The band’s music faded behind me, the crashing waves taking its place, and I’d almost made it to freedom when I heard Tyler call my name.
“Jasmine,” he said again when I didn’t stop, and I trembled even harder, willing my feet to keep moving. “Jasmine, wait.”
It was as if that command was one of a god, the way I halted at the words. I closed my eyes, reveling in the cool sand beneath my feet, as if it was the only thing grounding me in that moment.
And in the next breath, I started crying, and I didn’t even bother to try to stop myself this time.
When I turned to face Tyler, his face crumpled at the sight of me, and he opened his mouth to speak, but closed it all the same, shoving his hands in his pockets as if he was afraid he’d reach for me if he didn’t.
I prayed he would.
I prayed he never would.
It was a constant war, one neither of us would ever win.
Time stretched between us under the dim light of the moon, the breeze doing nothing to cool my hot skin as I waited — just like he’d asked. I dropped the skirt of my dress from one hand, my heels from the other, abandoning them in the sand. But Tyler just watched me, his eyes casting their gaze over every inch from head to toe, his jaw tense, eyes filled with an emotion I couldn’t place.
“You left,” he said simply.
I choked on something of a sob or a laugh, though I couldn’t be sure which. “Yes,” I whispered. “Yes, I did.”
“Why?”
My eyes rolled up to the stars, like they would somehow be able to explain what I couldn’t. “Because I can’t do this anymore,” I whispered, rolling my lips together as fresh tears marred my cheeks. When I finally found his gaze again, all I could do was shake my head. “I can’t watch you with her, Tyler. I can’t watch you put your arms around her waist,” I choked. “And her lean her head on your chest, and you hold her the way you held me. I can’t watch you with her at all and pretend like I’m okay.”
Tyler’s lips flattened, his brows bending together so fiercely that a flurry of fear swept over me.
He took one step toward me, and somehow I managed to keep my feet planted. “You said this was for the best. You said you didn’t want me.”
“Well, I lied, okay?” I said, matching his step with my own, and before I knew it, we were chest to chest, nose to nose, every shaky, hot breath of his meeting mine. My hands reached out for him, but I stopped them before they could make contact, holding them in the warm air between us as I whispered again. “I lied.”
The air was thick and heavy, armed with electricity and toxins as we stood there on that beach bathed in starlight. My hands trembled as I lowered them, gently, carefully, until they rested so lightly on the lapels of his suit that I wondered if he’d even feel them at all.
I lifted my chin, looking up at him through my lashes, waiting for him to say something — anything.
But nothing came.
I watched as a range of emotion washed over him, everything from surprise to pain, but he settled on something that looked a lot like anger. He ground his teeth, his eyes welling with tears and jaw muscles ticking from how tightly he held his mouth shut. His mouth opened just enough to let out a hot, quivering exhale, and his eyes flicked to mine.
They were filled to the rim with tears, but he didn’t let them fall, and he didn’t say a word, either. He just watched me for a long, anguished moment.
And then he sniffed, looking straight ahead again, his hands still in his pockets and his jaw set.
That was it.
That was my cue to leave, to let it go, to let him go. This was his chance to take what I’d confessed and run with it, to pull me into him, to say he wanted me, too.
But he didn’t.
The breath I took when I stepped back was like black smoke to my lungs. The first steps I took away from him felt like walking on shards of glass and rusty nails. And when I turned to look at him once more over my shoulder, it was a view I knew would be burned into my memory for the rest of my life.
Still, I left him there.
And he let me go.
The day my mother left, there was an elemental shift in me.
I didn’t realize it then, because I was young and, for the most part, untouched by the cruelties of the world. I lived in the sheltered little bubble of Bridgechester, in the warm hideaway of my best friend’s house and family, in the comfort of my aunt’s arms. I believed everyone when they told me something — Morgan when she said we’d be best friends forever, Tyler when he told me I was spectacular, my mother when she told me she’d be back for me.
But on that day, something shifted.
It was the first time I was hardened by life, the first time I saw through the curtain I’d been hiding behind and viewed the world for what it really was.
I hadn’t felt that way growing up without a father, for some reason. Maybe it was because I never had one at all, so I didn’t know what I was missing. Robert was the closest thing I’d had to a father figure and he served me just fine. But, when my mom made a promise to come back for me and then broke that promise, I never recovered.
And when Tyler told me what we’d done was a mistake and that it shouldn’t happen again, it drove the nail further into the coffin of what my life had been before that day.
I looked back now and saw that moment for what it truly was — an awakening. It was the separation between who I had been as a girl and who I would become as a young woman. It was a clear, delineating line of before and after.
And when I woke the morning after Morgan’s wedding, I felt that same, bone-quivering, soul-deep shift.
I packed my bags in silence, listening to the gentle waves outside and the steady beating of my heart. My mind didn’t race, the way it had for the past few days — hell, for the past two weeks since I’d flown back to New Hampshire. Instead, I felt eerily calm and decisive.
When I was packed and ready to go, I stood in the doorway and let my eyes wash over the entire room. And I knew in the pit of my stomach that when I left it, I’d be leaving the young woman I was yesterday inside it, too.
I wasn’t the same one walking out as I was walking in.
There was commotion in the kitchen and dining area when the little house elevator opened on the bottom floor. Oliver and Morgan were at the center of the dining room table, with Oliver’s family and the Wagners gathered around them. Aunt Laura was there, too, with what looked like a tequila sunrise in her hand. A few of Morgan’s friends were in the kitchen pouring mimosas and making breakfast for everyone, and one glance was enough for me to see that Tyler was there, too, making a cup of tea.
Azra was sitting right next to Morgan, and she was mid-laugh when her eyes flashed to where I was pushing my rolling suitcase through the elevator door. At the sight, she frowned, and Morgan followed her gaze with the same expression.
“Why are you all packed?” she asked, and I cringed at how the entire party stopped at my entrance, at how everyone at the table and in the kitchen turned to find what had the new bride in a tiff.
I managed a smile somehow, clearing my throat as I leaned against my suitcase. “I’m heading out,” I said. “Time for this Cali girl to get back to the beach.”
“But you’ve got a beach right here,” Morgan pouted, standing. “And you weren’t supposed to leave until tomorrow.”