Chapter 31 #2
Natalia frowns, her lips pulling into a quivering pout. “I know, I’m sorry,” she rasps. “I shouldn’t have done that and—”
“Sweet—”
“No, wait,” she says. “I’m not done.”
I dip my chin and wait for her to continue.
“I’m sorry for the way I’ve been treating you,” she says, her voice hoarse and her lids heavy with emotion.
“I’ve been so…shitty to you, Rowan. And I hate myself so much for it.
I wish… I really wish I were better at all of this.
I really wish I could control it, but I’m learning how, believe me.
But if you can’t forgive me right now, I won’t blame you.
In fact, be mad. Shout at me or something, I can’t take—”
“I would never shout at you like that,” I say quickly. “I’d never hurt you or touch you in any way you don’t want me to. And I’m not going to yell at you now, either. Or ever.”
“But you’re mad.” She pouts, but she’s visibly trying not to frown at all.
“A bit, but, Natalia, out of everything I feel for you,” I say, “anger is at the bottom of the list.”
“See,” she says. “You say things like that. You make me feel things like this… I was— I was scared.”
“I know you are.” My hand let go of hers to grab onto her hip. “But you can let me be scared with you.”
“You aren’t scared, Rowan,” she says. “You’re never scared. You’re always so sure of everything, I don’t know how to do that. I don’t have as much control over my brain as you do over yours. How?”
I chuckle and squeeze her hips once. “One of us has to be level-headed, right?”
“I guess,” she murmurs, hiding from me again.
“Please, sweetheart,” I beg. “Don’t do that to me anymore. Don’t hide from me like this.”
“I don’t—”
“After every time we were together, you’d shut down,” I say.
She frowns and lifts a shoulder. Her delicate hands trail up my arms until they settle on my shoulders, resting there. “I’m working on it,” she whispers.
I tilt her chin up, her face level with mine again, and push a curly stray behind her ear. “What are you scared of with me?”
“Everything,” she breathes. “The way you make me feel, Rowan. I don’t know what to do with it. Where do I put it?”
“Give it to me,” I say. “And I give mine to you.”
Her lips twitch. “I don’t know how.”
“It’s easy,” I promise quietly as I pull her in for a kiss. “I’ll show you.”
I feel her small smile against my mouth, and it’s enough to make my chest less sore.
“Have you ever felt—It’s weird.”
“It’s not. Tell me,” I whisper and put my hands back on her hips. “Please.”
“Have you ever felt…a lot for someone? So much that it’s overwhelming and you feel like you can’t breathe?”
I nod. You.
“Rowan, I can’t breathe,” she says. “And then, suddenly, this person feels the same and you don’t know what to do or how to react?
Now you know they feel the same and you feel—confused.
Because you’ve spent so much time pining and yearning in silence that it doesn’t make sense that he feels the same way you do? ”
Her hazel eyes soften, her brows lowering into a low sad expression.
“I mean, they,” she whispers.
“Yeah, I’ve known what that’s like,” I rasp. “But not right now.”
“No?”
I shake my head. “No. I know exactly what to do and how to react. I’ve known what I wanted for a long time, so it makes perfect sense to me. You make perfect sense to me, even if I don’t make perfect sense to you.”
“I never said that.”
“Do I then?”
Her fingers brush up my shoulders to the nape of my neck and into my hair. Her nod is short, barely there, but it’s a nod. I love that nod as much as I love this girl.
“See?” I smile. “Perfectly sensical.”
“Not entirely but…” There’s a lift of her shoulder.
“What’s going on in your head, sweetheart?”
She huffs. “You don’t want to know.”
“Yes I do.” I pull her hips forward until she lifts a leg, then the other, and she’s straddling my thighs. “I always want to know.”
With a soft sigh, and her fingers still in my hair, she whispers, “I don’t think I make sense with you, but maybe you make sense with me.
And maybe one day you’ll hate me, resent me, I don’t know.
Like, what if you realize how shitty I really am?
How badly I’ve treated you until now? And I can say sorry a million times but that doesn’t make any of it better—it doesn’t make me better.
But I was so, so mean, Rowan.” Her voice cracks and her forehead falls to min, her chest glued to mine.
“I’m sorry.” She kisses my lips, the salt of her tears slipping into my mouth.
“I’m sorry.” She kisses the corner of my mouth.
“I’m sorry.” The other corner. “I’m sorry, Rowan.
” She sniffles and kisses my cheek before brushing her nose over my skin. “I’m sorry.”
“You don’t need to be.”
“I do.” She kisses my cheek again. “Forgive me, please.”
“I forgive you.”
“Rowan?”
“Sweetheart.”
“I really hated myself,” she croaks. “And I think the way you love me made me hate myself more because, in my head, there’s no way you could possibly love me.
Because there’s a voice telling me that I don’t deserve it—that I’m not worthy and there’s nothing about me you could love.
And because every time you look at me the way you do, my mind points out all of my insecurities. ”
Even with a broken heart, I rasp, “It lies to you.” I pull back enough to look into those beautiful eyes that break and heal me all the same, and I wipe the tears rolling down her cheeks.
“Nothing I say can heal you, I know that. Not me telling you how worthy you are or how much I love you or how beautiful you are. That all has to come from you.”
She frowns. “I know.”
“But, sweetheart,” I whisper, holding her face in my hands, “I’m here to help you. I might not be able to do the healing for you, but that doesn’t mean I won’t be here.”
“I just need you to be patient with me,” Natalia croaks. “I haven’t… I’m not used to this. I haven’t been in a relationship in almost two years, Rowan, there’s a good chance I’ll mess this up.”
“You won’t mess this up.”
“I already have,” she says. “Multiple times.”
I shrug. “Those were flukes.”
Natalia snorts, rolling her eyes. “They weren’t. I haven’t been the best at handling myself and my emotions. They crash right into me and it’s fight or flight—I don’t always pick the right one.”
“But you’re working on it,” I say.
“Don’t do that. Don’t sound positive and make excuses for my toxic behavior. What I did was gross and disgusting and ugly. I hate myself for it, but yes, I’m working on it. ”
“Stop that,” I murmur. “Don’t do that.”
“You don’t do that, Rowan,” she insists. “Why can’t you let me just be angry with myself?”
“Because now you’re just being violent with yourself and I won’t let you do that,” I say, my thumbs smoothing up her cheeks. “I already forgave you, Natalia.”
“You shouldn’t have let me off that easily.”
“Well, I did, because I love you and you’re mine and I’m yours and there isn’t anything more important than those three things to me.” I kiss her lips. “My entire world has revolved around you since the moment I first saw you and that won’t ever change.”
“Not now—”
“Not ever,” I push, dropping my hands from her cheeks to wrap my arms around her and pull her into my chest. “Sweetheart, I love you. Oh my god, I fucking love you, and I don’t think that word is enough for everything I feel for you.”
Natalia’s bottom lip wobbles.
“Just because your mind plays mean tricks on you doesn’t mean I won’t be here,” I say softly, my hands splayed on her back, feeling her warm skin burn through my palms. “You forget, I understand you. I know you.”
“I know you do,” she rasps. “I’m not being fair to you, I’m sorry.”
I exhale. This will take time.
“But… You should know that there are so many things I like about you.”
My heart skips. “Pick one.”
“Your favorite color is green and it reminds me of purple,” she whispers, I remain silently confused for a moment. “You always eat mozzarella sticks with me, but I know you don’t like cheese.”
“I eat it because of you.”
“I know but I don’t get why—I see the way your face gets when you eat cheese.”
“Fine,” I say. “I hate cheese.
She chuckles.
“What else, sweetheart?”
“Your hair,” she murmurs, her fingers brushing through the strands. “I love your blond hair. But only your shade of blond. Every other blond isn’t as pretty as yours.”
I laugh. “Yeah?”
She nods. “You treat Grace like a princess and you treat our friends like family. You love with your entire heart, Rowan, and I got so lucky.”
Only this girl can make my cheeks flame and hurt like this. Only ever her. Only, always, forever her.
“And your middle name,” she whispers suddenly. “I love that I’m the only one who knows what it is.”
I lick over my teeth. “I should’ve never told you that.”
“Oh, but you did.”
I shake my head. “Ugh.”
“Rowan.” She kisses the corner of my mouth. “Arthur.” She kisses the other corner as I chuckle through my grin. “Asher.” Finally, she kisses my lips.
“To be fair, I have no idea where that name came from.”
Natalia hums her amusement. “Tell me you love me again.” My sweetheart breathes, putting her forehead back to mine. “Please.”
“I love you.” I press my forehead against hers.
“Again.” She presses hers against mine.
“I love you.” I bump my nose with hers.
“Since we’re confessing things,” she murmurs, “can you confess some things too?”
“What do you want to know?” I ask.
“Everything.”
“Okay.” I take a breath. “I’ve thought about the same things you have—especially after my mother.” My ribs shrink around my heart and lungs as I think about it again. “I told you about…some of it. It was really hard, Natalia.”
“I know, baby, I know.” She kisses the corner of my mouth. “I know.”
I sniffle, wiggling my nose, and she presses her body in closer. “When I visited you in the hospital, it was during the week of her first anniversary. That week has always been so hard, remembering the hospital, wake, and burial. I hate it so much, Natalia.”