Twenty-Two
I rolled over in bed with a huff and punched my pillow in annoyance. I’d been trying to sleep for the past four hours and hadn’t even come close to drifting off. It’d been like this for days now. I needed to get some rest. Finals were in full swing and I needed to be able to concentrate. Or at least, you know, stay awake in the tests. I wouldn’t push it by asking to actually be able to remember the answers.
“If I go to sleep right now, I’ll get five hours,” I muttered. Deep down, I knew this was a losing battle. All it did was make me stare at my alarm even more, counting down the time I was missing out on that could be spent sleeping.
Lord knew I could have used it; I was exhausted.
It’d been almost a week since I had seen or spoken with Ryan. That wasn’t to say he hadn’t tried. I had numerous texts, voicemails, and emails I had been studiously ignoring. It was something of a surprise that he’d even tried to get hold of me after the fiasco the previous week. I’d figured he would have moved on to his next conquest at this point. He had proven me wrong, however.
Had it been under different circumstances, I would have been flattered. The fact of the matter was it did nothing but make me feel the loss of Teagan all the more. I knew from Connor that he’d withdrawn from some of his classes because he’d fallen behind. That broke my heart a little, since I knew he’d looked forward to graduating this semester. I’d seen him around the campus a couple of times, but he was always on his phone and didn’t notice me.
I couldn’t help but wonder if he’d been on the phone with her.
That thought suddenly had a million others racing through my mind. What was he doing? Was he back with her, in a relationship? Was he doing with her all the things he wouldn’t do with me? Had he moved on? Did he miss me like I missed him?
I sighed and swallowed hard against the lump that formed in my throat at the last thought. The notion that he had maybe moved past us already cracked my heart a little more than it already was. The ache in my chest just got a little deeper than it had been.
Then there was Ryan. I didn’t know what to do about him. He had never been more than a friend to me, someone who helped me during a time of pain and depression. I could freely admit I missed him, but I didn’t want to lead him on either. There was no future for us. The feelings on my side weren’t romantic, and distance was the best course for that situation.
I glanced at my clock and saw I’d managed to lose half an hour and I was still no closer to falling asleep. With a groan, I admitted defeat and sat up and turned on my lamp. If nothing else, I could always go online and waste time reading memes that I no longer found amusing. To be honest, I didn’t find much of anything entertaining these days. I would have tried to call Penny, but I could never get hold of her. I missed my best friend.
Annie must have been awake as well, because I heard a knock on my door before she opened it. She poked her head in and frowned. She glanced around and then took a step in to lean against my dresser with her arms crossed.
“Why are you still up at this hour?” she asked with a concerned look.
I shrugged. “Just couldn’t sleep,” I answered vaguely.
She studied me in silence for a moment and I had to squash the urge to fidget and look away. “What’s going on?” she asked me suddenly.
“Huh?” I wasn’t prepared for questions. It was why I hadn’t been making myself accessible as of late.
“I haven’t seen you lately, and when I do you’re always frowning, and I haven’t seen Ryan around in days. That’s not like him.”
I winced and looked away at Ryan’s name and struggled to come up with an explanation that wouldn’t cause more questions. “We’ve just been busy, is all.” When silence met my statement I looked up and saw she was watching me with a strange look on her face. “What?”
She pursed her lips for a moment and seemed to be debating her words before she dropped her arms with a sigh. “Ash, I heard about what happened at the movie the other night. How you and Ryan rushed out and all?”
I just stared at her in silence, neither confirming nor denying what happened.
“I’m guessing he finally let you know how he feels about you, right?”
Again I just shrugged, not saying anything.
She sighed and ran a hand over her face. “I was worried about this,” she mumbled.
“What?” I asked, not sure I’d heard her correctly.
She shifted her stance on the dresser and shook her head. “I could tell that Ryan was starting to…I dunno, I guess get more invested? I don’t know how to explain it. But I knew something was going on there.” She looked away from me for a moment before she continued. “And I knew it wasn’t like that for you.”
I nodded in agreement. “Yeah, you’re right. It wasn’t.”
“How did he take it?”
“Not well,” I admitted. I paused before I decided to tell her what had happened. “He kissed me.”
“What?” Her jaw dropped open.
I raised a shoulder and gave a humorless smile. “Yeah, you heard me right. He kissed me.”
“Wow,” she breathed. “I wasn’t expecting you tell to me that one.”
“Yeah, well, I wasn’t expecting him to do something like that. So, I guess we’re even, huh?” I said with a sad laugh.
Pressing her hands to her chin like she was holding back a flood of questions, she asked, “How did you feel about it?”
I looked away and squinted as I tried to figure out the best way to explain it to her. “I was surprised, of course.”
“Of course,” she agreed.
“And he’s a great kisser, I’ll give him that one.” I took a deep breath and then told her what I hadn’t want to admit to myself. “But I felt like I’d been duped, like he’d played me.”
She furrowed her brow in confusion. “What? Why?”
I sighed and ran a finger along the pattern on my comforter for a moment before I responded. “Everyone told me to be leery of him, that he was only after one thing. They all said, and I felt the same way, that I was a challenge because I wasn’t interested and he’d just play the game until he finally got what he wanted.” I raised my eyes to hers. “I thought he and I were actually friends, Annie. I guess I was wrong,” I finished sadly.
She tilted her head in thought before she spoke. “Ash, can I ask you something?”
“Yeah.”
“Are you still hoping things will work out with you and Teeg?”
Actually being asked that, point blank, caused me to freeze in place. I opened my mouth to respond, then settled on just giving a shrug.
“I’d like an actual answer,” she pushed.
I sighed and dropped my head back against the headboard of the bed. “I don’t know. Maybe?” I squeezed my eyes shut for a moment before I opened them and swallowed hard. “Yeah, I think so.”
At her lack of response, I rolled my head over and saw she was looking at me with her lips pursed in a tight line. “What?”
“Aislinn…” She stopped and ran a hand through her blonde hair. “Honey, you need to realize it probably won’t ever happen.”
Even though I knew what she said was true, it didn’t make it any easier to hear. A lump formed in my throat and the back of my nose started to burn as tears fought to make themselves known. “I know,” I croaked. “But it’s not like I can just stop loving him and wanting to be with him.” I sniffed in an effort to keep the tears back. “I miss him, Annie,” I whispered.
She stood up from the dresser and crossed the room, crawling in bed with me, and wrapped her arms around me. “I know you do, sweetie. Believe me, I know what it’s like.”
I rested my head on her shoulder and let the loneliness wash over me. The tears started to fall as memories began to play through my head and I sucked in a shuddering breath. “I really thought he and I were a forever type of thing,” I said with a broken voice. “It felt like it was unbreakable.”
“I understand,” she said gently. “But I think it’s time to start accepting that it isn’t.”
I broke down and sobbed at the knowledge that she was absolutely right. It was time to let go.
***
I walked into my dorm room and closed the door with a sense of relief. I’d just finished my last final for the semester and could finally breathe. I had no illusions I’d come even close to acing any of my exams, but I was fairly confident I’d passed them, at least. I’d take it. It was asking for a lot as it was.
The Russian projects had been turned in by Ryan after coordinating via email to get it done. I hadn’t spoken to him since the night he’d kissed me, and he had finally accepted that I wasn’t going to. I’d eventually conceded enough to communicate via email to turn everything in. The grades for the class had already been posted, and I was pleased to see the two of us had wrangled one of the highest grades in the class. Thank the Lord for small miracles.
I tossed my bag onto my bed and blew out a breath, making my bangs shift. I stretched my arms over my head and felt the tense muscles begin to loosen. It’d been a stressful few days and it was time to relax before beginning the pack-up process for the winter break. I planned to change into something more comfortable and veg out for a bit. I’d be doing it alone as Annie had already left the day before.
The phone rang while I was digging through my dresser drawers for lounging clothes. Sighing, I trudged over and grabbed it out of my bag. I glanced at the number and frowned when I didn’t recognize it. The thought of ignoring it crossed my mind before I shrugged and hit the accept button.
“Hello?” I answered.
“Hello. Is this Aislinn Munroe?” a deep male voice asked.
The mangled pronunciation of my name had me rolling my eyes, but I responded anyway. “Yes, this is she. Who is this?”
“This is Logan Rollins. I work with your mother.”
A sense of foreboding washed over me at his explanation. I took a deep breath in an effort to calm down my suddenly racing heart. My palms started to sweat and I had to tighten my grip on the phone to keep it to my ear. “Okay,” I said in a hesitant voice. “Why are you calling me?” I wasn’t sure I wanted the answer. “Is Mom all right?”
At his silence, panic started to build.
“Hello? Are you there? Is Mom okay?” I cried, frantic.
“Ash, there was an incident at the station. A suspect managed to get loose in the main station and was able to get hold of a letter opener.” He paused, and I fought the urge to yell at him to just answer the damn question. “Your mom came out of her office to see what was going on…Ash, he grabbed her and was using her as a shield.”
“What?” I didn’t understand what he was saying.
“He was trying to get away, and he grabbed your mother to keep from being shot. But when the officers wouldn’t move out of the way, he stabbed her.”
The room started to spin and I sat down heavily on my bed. “Oh my God!”
I could hear him swallow hard before he continued. “He stabbed her several times in the chest and stomach before they were able to take him down. She’s in emergency surgery at Tallahassee Memorial.” He paused for a moment and then continued, confirming my worst fear. “You need to get here as soon as possible, sweetheart. They don’t know if she’s going to make it.” His voice broke on the last two words.
I sat in a daze, listening to him hang up. This couldn’t be real, wasn’t happening. This was a bad dream and I would wake up at any moment. I had to.
But I didn’t.
***
Reality was a bitch. It took me about half a second to come to that conclusion. I also realized that when crap hit the fan, it didn’t do it in half measures. It went the extra distance.
I started to get an inkling of this fact when I tried to frantically get hold of Connor and his phone kept going straight to voicemail. I packed one-handed as I kept hitting the redial on my phone and getting the same result each time. Finally, the only option left was to leave him a voicemail and head out. Time was not on our side.
I raced out to my car and threw my things in, not caring that my purse ended up on the floorboard with everything spilling out. I slammed my door shut and jammed my key into the ignition and turned it to start. My reward was nothing. I tried again and it still didn’t start. All I could do was sit and stare at the instrument panel in shock. This wasn’t happening. Not now, not when I needed to leave!
I tried again and still nothing. Not even a click. The urge to cry was overwhelming.
I leaned over and dug through the mess on the floor of the passenger side until I found my phone. I tried calling Connor again, and still no answer. At that point, the tears couldn’t be held back and started to spill down my cheeks.
“God dammit!” I screamed in frustration.
I took a moment to breathe in. I knew panic and fear weren’t going to get me anywhere. There had to be a solution. But if I let the panic take over one wouldn’t reveal itself to me.
I eyed my phone and decided to look through the contacts to see if anyone could help me. But as I scrolled through, the sinking realization that most of the people had already left for break dawned on me. One name stood out, but I refused to acknowledge it. There was someone other than Teagan I could call. There had to be.
Just as I was about to give in and call the absolute last person I wanted to, a name jumped out at me. While this wasn’t much better, it was preferable to the other option at hand. I pressed the call button before common sense took over and talked me out of it.
“Yeah?” Ryan answered.
I didn’t know what to say to him. I had no clue how to ask this level of a favor. Silence was all that could be mustered at that point.
“Ash? Is that you?”
I nodded before I realized he couldn’t see me. “Yeah,” I whispered.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, alarmed.
“I need your help,” I said as I fought to keep my voice from breaking.
I could hear movement over the phone. “What do you need?”
“My mom…” I swallowed hard but it didn’t stop the lump from strangling my voice. “My mom’s in the hospital in Tallahassee. I can’t get hold of Connor and my car won’t start—”
“I’ll be right there, sweetheart. I’ll take you,” he said and hung up before I could say anything else.
All I could do at that point was wait and cry.