Chapter Forty-Five Tom
Chapter Forty-Five
Tom
He’d followed me back.
He didn’t follow anyone, but he’d followed me. My stupid, made-up profile that had zero followers and a profile picture of one of Grams’s cats wearing a crocheted watermelon helmet.
My heart beat so hard in my chest I was pretty sure I was going into cardiac arrest. I couldn’t stop grinning at the screen.
ItalianSausage: Then he should do something about it.
I wanted to message him.
No, I wanted to go to him. Now. To cover him with kisses and promises that everything would be different going forward, that there would be no more lies, no more deception, no more decisions being made without consulting him.
I was halfway through the door when my eyes landed on the get-out-of-jail-free card sitting on the credenza. A reminder of the promise I’d given him.
I’d told him I wasn’t going to go after him, and I meant it.
Not because I didn’t want to, but because I knew what he was going through. I’d gone through it myself when I was younger. He needed time to process.
Enzo had a lot to digest. To embrace an identity that had lurked in the shadows for the majority of his life. He needed to get better, and throwing himself into a relationship with someone he had a toxic pattern with wasn’t necessarily constructive right now.
We could do things differently. We could be amazing together. But first, he had to choose us.
This wasn’t about pride, ego, or the need to feel appreciated for what I’d done for him.
Grams had once told me that with Matt, I’d settled for the love I thought I deserved.
But it had been different then. Not because I didn’t love Matt, but because a fraction of him had been enough for me. I’d been content. I’d had other things going on—school, work, therapy. I hadn’t wanted an all-consuming love story that would change my life to its very core.
With Enzo, it was all or nothing.
The nothing was a big risk.
But something simply wouldn’t do.
This time, I was going to wait.
Even if it took an entire lifetime.
Until he realized I was the one.