“I don’t see how your question is relevant.”
“You want to see me all the time,” she says. “You blow up my phone. You demand my body every chance you get. But sometimes, the way you look at me ... the way you touch me when I’m lying in your bed ... it confuses me. I think you want to like me, Rhett. But I don’t think you’ll allow yourself. And that’s why you’re so closed off. If you let me in, you might fall for me, and that terrifies you. But guess what? I won’t let you fall for me. I’m just as terrified to fall for you too.”
Her confession sucks the air from the room for a brief moment. Falling for each other was never remotely a part of this agreement.
“I like what we have,” I say. “I don’t want it to change.”
“Because you’re afraid you might like me, and you’re afraid I might hurt you.”
“I’m not afraid of anything. I just don’t want it to change. Not sure why that’s so difficult for you to comprehend.”
Ayla lifts her fists to the air, clenching them tight before walking toward the kitchen. She’s getting nowhere with me and she’s frustrated, but this is how it has to be.
“Where are you going?” I call after her, following.
She grabs her bag from the kitchen counter. “Home.”
“So that’s it?”
All this because I won’t open up to her? Good fucking riddance.
Ayla turns to me, brushing her dark hair from her face and lifting her nose slightly. “Yeah, Rhett. I guess that’s it.”
She turns away from me, walking farther and farther away, across the apartment. It doesn’t feel real until she’s twisting the doorknob and disappearing into the hallway a moment later, the door almost slamming behind her, and suddenly there’s this cannonball-sized gaping hole in my chest.
I take a seat at the kitchen island to compose myself. Wasn’t expecting to feel a damn thing. I didn’t even think I liked her. Hell, I knew I liked her company. I liked her mouth. And her body. I liked the seductive smile on her face that appeared like magic every time I’d open the door. I liked the way she wasted no time pouncing on me and the way her body melted onto mine the second I touched her. I liked the way she smelled, like clean soap sometimes; sweet almonds other times. I liked the sound of her voice; velvety soft, calm. And her laugh; gentle and easy.
God damn it.
I think I like her.
Twenty-One
Ayla
* * *
I never should have read his letter on the plane to LA.
* * *
Ayla,
If you’re reading this letter, it means we never got to meet. And for that, I’m not sorry. But before you crumple this paper and toss it in the trash where it probably belongs, hear me out.
I was nine years old when my father told my mother he had cheated on her. I overheard them in the next room. She had just finished her final round of chemo and her doctors had given her the all clear. You see, she’d been sick most of my childhood and the only thing keeping her going was her desire to watch me grow up. That, and her undying love for my asshole father. Correction—our asshole father. I listened through the walls as she cried all night. That one night turned into days. Those days turned into weeks. Months passed, and I would still catch her crying when she thought no one was around to hear her. Have you ever heard your mother cry? Have you ever known what it felt like to see the one person you love more than anything in this world succumb to intense emotional pain, knowing there wasn’t a damn thing you could do about it?
Anyway, she never looked at him the same again after that. The color from her face was gone. Her eyes were gray and dull. After a while, I forgot how she sounded when she laughed; how her hugs felt. She became a shell of herself, yet she stayed by Dad’s side because she knew she would never love another man half as much as she loved him.
Years passed. She was doing better, though she was never quite the same. And then your message came through one morning while I was checking my Facebook. I read it in a hurry, and then I accidentally left my computer open when I saw the bus coming around the corner. When I came home, I knew. I knew my mother had also read it. And that’s when everything changed again.
We didn’t know you existed until that day.
Her tumor returned shortly after that, which I realize now was a coincidence. Only this time, her will to live was a fraction of what it used to be. She didn’t have it in her to fight harder this time. She slept all the time, and when she wasn’t sleeping, she was crying. My father was exhausted trying to make things right for her, but nothing worked. It didn’t matter what he said or how much he vowed to be the man she deserved, nothing could undo what had already been done.
I was sixteen when she died.
And I hated you.
I hated what you represented.
I wanted nothing to do with you or your mother or anything relating to my father’s past affairs. Out of loyalty to my mother, I vowed I would never so much as acknowledge you, and I swore to myself I would never, ever love you.
You weren’t my sister.
You were the incarnation of the very thing that destroyed my mother’s will to live, and for that, I vowed I would never forgive you.
Maybe it seems petty. Maybe it seems irrational. But I was sixteen, and I was staring ahead at a future that my mother would never be a part of, and it hurt in ways that I could never put into words.
But my father—our father—died a few years ago (massive heart attack—died alone in his sleep if you’re wondering), and I came home one day after his funeral to a package filled with letters, all of them scribbled in pink gel pen in the kind of handwriting that belonged to a young girl. I read them all, along with the note your mother had attached.
I still hated you. But then I felt sorry for you. You had idealized me into this version of what you wanted me to be. And let me tell you, I wasn’t that guy.
Far from it.
This is going to be hard for you to understand, but I spent years and years hating you and what you represent, and while it isn’t fair or even rational, a part of me still does. I feel robbed. And I’m sure you do too. I’m trying, but I can’t get past it. Not yet anyway. Everything is still too fresh.
I’m twenty-four as I write this. And who knows? Maybe you’ll never see this. Maybe I’ll come to my senses in twenty years when I’m in the thick of my middle-aged existence, realizing I’m staring down the barrel of the second half of my life and I’ve still never met my little sister.
But if I don’t? If we never meet? Know that it’s probably for the best.
If I’m forty-four and still not over this shit, you’re better off without me.
I’m not a nice person, Ayla. I’m angry and contentious. I have many acquaintances but only one close friend, because he’s the only person who puts up with my shit because he’s just as fucked up as I am.
I’ve done bad things. I’m selfish. I’ve spent my entire life numbing myself up so now I hurt people just so I can feel something.
I’m not proud of the person I’ve become.
But believe me. It’s better that we don’t meet because I’d probably fuck that up too. I’d hurt you. I’d say mean things. I’d let you down.