Me After You Page 24

  I choke on tears rising, reality slowly closing in. I don’t agree. I don’t agree at all. “This can’t be it.”

  “Please stop.” Her voice is wrought with emotion. “Please, let me go.” I tighten my grip because I know this is the last time she will ever be in my arms. “Dean,” she begs.

  I don’t want to, but I release her from my arms and bury my head in my hands. The sound of the shop door closing is the sound that will always remind me of our story ending.

  SAWYER

  ALIX AND I lay side by side on my bed. I didn’t respond to her texts or calls all day, so she finally came over and saw me lying here. Without a word, she crawled onto the bed next to me and joined in staring up at my blank ceiling. It’s blank now. I can’t make out any of Grayson’s features. I probably never could.

  “I told him.” Warm tears rolls off my cheeks, soaking the pillow beneath me.

  I feel her head shift on my pillow to look at me, but I can’t make eye contact yet. I don’t have to explain myself. She knows I told him about the baby. “And?”

  “He feels guilty.” I exhale. “And I thought that was exactly what I wanted. I wanted him to hurt as much as me. But Felix, seeing the torment and regret on his face… I’ve never wanted to take away someone’s pain more.”

  Alix pauses. “You love him,” she says softly, simply.

  I nod, not taking my eyes from the ceiling. “But it doesn’t change anything. He loves Sawyer from six years ago. I’m not that person anymore. He deserves more. And on top of that…” I breathe. “Every part of me is so sad we lost our window of happiness because he left. I can’t let that go. What if he stayed? What if I hadn’t miscarried? What if I stayed? What if all of this heartache could have been avoided?”

  She stays silent for a moment. “If nothing ever happened to us, how would we grow? What would make us stronger?”

  “That’s what we say to make ourselves feel better about the despair we have to endure. How is it supposed to make me feel strong when I feel so damaged? I would rather stay weak if it meant I didn’t have to feel this way anymore.”

  “You don’t mean that.”

  “Sometimes I do.”

  She pauses. “So what are you going to do?”

  “I told him it was over. Even though I promised Grayson I'd move forward, I don’t feel like I have the right. And I miss Grayson. So. Much. He was my constant. He was everything,” I whisper. “I don’t want people to think I’m trying to replace him.”

  “No one is ever going to replace Grayson,” Alix says gently. “Just like Grayson couldn’t replace Dean. People judging you should be the last thing on your mind. I don’t think they would. And who cares if they do? It was always Dean. And Grayson has been gone long enough. No one could blame you for moving on. It’s not like Dean is just anybody. I think Grayson would understand, don’t you?”

  I decide to wait to tell her about the end of Dean and me. I’m already feeling every bit of that loss. Once I tell her, it will demolish the last piece of my heart I’ve been clinging to so tightly. “Grayson knew everything.”

  I wait for her to ask. “You told him about the miscarriage?”

  I nod.

  Grayson pulls away from me after I pour out my soul. Though I finally feel free, I worry how Gray really feels. His hand brushes back my hair and wipes away my tears. His hazel eyes gloss over with unshed tears and tenderness, and I know without a doubt he must really love me if he’s able to look at me that way when he knows the darkest parts of my soul.

  “Sawyer, I want you to be happy. Whether that is here with me in Seattle or whether it’s back in Willowhaven. You need to decide. But I can’t look at you every day knowing you left, not because you were moving forward, but because you were running away.”

  “Wherever you are I will be happy. You make me happy.”

  “Do I?” he breathes, his eyes searching my face.

  “Yes.” I touch his cheek, and he offers a sad smile. I want to be honest with him. I can’t look him in the eyes and give him a partial truth. That’s all I’ve ever given him. “But… but I think there will always be an ache in my heart for everything I lost in Willowhaven.” The ache never goes away. I’ve learned to live with it by pushing it away. We can only coexist because I ignore it.

  “Do you still love him?”

  I feel the air leave my lungs. That isn’t fair. He doesn’t really want the answer to that question. I can’t answer him right away.

  “I don’t expect you to say no, but I do expect you to be honest with me.”

  Lie. The thought rushes my mind. Lie to save him. I want to say no, I want to say no so badly. “I love you, but there will always be a piece of my heart that will keep Dean.” I can’t be rid of him no matter how hard I try. He holds a connection to my greatest loss. He was my first love, and one doesn’t forget that kind of love no matter how elusive it might have been. It was always real for me.

  “Do you want me? Do you want to stay here with me?” Grayson chokes out the last word and then recovers. “Or do you want to go back home, Sawyer?”

  “No,” I answer too quickly, and he shakes his head. “There’s nothing for me in Willowhaven.” I know he’d go back with me in a heartbeat, but that’s not what he’s asking. Our life is here. Not in Willowhaven. I could never have a life in Willowhaven with Grayson.

  “There are answers there. You can’t find your answers here. You can’t find your answers by running from them. You will never be happy if you keep running from your past, Sawyer. I’ve tried looking past it. I thought if I loved you enough… but there’s always a distant look in your eyes like you’re somewhere else. I can give you time. But I can’t wait forever.”

  In my gut, I know what I should do, and it makes me sick. I’m not ready. I don’t want to face everything yet. “I don’t want to go back. I want to stay here with you. I can work through it all here.”

  He nods. “You know I would understand if you didn’t. I wouldn’t like it, but I would understand.”

  “I know.”

  “I just want you to be happy.”

  “I know that, too.”

  “I told him everything about Dean and the baby the day before the incident. He was the one who was encouraging me to come back. He basically told me our marriage couldn’t last if I couldn’t figure my crap out. I didn’t want to come back, but he told me I couldn’t move forward if I was running away.”

  “Did you ever make up your mind? Did you choose between him and Willowhaven?”

  I finally look over at her. “Yes.”

  “Did you get to tell him your answer?”

  DEAN

  “DEAN, IT’S AFTER midnight. What are you still doing here?”

  The brick wall of my office comes back into focus, and I look up to see Aiden’s shadowed figure standing in the doorway. “What?”

  “You look horrible.” He snickers, but there’s a nervous edge.

  Running my hand down my face, I blink and try to make out the time on the clock on the back wall, but I can’t focus. I’m not sure I want to be able to focus on anything ever again. When I do, my broken life will become clear. “What time is it?”

  “It’s a quarter after midnight.”

  “Already?” How did I lose track of five hours? “What are you doing here?”

  “I was driving by, and I saw the light on,” Aiden explains. “I wanted to make sure it was you.”

  I pinch the bridge of my nose and take a deep breath, leaning my elbows on my desk. Sawyer’s words have been running through my mind all night and my body is finally catching up. I ache everywhere.

  “Oh man,” Aiden sighs, moving forward. “What happened? Did you tell Sawyer about Lily? Is she going to forgive you?” He pauses, but not long enough for me to answer any of his questions. “What did she say? You didn’t lose her for good, did you? Throw me a bone, man.”

  All the air leaves my lungs. I can’t tell him that yet. I can’t bear to say the words. “S
awyer was pregnant when I left.”

  Aiden’s steps halt in the middle of the room. “I did not see that one coming.” He falls back into the chair on the opposite side of my desk. “And…”

  “She lost it.” My eyes follow the wooden grooves that branch out across my desk. I’m hoping they will lead me to answers to end this intensifying agony.

  He exhales. “Yours?”

  I want to snap at him for thinking otherwise, but that would make me a hypocrite. I merely nod, keeping my eyes down.

  “I realize I don’t know a lot about women, Dean, but I know that must have messed Sawyer up.” I want to agree, but for some reason I can’t say the words. I don’t want to believe my Sawyer is gone. I know she’s not. There have been enough glimpses throughout the last few weeks for me to know she’s not completely lost. Even if she were, I would have found her. I would have brought her back to me. If she would have let me.

  The silence lengthens between us before he speaks again. “My sister has had two miscarriages. She’s changed a little bit with each one. We don’t get it. My sister once told me, that when she’s pregnant, it’s on her mind every minute of every day. Every little change in her body, every cramp or shift makes her wonder if something is wrong or if the baby is okay. It’s not the same for us. Her husband said he didn’t feel like a dad until he first saw their son, but my sister felt the change as soon as she saw her pregnancy test was positive.”

  I choke back a sob. I can’t figure out why I’m so sad about this. I should be grateful I’m not a dad. I should be grateful I didn’t obliviously miss the last five years of our baby’s life. But right now, I wish for nothing more than to have that connection with Sawyer. I want that for us. It hits me that I want that more than anything.

  “You okay, Dean?”

  “It’s over, Aiden. She told me it’s over.” My jaw tightens, and my fists close shut.

  Aiden doesn’t say a word. All I hear is the sound of our breathing filling the room. “I… That can’t be… What can I do for you?”

  “Nothing.” I shake my head, unable to meet his eyes.

  “Will you be okay?”

  “Yeah,” I grunt, dragging my hand under my nose. “I’ll be fine.”

  Aiden can sense I’m about to fall a part. “You want me to go?”

  “Yeah, I’m right behind you,” I say as calmly as I can.

  He reaches over and clasps his hand on my shoulder with a knowing look. “I love you, man.” I nod to acknowledge him before he leaves.

  Aiden isn’t gone for more than a minute when I break down. The loss draws me forward, doubling me over with its force. For hours, the knowledge of losing that baby took its time setting in, seeping into the crevices of my heart and mind. Now that it’s soaked in, it’s taken hold of me. It’s a part of me just as it’s a part of Sawyer.

  I drive myself home—though it’s probably not the smartest thing to do—rubbing away tears from my eyes to keep them from blurring my vision. I want to sleep and forget what she told me. I want to forget that she’s had to carry this around for years without me. She might have had Grayson, but the baby wasn’t his. It was mine. The wave knocks me down again.

  It was mine.

  When I crawl into bed I lay there with my eyes shut tight, trying to smother the tears, wondering how it’s possible to mourn the loss of someone I didn’t know existed. Tonight I lost more than just Sawyer. I lost everything.

  SAWYER

  I’VE MADE UP my mind. Grayson deserves so much more from me. I made a vow. He’s given me the world and more. I owe him to be better. Our marriage deserves better.

  I get in my car and head to the school to find him. Because finals are coming up, he’s studying late at the library, but I can’t make him wait any longer. I want to tell him now. He needs to know now. He needs to know that I will never leave him. He’s my husband, and I will be loyal to him until the very end, as I vowed.

  When I near the school, I see red and blue lights flashing. They blur and blink under the night sky. A sick feeling pools in the pit of my stomach. There are cop cars and ambulances and yellow tape blocking off the parking structure. Crowds of people gather on the border of the barricade. My heart sinks, and I know. I just know. I don’t know how, but I know all of this commotion is for Grayson. I leave my car in the middle of the intersection, with car horns blaring at me, and run to the scene.

  “Ma’am, I need you to step back.” An officer holds up his hands to stop me from barreling through. His voice gives no room for civility. “You can’t cross this line.”

  “What happened?” I say, catching my breath. “Please tell me what’s going on.”

  “There was an incident regarding a student. No one is allowed in the structure until we clear the area. Now please step back.”

  “My name is Sawyer Jones,” I hurriedly say. “Was the student Grayson Jones?”

  “Ma’am, I can’t give out any information,” he says routinely. “I need you to step away now.”

  “Please tell me if my husband is okay.” I know I’m hysterical, and soon someone’s going to haul me away, but I have to know. I have to know if my husband is okay. “He’s a student at UW. Please tell me!”

  Another officer approaches us. “What’s your husband’s name, Miss?” he asks calmly. His voice holds a little more courtesy, but it’s clear he wants to contain the situation and ask me to leave.

  “Grayson,” I nearly choke. “Grayson Jones.” The officer’s eyes fall. He didn’t actually believe I would be of any importance. “Please, is he okay?” I know the answer. Of course I know the answer. If he were okay, there wouldn’t be a thousand cop cars and ambulances and fire trucks lining the streets. People wouldn’t be crowding the area to get a peek at the scene of the incident. If he were okay, the officer’s eyes wouldn’t be looking at me with pity.

  “Come with me,” the officer says quietly and lifts the yellow tape.

  Grayson lies in a hospital bed, bandaged from head to toe. I hardly recognize him. An IV pierces his wrist and tubes feed into his nose. They’ve taken his glasses from him. His face is swollen and bruised. He’s motionless. When I drag a chair across the linoleum to his bedside, it thumps, and his eyelids flutter.

  “Hey,” I croak, swallowing back tears and brush my fingertips across his partially unbandaged jaw.

  His eyes open as much as they can. “Hey,” he rasps.

  My heart clenches at the weakness in his voice that sounds nothing like him. The doctors are surprised he’s still conscious. I don’t know what to say. I want to say everything and yet nothing at all.

  He licks his lips before he speaks. “I waited for you,” he whispers.

  I can’t force back the tears. I collapse across his chest. “There is so much I want to tell you, and yet I don’t know where to begin.” His hand slowly brushes down my back.

  “Some way to go, huh?”

  “Stop it,” I hiss, looking up. “That’s not funny, Gray.”

  “Sawyer, you need to go back to Willowhaven.” His voice is so gruff I can hardly hear him. “You need to go back home.”

  “No.” I shake my head. “What are you even saying?”

  “Sawyer, promise you’ll go home. Be with your parents,” he utters. “Fix whatever it is you need to.” He pauses, then says, “Find him. Have babies. Grow old. Live your life.”

  “No, I’m staying here with you. I’ve already made that decision. I was coming to tell you before,” I choke as the tears stream down my cheeks. “I want this to work. I. Choose. You.”

  His head feebly shakes once. “You know it doesn’t matter anymore.”

  “It does matter. You have to stay with me. I choose you!”

  “Stop it, Sawyer. I know the doctors…” he pauses to catch his breath, “spoke with you.”

  I shake my head in frustration. “It wasn’t supposed to happen like this.”

  “I know.” He tries to lift his hand to touch my cheek, but he doesn’t have enough strength
. I grab his hand between mine and bring it to my lips. “I love you.” His words make me cry more. “I love you so much.”

  I kiss his palm and cup it against my cheek. “I love you, too. So much.”

  “Promise me. I couldn’t fix this. You have to do that for yourself.” I clench my jaw and try to breathe. “Promise me,” he presses.

  “I promise.”

  He nods once and relaxes, closing his eyes.

  “Grayson?” I ask, fearing he’s already gone.

  “I’m still here, S.”

  I swallow. “Please don’t leave me. Please. Please stay.”

  “You know I’ll never leave you.”

  Tears pool in Alix’s eyes. “Sawyer,” she murmurs. And then she pulls me into her arms because she obviously can’t bear to look at me in the eyes anymore.

  “You don’t look surprised,” I whisper.

  “Of course you picked him.” She pulls away. “He was your husband. Your loyalty runs deep. Why would he think there was any other option?”

  “I think he wanted to hear me say it.”

  “And you did. Whether you did it because that’s what your heart wanted or because of loyalty, it doesn’t matter. He knows you loved him. You had a good life together, no matter how short. It was good. Great, even.”

  I nod and feel the tears taking over me again. It was great. It was really great.

  Her fingers brush through my hair. “Do you not want to be with Dean?” she quietly asks.

  “I do,” I confess. “I just… I can’t. We would never work. I don’t understand why he felt like he had to leave, why he thought that was what was best for us. He said it was because he was afraid, but that doesn’t sound like him to me. I’ve never seen him do anything but face life head on. With everything and everyone against him, he always believed in himself. If he really loved me, he would never have left.”