He must be fighting his own demons. But his comment is bittersweet. I want him to miss me—I really and desperately do. I want him to miss me as much as I will miss him, but in the same breath, I don’t want him to hurt as I do. I can’t stand the idea of him feeling this pain. This is his future. He’s wanted this for so long. And my future has been equally sought after.
I was ecstatic when I found out about my scholarship. It’s hard to land great ones, especially in the arts. This particular program only gives out one per year, and it was given to me. It was more than I ever hoped for. I still remember the day I received the letter. Sara was with me when I opened it, and we both sobbed. It was the best moment of my life. It was the very thing I needed to help me understand life would move on from my shitty old trailer and my asshole of a father. Imagining life after my mother passed away was impossible. It was hard to look forward to the next week, let alone a happy future. This scholarship symbolized all of that. It put to rest my long-held fears that I would end up alone in Grand Rapids, never escaping my father and doomed to slave away a meager living for the rest of my life. It was truly the first time I was happy since my mother had passed away. And it seems to symbolize nothing but loss.
I finally drift off to sleep dreaming about her—my mother. These dreams are always sad, and I always wake missing her as if she was only taken away from me yesterday. This night is no exception, and when I wake us both crying out for her like a child, I start sobbing pathetically as Logan pulls me in to his arms, hushing me and stroking my hair.
The next morning as I get ready for the day, Logan watches me closely. I’m numb and emotionally drained from my dreams. And as he approaches me from behind as I stand at the bathroom sink staring at myself, he wraps his arms gently around me and nuzzles my neck with his mouth.
His lips find my ear, and he whispers, “Do you want to talk about it?” I shake my head, and he exhales a deep, concerned breath.
As he looks down in to my eyes before leaving for the day, my emotions get the better of me again, and I start to furiously blink away the unwanted tears that suddenly hit me. He exhales another deep breath, and I can see how helpless he feels. He wants to fix my pain, but he can’t, and he hates it. I kiss him swiftly and move away from him before my tears can destroy his mood more than they already have. And when the door finally closes behind him, I start to numbly move through my day, carrying the haze of my sadness with me.
Chapter 20
The week moves faster than I want, just like all the others, and by Wednesday night Logan is packing, and we’re spending the last of our intimate time together. It is erotic and intense as always but also tinged with dread because of another long weekend apart and the knowledge that every day takes us closer to our final moments together. We don’t speak a word to each other as our bodies move together, and his hands and mouth explore every secret part of my body. He touches me with possession, and I give it willingly, craving to be captured and owned by him.
His flight is early the next morning, and he must leave long before I need to get up, but when he rises in the pre-dawn hour leaving for the bathroom to shower, I’m wide awake, not wanting to miss a moment of him. I curl up to his pillow, waiting for him to return. It smells of him, his scent, and I miss it already. When he reemerges, he is freshly showered and naked. I watch in pleasure as he moves around the room, packing last-minute items and laying his clothes out. He’s in no hurry to dress, and I’m thankful to have this quiet time to study him. When he catches me watching him, he smiles a warm and wonderful Logan smile. And as he approaches me on the bed, my body shivers with desire that will have to wait until the long weekend is done. He looks down at me with the same longing, and with a frustrated shake of his head he lets out a long sigh. He kisses me and tastes my mouth before finally breaking away and standing to dress.
I offer a weak attempt at early morning humor. “Did you remember your underwear?”
“You know you’re completely responsible for that.”
Once dressed and ready to leave, he returns to my mouth and tortures us both for a while longer before begrudgingly breaking away to leave. It’s going to be a lonely weekend. But Sunday does eventually arrive, and when it does, so, too, does my excitement.
When I hear the door open, I practically scream in excitement to see him. He comes in carrying his bags, and I bounce off the couch ready to attack him. He sees the look in my eyes, and sensing my animalistic prowess he drops his bags just as I reach him and pounce into his arms. His eyes look tired, but as he carries me to the bedroom straddling his hips, I can already feel his hard erection pushing into my groin. He lays me down, and as I gaze up at him I notice again just how weary and exhausted he looks. I feel guilty for a moment at pushing his buttons the second he walked through the door until I see his own ferocious, animalistic gaze searing down at me. As he climbs above me, mounting my body, he grinds his erection against my sex hard. I reach down, and fumbling with the zipper of his jeans I set him free.
Her eyes watch mine, hungry and beseeching. We’ve been apart for days, and the separation has been as difficult as it always is. And with this separation comes the intense need to be together in every possible way. And she asks the question I dread—her expectations always set to this one act. Making love. She wants it. And God, so do I. Every day with her, every touch, every look, every taste erodes my resolve just a bit more. But she sees the rejection in my eyes before I’ve even a chance to turn her down yet again. The weariness of her thoughts is clear in the depths of her eyes.
She turns to me and begs the question she needs an answer to. “Why won’t you make love to me? Please, just tell me.”
There is no answer to this question that will satisfy her, but she also deserves the truth. I’d rather she understand how her importance to me and my respect for her are at the heart of my decision rather than sending her away brokenhearted and dejected. So I open a page of my innermost heart and give her a glimpse of what it means to be completely and utterly obsessed with her. “You can’t imagine how hard it is going to be for me to let you go. I’ve become … attached to you … very attached,” I continue as I reach out and stroke the porcelain skin of her cheek.
“Then why not? Don’t you want to? Is it something about me or something I’ve done?”
“No! That’s not… I want to make love to you as much as I have ever wanted anything in my life. This isn’t about what I want. Hell, it’s not even about what you want. It’s about what is right.” The confusion in her eyes tells me I’m not making any sense, so I trudge on. “I can’t keep you. You don’t belong to me, and some day you will belong to someone else.” I can’t keep the pain of this thought from registering on my face. But still, I trudge on. “You deserve a man who will take you and keep you, not a man who will have you and leave you. I can’t be the man who does that to you.”
This evening, after so many away from each other, has just turned to hell. Tears sting her eyes as she struggles to maintain her composure. I’ve rejected her once again, and the reasons don’t soften the blow even a fraction. I wish she knew it was all about her. Every last decision I’ve made has been about her; whether they were right or wrong, her. She struggles against her tears and fights to find her voice. She finally gives up and, in tears, leaves the room. She leaves me, numb and in shock, sitting on my bed.
My gaze trails after her, and I want to call her back. I pray she’ll return to me so I can comfort her, touch her, fix her, fix us. But she doesn’t come back, and I know why—because there is nothing to say. God, I want to hit rewind and start this reunion over again. At my core, I want to keep her safe, content, and satisfied, and my heart screams at my head in protest. I can’t keep hurting her. All I want is to give in to her wishes. Show her how much she means to me. But my head knows what my heart doesn’t understand—she deserves better than that. She isn’t mine to take. Our paths are just simply too far gone from any common direction. The obstacles are insurmountable. And this weekend in Denver, meeting the partners and touring the area with a real estate agent, has confirmed this fact harshly again in my mind.