Chapter 34 #3
The sentence breaks something inside me. I refuse to let him see how deeply. I place both hands against his chest again and feel his heart hammering beneath them.
“You don’t have to decide anything tonight.”
His shoulders sag. “I’m not trying to hurt you.”
“I know.”
“I don’t want to lose you.”
“Then don’t push me away.”
His face crumples for one brief, unguarded moment.
“I don’t know how to be what you need when every part of me wants to lock the door and never let you leave again.”
“You are not that man.”
“You don’t know what fear can turn someone into,” he argues.
“Neither do you. This is the first time it has happened. You are treating one awful night like proof that you are incapable of loving me.”
“I’m treating it like a warning.”
The certainty in his voice frightens me.
Liana makes a soft sound in her sleep. We both look toward her, and the moment breaks.
Dean lifts her carefully from the playpen and carries her down the hall. I follow a few steps behind, watching the way his body instinctively softens around her, even while everything else inside him remains tense.
He lowers her into the crib and stands there longer than necessary, one hand resting against her small back.
I remain in the doorway.
The sight of him with her fills me with an ache so deep that it becomes difficult to breathe.
This is the life I want. Dean and Liana. The apartment filled with mismatched ornaments and baby toys. Dinner cooling because life got in the way.
For the first time, I realize wanting it does not mean I get to keep it.
Dean turns away from the crib. He looks older than he did this morning.
“Try to sleep,” I whisper.
He nods, though I doubt he will. I wait for him to ask me to come with him, but the request never comes.
He walks toward his bedroom, and I stand frozen in the hallway until he disappears inside.
I tell myself to go to my own room. Instead, I follow him.
Dean sits on the edge of his bed with his elbows resting on his knees, staring at the floor. He has removed his sweater, leaving him in a white T-shirt and jeans, but he makes no move to change.
His hands have finally stopped shaking. That should reassure me.
I cross the room and stand in front of him. “Lie down.”
“Aubrey.”
“I’m not asking you to talk.”
His eyes lift to mine.
“I’m not asking you to make any decisions. I’m just asking you to lie down.”
He studies me for a long moment before shifting farther onto the mattress.
I climb in beside him.
Dean remains on his back, rigid beneath the covers, staring at the ceiling. I turn onto my side and rest my head against his chest.
For a moment, he does nothing. Then his arm comes around me. The movement is slow and uncertain, as though holding me might be both the comfort he needs and the thing he fears most.
I place my palm over his heart. It still beats too quickly.
I listen to his breathing gradually even out while my own thoughts circle endlessly.
He loves me. The words should glow inside me.
Instead, they sit beside every other thing he said.
“I don’t know if I can do this.”
“Love you and survive it.”
“I’m treating it like a warning.”
I close my eyes and press closer. Maybe tomorrow will look different.
Maybe the panic will recede, and he will understand that being afraid does not mean he has to give up everything that makes him happy.
I hold on to each possibility while his breathing grows deeper beneath my ear.
Eventually, the hand resting against my back goes heavy.
I remain there for several minutes, afraid that moving will wake him.
When I finally lift my head, his face is peaceful for the first time since I came home.
I study him in the darkness. The strong line of his jaw. The faint crease between his eyebrows that never fully disappears. The mouth that told me he loved me for the first time tonight.
I lean forward and press the softest kiss against his chest, directly above his heart.
“I love you,” I whisper.
I slide carefully out from beneath his arm and leave the room.
The hallway feels colder than it did before.
I check on Liana, then continue to my bedroom and close the door behind me.
The garment bag from the gala still hangs in my closet. A photograph of Dean and me sits on the dresser, taken only a few weeks ago. We are both smiling. His hand rests possessively around my waist, and I am looking up at him like he is every wish I ever made.
I turn the frame face down. I can’t bear to look at it.
I crawl beneath the covers without changing my clothes.
The tears come the moment my head touches the pillow.
I press my face into it to muffle the sound, even though Dean is asleep down the hall and the walls are too thick for him to hear me.
He loves me.
I repeat it silently, trying to make the words feel like enough.
He loves me.
But love is the thing frightening him away.
I spent years imagining what it would feel like to hear Dean Ledger say those words. In every version, they were the beginning of everything.
Tonight, they feel terrifyingly close to goodbye.
I wrap both arms around myself and cry until exhaustion finally pulls me under, mourning a future I have not lost yet and already fearing that this may not be my happily ever after.