s the family,” I ask and try to hide my wince at how obvious I feel like I’m being.
“Umm, good, I guess. I bet you’ve been seeing more of Willow than any of us have.”
His words shouldn’t hurt, but they fucking stab me. I had been seeing a ton of Willow, but I ruined it.
“Oh, yeah. She’s been working in here a lot recently.” But not this week.
“I’m worried about her. Usually, she cranks out books and it’s no big deal, but this book is consuming her. She’s stressed and definitely wasn’t her usual self at family dinner on Sunday. And she hasn’t talked to anyone since then.”
I nod because if I say anything, he’ll see right through me.
“Will you keep an eye on her? I mean, I know you’re probably busy, but if she comes in here, will you keep an eye on her?” What’s lower than dirt? That’s how I feel. I feel like the scum of the earth I used to track down.
“Of course, man.” I bag up the sandwiches and slide Ainsley’s coffee his way.
I watch him as he nods his thanks, relief in his eyes, and then turns to walk out. I feel sick to my stomach. This is all because of me, and now he’s asking to look after her like I’m not the cause of it to begin with.
The bell dings again, and I almost throw a coffee mug through the window. My nerves are frayed, my mood is completely shot, and I don’t want to talk to anyone. But I do have a business to run, so it’s time to shove all that shit down, like I did before Willow.
“Good afternoon.” Sheriff’s voice is like a spark that causes the fire to start.
“Sheriff.”
“Haven’t seen Willow around lately. Everything okay there?”
What the fuck is with everyone asking me about Willow? I mean, I was glad for a little bit of information from Ledger, but this is just too fucking much.
“Wouldn’t know. I’m not her keeper,” I almost sneer.
His eyebrows raise, but none of this is his business. He can try to pry and dig all he wants, but I’m not talking to him about it.
“Your usual?” I ask.
“Yeah,” he grunts. I wordlessly go about making his stupid Americano before sliding it over to him.
“Something happen between you two?” He smirks, but it disappears just as quickly. Must be the death stare I’m giving him.
“Message received. You know, Oakley, I’m not your enemy. If you want to talk about things or go out to Sal’s for dinner and shoot the shit, we can. You’re allowed to have friends here.” He looks genuine, and I swear it fucks my head up more.
“I appreciate it.” And I do, but I’m not in the headspace to even remotely consider this right now. And that’s a fucking realization.
How much have I really worked on myself since I moved here? I left my old life behind so that I could start fresh, but what have I really done? Open Grind Time? Know everyone’s food and drink order but nothing else? That’s not really living.
Maybe this is my sign to make some serious changes. To really think about what I want long-term.
Because what I think I really want … Is Willow.
“I’m shocked to see you calling,” my therapist from when I first left the Marshals, Dr. Ames, says when he answers my phone call.
“Yeah, it’s shocking to me too, honestly.”
“Is this a friendly phone call, or an ‘I need help’ phone call?” he asks plainly, and it’s one of the reasons I didn’t outright hate him at first. He’s no-nonsense and doesn’t sugarcoat shit.
I take a deep breath and say the one thing that’s the hardest to admit. “I need help.”
“Okay, you want to start with updating me on what’s going on in your life? Last I heard you were leaving the Marshals, but hadn’t heard anything since.”
“Yeah. I left pretty abruptly. I, umm, I just couldn’t stay when I was failing every single day Tennison wasn’t caught.” I clear my throat to try to shove down the lump in it.
“We didn’t get to talk much about how you were feeling overall, more about decompressing from the things you saw and working through that. I apologize for not going big picture with you, but I’m glad you took the step to call me. Do you still feel this way? Still feel like you’re failing?”
“I probably feel it more now. Is it possible to enjoy the changes I made, albeit they were drastic, but also feel like I fucked up by leaving the way I did? I mean, he’s still out there, still torturing innocent people, and I just … left. Because, why? I couldn’t handle it anymore? That’s not really a good enough reason.”
God, I know this is what I should be doing, but it’s like opening up a wound and letting it bleed out until you’re left as just a lukewarm body.
“Why do you think that your life is any less important than theirs? Than anyone else’s?”
“Isn’t it? I signed up for a job that was to catch the bad guys, no matter what. I was good at it and felt like that’s what I was put on Earth to do. My life, at the end of the day, is just a tool to protect the innocent.”
And I fucking ran away, so really, how good am I?
“Do you feel that you aren’t allowed to be happy?” He asks so calmly, but it blows what I know about myself wide open.
Do I feel like I’m not allowed to be happy because of what I’ve seen? Because of all the terrible shit I see people go through?
“I think…” Fuck, admitting this makes it real. Makes it so I can’t just shove it down. “I think I’m scared of being close to people because of everything I’ve seen in the Marshals. How much hurt they can cause and how fast you can lose the ones you love. It scares me to not be in control, not be able to protect someone close to me.”
“That’s a good observation. And I’d venture to say a lot of people in your old position would feel the same. It’s hard seeing the worst of people, and for people day in and day out to not be affected by it isn’t realistic. Let’s go back a little. Do you feel like going back to your old job would make you feel better?”
“Better? Hell no, but could it make me feel like I have more control? Possibly.” I lean back on my couch and stare at the ceiling.
“Control, that’s a good word choice for you. It sounds like a lot of this comes from control, or rather a lack thereof. But, I gotta tell ya, James, you can’t control everything. Trying to leads to things like obsession with catching Tennison, feeling like you’re failing no matter what you do, and falling back into old habits. Let me ask you, have you had any more panic attacks?”
Lying on the trail, talking to Woodcroft flashes in my memory.
“Yeah, I, umm, I had one about a week ago. Before that, it had been months.”
“And do you know what brought that on in particular?”
“Woodcroft. Well, not Woodcroft specifically. I was talking to him, and he updated me on some details on Tennison.”
“So, you’ve been away from the Marshals for about a year now, right?”
“Yep,” I clip.
“Do you think the right move for your life is going back? You said you enjoy the changes you made, but do you think you can be happy? Can you be truly happy with a life going back to your old position and leaving what you’ve built up there? If the answer is no, I want you to think about what would really make you happy with your life. We only get one life, James, and everything you’ve done with the Marshals has been admirable. But there is no shame in saying you need to put yourself first for once.”
“I met someone,” I blurt out because all this talk about being happy brings only one person to mind.
“Ah, things are making a little more sense now.” I swear I can hear his smirk through the phone call.
“Being around her has brought up a lot of things I probably pushed away when I moved. It was easy to just shove all my issues to the side and work, distract myself, you know. But with Willow…” I pause, trying to decide how much information to tell him. “We have—had—fun together. But I fucked up and took out some of this mess that is my head out on her, not physically,” I quickly add. “But I treated her— God, I treated her like shit.”
“Because you’re starting to get too close,” he observes.
“And it scares the hell out of me. What if something happens? What if lose her or can’t protect her? I don’t think I can recover from something like that,” I admit quietly.
“You can’t control everything, James. There is always a chance that bad things will happen, and that goes for every single person, not just you because of your past. I think you need to really make a conscious decision about what you want in your life, how you want your life to be. If that’s with Willow, you need to be willing to be open and communicate with her your fears and needs. If that looks like going back to the Marshals, you need to make sure you are doing it for you, not because of some sense of failure you need to correct. What is going to make you happy and fulfilled?”
“You’ve given me a lot to think about.” I let out a self-deprecating laugh.
“That’s my job.” He chuckles. “But seriously. If you want to do this more regularly, if you think it helps, just call me and I’ll put you on my schedule, okay? There’s no shame in going back to therapy.”
“I will probably take you up on that,” I admit. He’s right, as hard as it is for me to admit that. Sometimes, you need more help than you can provide yourself.
“I’ll wait for your next call. It was good to hear from you, James.”
“Thanks, Doc.”
I hang up and throw my phone onto the couch. The realizations in a half an hour conversation with Dr. Ames are a lot to take in.
The biggest one?
I want more with Willow, but I’m scared to lose her, scared to get close only to have my heart shattered.
Can I put in the work to be mentally in a good place to be open to a relationship with her? Would she even want that after how I behaved?
There’s only one way to find out.