I tell him I’m sorry every time I’m reminded of him. I hate going south, too many old trucks. I could never tell the difference, but they were Tyler’s thing. He was an old soul like that.
“Every day,” Carter says as I sit there quietly.
“I did something,” I start to confess to Carter but stop myself. I’m too ashamed, so I settle on something else. “I ran into Addison.” Her name leaves me in a rush, taking all the air in my lungs with it.
“Tyler’s Addison? That’s what brought this up?” he questions me and I nod my head like an ass, as if he can see.
“Yeah,” I almost repeat, Tyler’s Addison. But she never belonged to him. As much as I love him, she was always mine. Maybe he was meant to be her first, but I’ll be her last. My throat tightens and my heart hammers in my chest. She’s not his anymore. She’s mine. And telling Carter feels like a betrayal of the worst kind. It feels like I’m telling Tyler. And as much as I thought it would be easy to admit it, I don’t want them to hate me. They have to understand.
“And?” Carter presses and I’m not sure where to begin.
“When I left … after Tyler died five years ago … when I left you and the family, I followed her.” The words spill from me. “Watching her cry made me feel normal. She gave me hope that I wasn’t broken, because she felt the same way. But she stopped crying, Carter. She moved on without me.”
“Daniel,” Carter warns and I hate him for it.
“You’ll listen to me,” I seethe with barely concealed anger. He will listen and accept it. There are no other options. I can’t have it end any other way. “I have no one.”
“You chose no one. You left us.”
“You know why.” They gave Tyler’s phone to Carter after the dust settled. Carter saw. He never spoke it out loud. But I was there and I know he saw that I was the one texting him.
I’m the one who led Tyler to his death.
“You didn’t have to go.” His voice is sincere, but soft and full of sympathy.
“Well I’m coming back now,” I tell him.
“Does she know?” he asks me and I answer him with, “I shouldn’t have told her.”
“She knows you followed her? Is she going to press charges?” he asks and I huff a humorless laugh and then stare at the ceiling fan that’s perfectly still.
“I don’t think so,” I say and it’s only then that question becomes a possibility. I’ve only been thinking about what I can do to make her forgive me.
“She has to forgive me,” I tell him with words stronger than I feel.
“She doesn’t have to do anything,” Carter answers me and the silence stretches as my disdain for him grows.
“What did she say?” he asks me just as I’m ready to hang up.
“That she hates me.” It doesn’t hurt me to say the words today like they hurt me yesterday. There’s hope, only a small piece, but it’s there. “She didn’t mean it,” I tell him.
“Did you do anything else?” Carter asks me with a tone that’s cautious, like he already knows.
“I’ve done lots of things, brother.”
“With her. With Addison.” My gaze wanders to my shoes by the bed and I bend down to put them on and lace them while I tell him, “I tried to stay away from her, but she sought me out … before she knew.”
“Did she fuck you?” he asks me and it strikes me as if he’s said it backward.
“I fucked her, yes.” The irritation gives me strength and I stare at the pile of shit next to the door that I’ll take with me back home and nearly leave it behind. It’s all meaningless.
“Is she …” Carter hesitates to ask.
“She’s mine.” The words leave me quickly, whipping out as if they’re meant to lash him, hating how he questions it. She’s always been mine.
I almost tell him that she’ll forgive me, but the doubt in me stops the words on the tip of my tongue.
“I’m coming home. I’ve been running away for a long time.”
“If you bring her, tell me so I can tell the others.”
“Why tell them?” Although I don’t give a shit what they think, I know Addison will.
“She was like a sister to us, Daniel. She didn’t just leave Tyler, she left all of us.”
She didn’t just leave us once. She left us twice.
When I heard her break up with Tyler in the kitchen, I could hear every word. I stood by the window, watching her leave.
I can’t let her leave a third time. I can’t let her go.
Before I can stop myself, I speak into the phone, “I’ll let you know.”
Staring at the closed door to this rented house, I can see Addison so clearly all those years ago. Driving away and I never bothered to stop her or tell her how she wasn’t allowed to leave.
She could never leave.
She was meant to be there.
Not with Tyler, but with me.
Maybe if I had bothered to tell either of them that, Tyler would still be here and none of this would have happened.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Addison
This coldness won’t go away.
It follows me everywhere. Even burying myself under the blankets doesn’t take the chill away.
I can’t sleep. I can only wait for updates from Daniel. He texted me all night. He’s really leaving.
It all feels so final and I have no time to process anything. There’s a heaviness in my chest and a soreness in my lungs that I’m so painfully aware of. They won’t leave me alone.
Another message, another plea from him.
Please meet me, he begs. I can’t lose you again.
Looking at his message stirs up so much emotion. I don’t want to lose him. That’s the worst part of all of this. It’s the fact that I don’t want to be alone and without him again.
But how can you forgive someone for watching you suffer when they knew they could save you?
I’ll wait outside. I’m on my way and I’ll wait for you, but I can’t wait long. Please Addison.
The seconds tick by as I stare at his message.
Tick-tock. Tick-tock.
It’s early in the morning; the sun is still rising. A new day.
I can tell him goodbye. Just one last kiss. A kiss for the love we had. The love we shared for another too. A final goodbye that I should have had years ago.
I can pretend that’s what this will be, but I already feel myself clinging to him.
Some people you’re meant to say goodbye to, and others you aren’t.
I don’t text him back. Instead I head to the bathroom. I look exactly how I feel, which is fucking awful. I half question getting myself somewhat put together to see him.
But I don’t want him to remember me like this if it really is the last time I’ll see him.
I take a few minutes, each one seeming longer and longer even though hardly any time has passed. And when I look up, I see a pretty version of me, with mascara and concealer to hide the exhaustion. I can’t hide the pain though.
I’ll try to let him go and move on.
Because that’s what I’m supposed to do. Isn’t it? It’s what a sane, strong woman would do.