24. A Little Love Goes A Long Way #4
Was it a blessing in disguise to have spent so little of Audie’s life with her so the pain wouldn’t hurt as badly when she died?
I don’t know. She was just a kid, and she didn’t deserve it.
Any of it. Her death wasn’t painless; it wasn’t expected.
She woke up that morning believing she’d walk into town with me the next day to pick up some of her favorite saltwater taffy from the family-owned grocery store on the corner.
That was the first promise I made to my sister that I couldn’t keep.
It’s taking everything inside me to stay calm right now—to not ruin Sutton’s perfect date that he worked so hard to plan.
I guess I thought I’d moved on more than I had. When I get like this, there’s not enough distraction in the world to keep my mind from straying back to the darkness. It lives inside me—a soot-stained footprint on my soul.
Disbelief brims in my throat as I white-knuckle the last of my composure. “Why do you like me?”
Sutton sits all the way up, his face collapsing into an expression of shock. Maybe a smidge of hurt. Nevertheless, it razes my heart, right over the dark, dingy, cobwebbed cavity that still has a vacancy sign hanging over it. I mirror his body.
“What?” His tone is painted in heartache, and he works faster than a NASCAR pit crew to squash the heavy implication behind the question.
“I like you because you’re…you, Lake. You’re selfless and smart and so fucking stubborn, and you have the biggest heart in the world, even though you keep it a secret from everyone.
You’re not your trauma. I know you’re used to running away when things get hard, but I won’t let you. Not this time.”
Finally, a wayward tear trickles down my cheek. “I’m sorry for bringing my darkness to your doorstep. Y-you never agreed to deal with any of my baggage.”
“Why are you apologizing? Don’t say that. Don’t make it sound so…”
It feels like I’m prodding at a shoddy suture line with fine-tipped scissors.
“Final?”
“You don’t have to push me away, Lake. I’m here, and I’ve always been here. I won’t be another person you can just shove aside. I don’t give up on the people I care about, no matter how much they try to dissuade me.”
For a split second, the tears and the misery and the memories feel so inconsequential. I just stare at him as if he’s speaking a completely different language. His truth is akin to apricity—a little beacon of hope amongst a tumultuous sea of loss.
“And I know this isn’t the right time to ask, but…fuck, will you be my girlfriend?”
“You want to make things official?” I whisper, so afraid of raising my voice in case this is yet another one of my hormone-enlightened delusions.
He cradles the side of my damp face with his large hand, diverting any incoming tears with a brush of his thumb. “Yeah, Trouble. I’m so goddamn serious about you that it scares me.”
Not a lot is able to stop my world from spinning, but I should’ve known Sutton would be the only force capable of keeping me from spiraling. He’s offering me a new memory—in this firefly-lit gloam—to counteract the one that’s haunted me for years without fail.
I didn’t think I was capable of being wanted. But I feel it—the light that I was deprived of for so long. Ironic, considering we’re in complete darkness. My heart has memorized his name—beats to the same rhythm as his does—and our souls are cut from the same tattered, moth-eaten cloth.
“Of course I’ll be your girlfriend,” I whisper, feeling the deadbolt over my heart break away.
This is the first time I’ve let someone all the way in since the accident.
Sutton doesn’t have to say anything to silence the graveyard shift of self-loathing thoughts that straggle behind in my brain whenever the sun goes down. The look he gives me is enough—irrefutable and undeniable compassion compacted into the tree rings of his irises.
Sutton exhales in relief. “Jeez, am I glad to hear that. This wasn’t how I wanted to pop the question. It was supposed to be showier, but I, honest to God, didn’t think I would make it through lunch without puking.”
“I didn’t mean for it to stress you out so much.”
“You’re the least stressful thing in my life, Trouble. I just…wanted everything to be perfect for you.”
Putting a label on my relationship with Sutton has been on my mind for weeks now, but I didn’t want to make him uncomfortable if he wasn’t ready to take things to the next level. I have a tendency to screw up the best things in my life.
“Perfect?” I repeat, the word practically masticated between my clenched teeth.
Since my steady stream of tears have ceased, he gingerly takes a strand of my hair and sweeps it behind the shell of my ear. “You deserve nothing less.”
For once, my affinity for diving headfirst into things doesn’t seem like a reprimandable quality.
I jolt forward enough to clash our mouths together, adoration swimming through my veins as the ski slope of his nose nudges against my own bridge.
It’s a slow pull—a top-shelf display of affection that I can feel in the marrow of my bones.
I detach just a smidge and rest my lips against his. “It’s about fucking time you asked me.”