Chapter Twenty-Four
Now
“I was taking a walk by the lake and saw the light was on in here.”
The stubble on Trevor’s chin was a little shaggy, and I thought of the hundred times I’d reminded him I liked him better clean-shaven. He ran a hand over his face, like he could read my mind.
“No, thanks,” I said, hating the stilted way I sounded.
I could hear the exhaustion in my voice, the frustration bordering on hostility.
There was a time when just looking at Trevor had made my blood race in my veins.
I was young and naive, couldn’t imagine not wanting to spend every possible second with him.
That was before he’d left me behind.
“Come on, let me walk you back. I know how much you missed me.” There was a glint in his eye that I knew well.
And God help me, I laughed. A real laugh, like how I used to laugh at him.
Everything was terrible and wrong and impossible—my mom was dead; Steph might have been murdered; I was still so mad at him; I was likely going insane—but I laughed anyway.
For a moment, it was worth the indulgence. “You’re an idiot.”
“There she is.”
“How’s the cabin treating you?” Rig asked—shocking me, slightly, as I’d forgotten about his existence the moment Trevor and I had locked eyes.
“Oh, it’s perfect,” Trevor said, smiling so wide I could almost see his molars.
“Glad to hear it, kid.” He grabbed Val’s tea off the counter and put on a to-go lid. “Well, think you’re taken care of, ladybug. See you both in the morning.” Rig nodded at both of us before slipping out the door.
When I looked back at Trevor, he was studying me intently. I wondered what he saw on my face.
“Come on. Let’s get you home.”
I let him lead me outside, his hand warm on my lower back as we stepped out into the night. I tried not to think of the ways home had shifted beneath me over the past few years. Once, he’d felt like home to me.
As we made our way to the cabin, Dread’s Cove seemed deserted. It wasn’t that late, but most people had retired early after a long day on the lake; today had been the hottest day this summer so far, and the heat tended to make you sleepy.
I closed my eyes in an overlong blink, trying to conjure the last time I’d gone on a walk with Trevor. I couldn’t remember.
The moon was bright, and I tried and failed not to keep glancing over at his perfect face as we walked. “I’m really sorry about your mom,” he said, breaking the silence at last. “Been thinking about her a lot the past few weeks. And you, obviously.”
I bit my lip so hard I thought it might bleed. “Thanks,” I said. “I’m not very good at this. Grieving.”
Trevor’s hand barely grazed mine, and my heart rate spiked. I couldn’t tell if it was on purpose, meant to be done as a comfort, or if it was simply the result of walking too close to me. Either way, I let the space between us grow.
“It’s not something you have to be good at. You can just—feel it.”
An owl hooted from somewhere in the trees. It was a sound that I had once loved that now felt oddly sinister.
“Can we skip this part, please? I get it. I’ve got stunted emotional abilities. Trust me, it’s been duly noted.”
He made a frustrated sound in the back of his throat. “I never said you were emotionally stunted.”
“Right. Never mind.” Tears threatened to make their way to the surface, making my vision blurry. “It was a long time ago. I don’t know why I said that.” Except, of course, that I did.
That night, after he left my apartment for the final time, I fell asleep on the floor. I sat with my back to the front door, wanting to hear him come back the moment his hand touched the doorknob.
But he never had. I waited all night, until my stiff neck became intolerable and, long after sunrise, I crawled into bed. I didn’t go to work for four days—I almost got fired. But I couldn’t face it. I couldn’t contemplate leaving, knowing he wouldn’t be there when I returned.
“So, that’s why?” Trevor said beside me, pulling me back to earth.
I frowned. “Why what?”
He gave a low, almost pained chuckle in the darkness. “Why you’ve been avoiding me.”
“I’m not avoiding you. I’ve just been busy.”
“Not too busy to buddy up with Margo Pierce, though.”
The path we were on was mostly quiet, save for the buzz of cicadas in the grass, the soft padding of our feet on the dirt. I could see my mother’s cabin up ahead, not far from us; barely peeking through the pine trees. I considered, just for a moment, if I should break into a run.
“Don’t be an asshole, please. I’m too tired to argue about this.”
“I’m not being an asshole,” he said, impossibly gentle.
“And we’re not arguing. I’m stating a fact.
You have been avoiding me. Every time I look at you, you look away.
Every time I try to talk to you, you make up some excuse and disappear.
Even right now, I can tell how badly you want me to leave you alone. ”
I couldn’t bear to look him in the eye. I didn’t want to see what was so clearly reflected there: a disappointment.
For a long minute, neither of us spoke. “So, that’s it?” he asked. “We’re really not going to talk about it?”
My plan with Trevor had been consistent all weekend: stay far away. Because of that, I’d established no talking points, no contingency plans. I hadn’t even considered what I might do if he got me alone.
It was too much already—being here, the loss of my mom, reliving the night of the fire every time I looked around.
And now, what Margo and I had discovered.
We were barreling toward something terrible that I couldn’t stop, didn’t know how to.
I couldn’t handle being faced with remembering the loss of Trevor, too.
It had been Trevor who’d helped me figure out what to do with myself in the days after the fire—Trevor who’d let me stay in his apartment in Atlanta for two weeks, before helping me find a studio on the same block as him.
I’d fallen in love with him in those quiet moments, when he’d played with my hair on his couch and let me watch whatever movie would help me fall asleep.
Our relationship had somehow been one of the best and hardest years of my life.
Trevor was my North Star—my days started and ended with him.
We made plans together, to travel the world and buy a cottage in England and snorkel in Australia and a million other ridiculous things that were both impossible and perfect.
I read all of his favorite books and he tried all the shitty cocktails I invented.
Once in a while, he even talked about marrying me.
I was happy. And I was lying.
I didn’t quite know how to reconcile these two truths that were so at odds with each other.
On Saturday mornings, when we would go see matinee movies, or lie in the grass in the park while live music drifted over us, I really was content.
I’d tell myself, I’m fine. I’ve healed. What happened to Steph will not be the tragedy that defines the rest of my life.
But at night—whenever our shifts didn’t match up, and I went to sleep alone—my darkest thoughts would catch up to me.
I couldn’t stop picturing Steph, that night in the woods.
I couldn’t stop myself from imagining what her last moments might have been like.
How things would have been different if I’d been able to save her.
Sometimes, I’d wake up screaming, terrified to go back to my dreams.
It was Trevor who suggested we move. Start fresh somewhere.
It made sense at first. It was a new life raft to cling to.
As I lay in bed at night, and Steph flashed through my mind, I would force myself to think of better things, future things.
The move to Boulder. A whole new life in a whole new city, with Trevor beside me. At first, it had worked.
But the more excited he got, the more uneasy I became. I couldn’t tell him I was having second thoughts; I wanted to make myself get over it. And I almost did.
Until that night. The night he left for good, disappointment shining in his eyes as he closed my front door for the last time.
Beside me, Trevor sighed, and I could feel it again. That fucking disappointment. One more person who I couldn’t be enough for, do enough for. A person who’d already walked away from me once.
I rounded on him, eyes wild with a rush of anger. “Jesus, what do you want me to say? Do you want me to say that I’m empty, still? Because I am. I lost—everything.”
My breath was coming in quick bursts, but Trevor was frozen solid. We’d stopped walking in the middle of the path. “Why did you even come?”
A muscle in his jaw feathered. “I wouldn’t miss your mom’s funeral. I didn’t mean to hurt you or make this any harder, I thought you’d want me to come—”
“I didn’t. I don’t.”
His eyebrows rose, but he said nothing.
I screwed my eyes shut, determined not to cry.
“Of course I don’t want to talk to you. It hurts to even look at you.
Being here with Chelsea and Wes and Margo and—God—being here with you, I feel like I’m losing my mind.
Nothing is right. Nothing is how it was supposed to be.
And I can’t accept that, but I have to, and I have to be strong and do this for her—”
My voice broke on the final word, and then Trevor was there, gathering me into his arms. He smelled like he always had, like salt water and mint and summertime, and I’d missed him so much that I felt physically ill. Simultaneously, I wanted to pull away and never, ever let go.
“I’m here,” he whispered into my hair, and I gurgled a sob. His arms were warm and strong in the way I remembered—could never forget. “I’ve got you. You don’t have to do this all by yourself. You’re allowed to ask for help.”
“It’s just so hard. I miss her so much.”
“Of course you do. But you need to take care of yourself, all right?”