LILY
I sat down on my porch steps. My heart was in my throat, but I steeled myself. I pulled a dead flower from my potted petunia and waited for him to join me.
There was an intensity on his face as he walked toward me that made a shiver of desire—of unthinking, deep-down want—rumble through me. But I had to be stronger than want. And I had to be stronger than need. Now, more than ever, I had to be sensible and logical. Life changes could not be made on the basis of a few days of wild passion and happiness. Fears could not be conquered by hope alone. We had been inside a fairy tale for the last little while. I loved a fairy tale as much any girl. But every fairy tale came to an end.
He sat next to me on the steps, and I took his hand in mine. I’d felt strong before that moment, but as his palm touched mine, my strength began to falter, and the tears started to trickle down my cheeks. “I can’t do this.”
“Hey, hey, hey.” He wrapped his arm around me. “Don’t give Scotland another thought. I love that you tried, but it really and truly doesn’t matter.”
I shook my head, sniffling and wiping my nose with my palm. “I don’t mean Scotland. I mean you and me. It’ll never work.”
Even through my tears I saw a flash of dismay and anger rumple his features—ferocious and intense. This wasn’t the gallant and calm Gabe I’d seen out in the world; this was the Gabe I’d seen in the bedroom, the version of him that seemed like maybe it was for me alone. “The fuck it won’t, Lily,” he said.
I gripped his hand harder, trying to memorize how it felt so that I never, ever forgot. I looked out at the street, at the way the wheatlike weeds that grew up from the cracks in the pavement bowed in the breeze. “I need to be honest with you. When my passport was denied, I felt so . . .” I turned to look him in the eye. “. . . relieved.” When I said the word, I saw him begin to search my face, like he just couldn’t understand. “I was relieved that I didn’t have to fly. But also that I didn’t have to go with you.”
He growled a little when I said the words, grunting almost. “Have to?”
I focused on my breathing. I had never been one for confrontation or hard conversations. I was all fizzle and no bang. This was a language I didn’t know how to speak, but I blundered ahead. “If I did travel with you, every trip would be pure terror.”
“Then you don’t fucking have to.” His voice was sharp and deep, certain and clear. “That was your choice. I would never have pushed you that far. Don’t give up on me before we’ve even started to try. What about the Ozarks? What about what you wished for at the Willows?”
I didn’t answer right away, and he stared at me with such hope and expectation. But I knew better. It was all so painfully clear to me. Where he saw solutions, I saw only problems and complications. Where he saw yes, I saw no.
Right on cue, his stupid freaking phone began to buzz again. He didn’t look away from me. He didn’t flinch. He was oblivious. But I was at the end of my tether—I felt like I’d managed to keep my cool for a whole movie of someone whispering behind me, but now I just wanted to let out a great big angry “Shhhhhhhhh!” The world would come between us soon enough, but not now, not yet. So I plunged my hand into his pants pocket, grabbed his phone, yanked it out, and pressed the power button so hard that it made my thumb bone ache. Finally, his phone went dark. Silent. Quiet. I thrust his phone across the porch steps at him, angry at what it represented, with its fancy case and its extra battery. And angry at myself too, for ever letting myself get too foolishly attached to a man who I’d known was not here to stay. “Our lives are too different. No matter what, you’d only ever be halfway here.”
I’d stunned him, I could see that. He’d made such an effort to figure out a way for us to make it work, but in my heart I knew it was all a fool’s errand. And I was embarrassed to be the fool in the middle of it. I said, “Even if we did take a stab at it, it would always come down to me. That I couldn’t go with you. Or that maybe I could. Maybe, maybe, maybe. I can’t live in maybe.”
He didn’t say anything at first. He looked so stern, so frustrated, I wasn’t sure that he would. But finally he asked, “How do you know it’s maybe? And how can you possibly assume I’m only going to be halfway here?” He leaned into me, pushing me up against the porch post. “Want me to give it all up for you? The show? The travel? Just say it, Lily. Just say it.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” I snapped. I would not ask him to give up his great big life to come live here with me inside my little one. I would not ask him to leave his flashy Hollywood reality for the world I’d built around myself. “I am not going to let my wagon drag down your star.”
“That’s my decision to make,” he said, looking deep into my eyes. “Maybe I want you to do just that. Ever think of that? Maybe I just want to belong to you.” He hooked my chin with his fingertip to make me look up at him. “Maybe I don’t want any of it except for you.”
It felt to me like he had to be talking about some other woman. I slid the copy of People out of my purse and pressed my hand to his beautiful body on the cover. When he saw it, he flared his nostrils and glared. “Is that what this is about? Some shallow article in a magazine that I’ve never read? I was a bachelor when they shot those photos. But I am not a bachelor anymore.”
I pressed my lips together as a wave of grief stole my words. After a second I was able to say, “This isn’t about being a bachelor. It’s about anywhere and everywhere,” I said, with my voice shaking. A handful of tears splattered onto his image like raindrops on his tanned skin. “You deserve so much more than I could ever give you. You deserve someone who can share the world with you, just like you said,” I told him, finding a little more strength. “I will not let you settle for a woman who is terrified to experience that world with you.”
His face showed a deep and undeniable hurt. “You are not just a woman. I am not settling.” He slipped his hand behind my head and drew me into him so we were nearly cheek to cheek. I let the magazine slide off my lap and wrapped my arms around him. I inhaled hard so I wouldn’t forget his scent, and I tried to memorize the way his stubble felt against my cheek. “You deserve to be loved senseless, Lily. And I want to be the man to give you that. I never knew what I wanted. And then I met you.”
No matter what he said, I felt as though I’d gotten X-ray vision into the future; I could never make him happy enough to stay here with me, and I had to stop him from trying. And I knew too that his life would drive me out of my mind with worry and longing. I imagined endless nights refreshing my browser, willing his plane across oceans and continents. I imagined the dread at waiting to hear where he was headed next. I imagined secretly hoping that his show would become less popular instead of more so, just so I could keep him closer. That was no way to live and certainly no way to love. “Thank you for everything,” I whispered as I reached up for the locket to find the clasp.
He pulled away with that fire in his eyes. “Enough,” he growled, engulfing my hand with his to stop me from taking off the necklace. “I will not let you push me away because you have some bullshit notion of what’s best for me. What’s best for me, Lily, is you. And you cannot argue with me on that.”
I wanted so badly to believe him. But I couldn’t. I just couldn’t. If it didn’t end now, it would end eventually. Our lives and our worlds were just too far apart. “I can’t do this, Gabe,” I whispered. “I need you to go.”
Now his eyes glinted with tears too, and he shook his head. “When we were driving back, you know what I was thinking about? I wasn’t thinking about flying or trips or jobs or any of the seemingly immovable bullshit of life.” He gripped my left hand in his right one, squeezing tight. “I was wondering about your ring size.”
The dam began to break, and I let my tears tumble down my cheeks onto his shoulder as I shook my head. “Please stop.”
“You stop. I love you. I want to marry you. I want to make a life with you. Fuck fear. Fuck the unknown. I have never felt anything like what I feel for you.”
Every word he said hit me in the chest like a tiny poisoned dart, and I stifled a sob against his shoulder, holding on to him so tight that it made my muscles ache. I adored him. I adored his spirit and laughter, the way he looked at me and the way he made me feel. I adored his unchecked love and his unstoppable passion. But that didn’t change a thing. It didn’t change that we had been swept up in a handful of days of pure madness. How we felt didn’t change who we were or where we came from. “Give me my key back, please,” I said in barely a whisper.
Gabe drew away from me, looking hurt and stunned. He shook his head slowly, and the muscles in his jaw fluttered. His eyes never left mine. “Fuck no. I will not let you take away my home.”
My heart sank even farther, like an anchor cut from its line. I looked away, focusing on the fuzzy petunia petals. And at the dried, lifeless buds that littered the soil in the pot.
“You’ve made this world for yourself,” Gabe went on. “Maybe because you feel like you can’t leave, you’ve made a little paradise around you. And my paradise is you. So don’t fucking push me away.”
I was a lot of things, but I could not believe that I was anybody’s paradise. Let alone his.
I couldn’t stand this anymore. It hurt too, too much. I stood up, wiping my nose on the back of my hand. I shoved my key into the lock and turned my back on him. But as I began to step through the door, he put his hand on my shoulder and spun me around, pressing me up against the hard edges of my mailbox.
This kiss was different than all the others because of our tears. He kissed me like we were just starting all over again. But I kissed him to say goodbye. I knew then that I would never love another man the way I loved him. He was my be-all and end-all. Never again would I get a chance to feel what I felt right then in his arms. I wanted to swim in those warm waters forever. But it was time to go back to shore.
When I pulled away from the kiss, he caged me in against my front door. He looked frustrated now, and when he spoke, he sounded stronger and more aggressive than ever before. “There’s a big difference between playing it safe and playing it scared, Lily,” he said. “I will do anything to keep you safe. But it’s up to you to stop living in fear. And I don’t mean just the fucking planes. I mean everything. It is up to you to think bigger and to realize that you deserve more.”
I reached up and placed my fingertips to his damp cheek, admiring those beautiful eyes of his for what I knew would be the very last time. “You have this bravery about you, like anything is possible,” I said, with my chin trembling. “But I don’t have that, Gabe. I’m not brave like you and I never will be.”
His eyes sparkled with new tears. As he wiped them away, I looked up at him one last time. He was all the things I never knew I’d wanted. And all the things I would never have. “I am in the palm of your hand, Lily. You turn your back on me and you’ll fucking crush me.”
I clapped my hand to my mouth to stifle my sob. And then I did it. I turned away and pulled the door shut behind me. Trudging upstairs, I knew he was still standing on the porch from the way his shadow darkened the steps in front of me.
“Lily,” he said, his voice muffled by the door but still strong and clear. “Look at me.”
I froze with both feet on the third step. I closed my eyes, willing him to walk away.
“Goddamn it,” he growled and smacked the door. “Lily. Look at me.”
I took a deep breath and looked back over my shoulder. I could see the hurt and the agony he was feeling. And I felt it too. I was responsible for all of it, which made it so much more painful. He held my stare for a second, blinking back tears before finally saying, “If I had a gratitude jar, the only thing in it would be your name.”
Everything in me told me to go back to him—to take a step into that vast and magical unknown. But I didn’t have the courage. I didn’t have the guts. And so once again I turned away and made my way slowly up the stairs with a self-inflicted broken heart, back to my small, safe, and lonely little life.