Chapter 18 Olivia #2
I laugh, nudging him slightly, the way Adam had with me on the dock. “I’m real. Corporeally speaking. Not in the eyes of the U.S. government, but that’s another issue.”
“Yeah, I can guess. But I want to hear more about your version of our lives. You said . . . we’re together?”
I nod, my smile fading. “In my . . . timeline, I guess, you and I were never with anyone else. We first kissed at the lake when we were fourteen, lost our virginity to each other a few years after that, also at the quarry. Prom king and queen our high-school senior year. You went off to Princeton and I stayed here to go to school for interior design. Mom and Dad helped me rent a loft downtown, which you moved into after law school. I started my business, which has been doing well, and that allowed you to go into legal advocacy for refugees, instead of having to earn top dollar at a private practice. Which I guess is what you do now.”
Jake nods thoughtfully. “Yeah. It’s okay.
Refugee advocacy would’ve been great, though.
But I was able to buy my condo a couple of years ago, and having this much access to the beach is amazing.
” He lifts his chin backward, toward the building behind us.
“Savannah gets a lot of free swag but she doesn’t have a big income, so she’s probably gonna move in soon.
” He says the last part quietly, almost as an apology.
“In your version, you and I live together?”
“We bought a little fixer-upper not far from here, by Bradley Creek, a year ago. I redesigned the interiors myself and it’s really sweet. And . . .” I blow out a breath, “in my version, we’re getting married next month. August 20th.”
Jake frowns. “That’s Savannah’s birthday.”
The day he’s planning to propose to her.
“Huh.” Not much more I can say.
Jake narrows his eyes as he watches two surfers bring their boards to the shore. “And in your version, we’re happy, right? You and me? We love each other?”
I follow his gaze. “Very happy. Never loved anyone else. We’re kind of fundamental to each other.
Like we are each other, you know? I mean I’ve had some issues with that, with the wedding approaching so fast. Fears about how we’ve never known anything else, so how can we be sure?
But I never for a moment stopped loving you.
” My voice cracks, my sinuses filling up.
“Since I’ve been here, and I no longer have you, I realized just how much.
How incredibly lucky I was. How I should never have taken you for granted. ”
He doesn’t look at me, but places his sand-crusted hand close to mine. “I can see how it would’ve happened that way between us. If you’d lived. Even at twelve years old, I already adored you. I didn’t recognize it as love, at that point, but I did think we’d be together always.”
I nod. “You told me the same thing, the day we first had sex. You’d just turned seventeen, I was still sixteen.
That was the first time you said you loved me, too.
I told you it had been different for me.
When I was twelve, you were just my best friend who happened to be a boy.
Then I hit thirteen and puberty, and all these feelings gradually formed, and I developed a crush on you that I couldn’t handle.
I was in total agony until you kissed me in the lake when we were fourteen.
” I smile, pushing away a tear that has slipped down my cheek. “We never stopped kissing, after that.”
Jake smiles. “It’s amazing we made it another, what, two, two-and-a-half years before we slept together? I remember being a very horny teenager.”
I chuckle through my tears. “I know. I remember. Lots of quarry pool erections.”
Jake laughs, turning his handsome face to me. A phone dings a dual-tone bell I don’t recognize. His expression changes, a flash of darkness passing across his eyes, and he pulls his hand away from mine. He checks his cell, pursing his lips.
“Savannah. I’m picking her up in an hour, and I have to change first.”
“I need to get home anyways,” I tell him, hiding my disappointment. “My folks will be serving dinner soon, and I need the free food.”
He nods, rising to his feet. The sadness is back.
“Thanks for talking to me, Liv. I needed to hear this stuff.”
I stand, brushing sand from my shorts. “I don’t know that it helped you get any closure.” I stare into his beautiful face. “I don’t want to complicate things for you, I swear.”
“It’s okay. I mean, of course it’s ridiculously complicated and messed up, but it’s not your fault.
None of this is even remotely explainable.
I just have to figure out how to accept there’s a version of life where you didn’t die, where I was able to save you.
Maybe if I can do that, I’ll feel more . . . I dunno. Settled.”
“I hope so.” I turn away, my heart breaking, not wanting to let the man I love go. “Take care, Jake.”
“You too, Liv. See you around.”
He heads off in the direction of his building and I wander down the sand toward my bike.
As I pass into shadow under the pier, out of Jake’s view, I stop behind a barnacle-crusted pillar, finally able to let out the sobs I’ve been holding in.