Chapter 51
Ash
Maa decided to stay in town for a few days, and I was thankful for that.
I needed her there for me, and I had a feeling she needed me too.
After we talked for a while, I headed toward the cemetery at sunset, knowing that was my best chance at running into Karla.
The moment I spotted her, she was standing in front of Dad and Rian’s tombstones, talking to them.
“So yeah, that’s about it for updates,” she said, before she must’ve heard footsteps behind her. She turned around swiftly, and her eyes widened the moment she saw me. “Ash. What are you doing here?”
“I came to look for you.”
She rolled her shoulders back and shook her head. Then a deep scowl fell to her face as she marched toward me. “Where have you been, you jerk!” Karla yelped as she approached. The second she was close enough, she smacked my chest. “What’s the matter with you, huh?” she hollered, smacking me again.
“Ouch, I’m sorry,” I said.
“You’re sorry?” Her eyes widened, and she went to smack me again. “You’re sorry?! How dare you give me a pathetic apology after what you’ve been doing, Ashish Otis Banks!”
She used my full government name.
I didn’t even know she knew my middle name.
I grabbed her hand midair before she could smack me again. “Wait, what am I doing to you right now?”
She took a step backward and huffed. “Don’t play dumb, Ash.”
“Trust me, I’m not playing dumb.”
She crossed her arms over her chest. “You’re ghosting me.”
“What? I’m not . . .” Christ. I had been ghosting her.
Well, that was until I came to my senses earlier thanks to Greyson and my mother. I’d been pushing Karla away for a few days now, and I felt awful about it.
“You’re right. I was ghosting a little,” I told her.
“Not shocking, seeing as how I met you at a cemetery. The guy who talks to ghosts also has ghosting abilities,” Karla mocked. “Great to know. I have to go.” She started walking away.
“I went into Rian’s room today,” I said as I stood in front of my brother’s tombstone. I slid my hands into my pockets.
Karla’s footsteps paused. She walked back in my direction. “You went in his room?”
I nodded. “Yeah.”
“Why today?”
“Because I got tired of running from the things that scare me the most. My mom and I went into the room—”
“Wait, what? Your mom? Your mom is back in Chicago? Since when?”
“Since your father flew her up here today.”
“My father?” she asked, stunned.
“Yup. Your father. It’s been a pretty wild day. Also, you should probably check if your father is in the FBI or something, because he has an odd ability to find out pretty much anything about anybody. But that’s not the point of this conversation. The point is that I went into Rian’s room today.”
“Are you OK?” she asked me, her voice nowhere near as irritated as when I first approached her.
I shook my head. “No. It was hard. It’s still hard. But it also felt like healing.”
“Yeah . . . healing can be hard at times. But it will be worth it.”
I lowered my head and cleared my throat. “I want to heal for you.”
Karla frowned and shook her head. She placed the palm of her hand against my cheek. “No, Ash. I don’t want you to heal for me. I want you to heal for you.”
“I just don’t want it to take forever. That’s not fair to you. You deserve my wholeness, not my broken pieces.”
“Did you love me when we were young?” she asked.
“Yes, of course I did.”
“I know.” She gently shrugged. “Ash, you loved me when I was shattered, and you called my cracks beautiful, like Kintsugi. Remember? Let me love your broken pieces the way you loved mine. Let me love your cracks and your strands of gold.”
I swallowed hard. Why was it hard for me to think I deserved the love she was giving me?
She released a small breath. “I really, really care about you, Ash. I do. And the only thing that could keep me from caring about you forever is if you need me to let you go. If I make the hard parts in your life harder, then I’ll let you go.
But if I can even the slightest bit make the hard parts of you soften .
. . well, then . . . I would like to stay, please. ”
“Karla, I—”
“Wait, I just want you to know that whichever choice you make, my love for you doesn’t change.
I’ll never regret this or us. But you have to choose, Ash.
You can’t be one foot in and one foot out with us.
You have to get in the car with me and drive, or you have to take the sidewalk.
Otherwise, we’re going to go nowhere. But if any of this is just because you’re scared of loving me . . .”
“I’m not afraid of loving you, Karla,” I confessed, feeling my emotions sitting at the edge of my eyes.
“I’m afraid of losing you. Seeing you the day after my birthday in so much pain terrified me.
Then seeing you in a hospital bed terrified me even more.
I was so scared that we wouldn’t have more of us.
I got spooked, and I’m sorry for all of it.
I’m sorry that the voices in my mind got so loud that I began to drown again. ”
She sighed and moved in closer, taking my hands into hers. She kissed each hand and looked up at me. “I’m just glad you made it back to shore.”
I leaned in closer. “So does that mean we can get back to falling in love?”
She playfully grumbled, “Yes, I suppose. You’re lucky I believe in second chances so much that I opened a bookshop named after them. But that also means you don’t run when things get scary, because it’s called Second Chance, not one hundred chances.”
“If you let me, I’ll spend the remainder of our lives apologizing for this.”
“Good,” she said, dropping her defensive stance. She brushed her lips against mine. “Because I really missed your kisses.”
I took that as an invite to wrap her into my arms and kiss her.
Just like always, she fit perfectly against me.
The week without her felt like the longest week of my life.
I was a dumbass who almost lost the one thing that made life feel like heaven because I let fear clog my brain.
Maybe that was the real devil in humans’ lives—fear.
I wondered how many people lost the loves of their lives, or their dream careers or passions because fear crept in and fed them lies.
But sometimes, love surpassed the fear. That was when life truly began.