34. Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Four
Paul
I swear, sometimes I think I’m cursed. It’s bad enough I have to pretend everything is fine at work, like I’m not thinking about how I fucked up the one good relationship and friendship I’ve ever had, but now I’m hallucinating him, too?
I know I need to lay off the drinking before I do something stupid. I know that.
Which is why I came to this bar; our bar. Just outside town, where no one else will find my miserable ass.
Because it’s all I’ll have left now that he’s made his decision. It’ll be the only place not soured by his memory since it was our bar long before we were… us.
I thought it would be easier to drink and be miserable with strangers, but I could not find it in me to keep going past that one beer.
The only one I had before he showed up, that took me three hours to kill.
I can’t even drink properly because part of me still dares to hope that maybe things will change.
And then he just fucking shows up here? Either I’m hallucinating or fate really fucking has it out for me, because this is a whole new kind of pain.
“Paul!” Andre calls out to me.
I don’t turn around. I can’t.
“Just fucking leave, Andre,” I bite. “Don’t fucking poison this for me, too—” I’m halfway across the parking lot when I feel a hand grab my wrist, and though I want to yank my hand away, I can’t.
Because I miss it. His touch.
The warmth of his palm against my skin.
I miss him so fucking much…
It’s why I came here in the first place.
“Paul, look at me,” he pleads, and though I don’t want to, I can’t bring myself to resist him because he’s not a figment of my imagination.
He’s here.
I slowly let my gaze travel up to meet his, and I swear I must be losing my mind, because it looks like he is on the verge of tears, too.
“What?” I ask, my voice fired up as hell. His palm against my skin is warm, and I ache to twist my fingers in between his, but I know it’ll only hurt more when he leaves. Which he will.
Because he has bigger things to worry about, including a bright, shiny new job and a new life to live.
“I didn’t take the job,” he says, and my heart sinks as I hang my head in shame.
I move to pull my hand back, but instead, I find myself moving closer.
“You what?” My voice is faint. Shaky. I hate how busted up I sound, hate that I can’t hide both the guilt and the relief in my voice.
Andre takes a couple steps toward me, encroaching on my space.
“I couldn’t,” he says. “I mean, I did. But I realized it was a mistake, and I took it back…”
My heart beats so loudly in my chest I think it’s echoing in the damn wind.
His words make me feel torn.
I want to tell him he’s making a mistake. That he should take the job because it’s what he loves more than anything else. He loves being Andre Taylor, renowned coach and a valuable athlete in his own right. And he should; he worked hard to be that man.
But I love Dre. The man who loves to bake the best muffins and is stubborn as hell. My best friend, who I thought loved me and our life we built together. And I know if the situation was reversed, he’d tell me to chase my dreams.
I just didn’t think he would be the definition of my dreams.
There are a million things I could say.
A million things I should say.
I should tell him he’s being an idiot. That he’s throwing away a great opportunity, and that he needs to do what’s best for himself and Rylee, but all that comes out of my mouth is “Why?”
The sounds of REO Speedwagon’s “Can’t Fight This Feeling” carries faintly through the parking lot, the melodic crescendos echoing as flurries start to fall. His hand warms mine, neither of us daring to move.
“Because I love you. And I made a mistake. No, not just a mistake. I fucked up—bad,” he says, as if it’s that simple.
I close my eyes as guilt falls on me, shaking my head. I don’t want to let go of him, but I have to. I can’t think clearly with him this close, his familiar scent clinging to my lungs, his touch making me ache for more.
His eyebrows furrow as I pull my hand back. I suck in a breath.
The damage is already done.
Silence blooms between us, tense and cold.
“What do you want me to say?” I ask.
I find his gaze, my heart in my throat.
Andre’s eyes glisten beneath the spotlight as snowflakes fall between us.
For a minute he says nothing and I think… I think he finally understands he’s better off without me. I’m just going to hold him back and if he didn’t take that job, he’ll resent me for it. I’ll always be the thing that kept him from what he wanted the most, and—
“The truth,” he says solidly, his gaze holding mine.
“What?”
“Tell me right now you want me to go and I’ll go. I’ll take the job and Rylee, and I’ll move and be miserable because it’s what I deserve for what I did to you, and you’ll never have to hear from me again,” he says.
Then he takes two steps—no three steps—toward me, and looks me dead in the eye, his expression unaware and honest.
“Andre—”
“Tell me to stay. Tell me you don’t want me to go, and I—”
Tears prickle my eyes.
The words fall out of my mouth.
“I can’t ask you to give up what we both know you want, Dre. Not for me.”
He reaches out and brushes his knuckles over my cheek, and I hate how that one touch unravels me. I close my eyes, turning to embrace his touch. His warmth.
“Tell me to leave then.”
The words are simple. But they are the hardest words I’ve ever had to speak.
A sob escapes my throat as I shake my head.
“I can’t.” I open my eyes, my vision slightly blurred from the tears I can’t stop.
I find myself falling into his gravitational pull, unable to resist the warmth, unable to fight the spark of hope that refuses to die, even now.
Andre leans his forehead against mine, his gaze biting into mine with undeniable clarity.
“Why not?” he whispers, his voice faltering like mine.
I close my eyes, my voice barely a whisper as I set the truth free.
“Because I love you.”