Chapter 23
Quinn
I looked around the empty apartment with a mixture of despair and disbelief. The night before I had cried myself to sleep after Jonah had left but I promised myself that the one moment of weakness was all I would allow myself. Then, I'd pick myself up, dust myself off, and figure out whatever the hell I needed to do to fix things between Jonah and Leo.
What about between Jonah and me? I thought desperately. I hadn’t spoken to him since he’d walked out the night before. I’d heard him stumble in sometime in the middle of the night but I hadn’t been up to talking to him again. I knew it would just turn into another argument and I could admit, to myself at least, that one argument with my brother in a day was enough for me.
But I hadn't seen him this morning either when I'd poured myself a cup of coffee before sneaking out to my car. My body had known where I was going before my brain did, but before long I knew where I needed to be. I needed to be with Leo.
Now, here I stood, shock filling me as I took in the sight of the empty apartment. Sometime between last night and this morning, Leo had packed up his possessions, the few that he had anyway, and he’d left.
I looked down at the bare wooden floor, surprised to find that there weren’t the shattered pieces of my heart littered around my feet. It hurt to draw in a breath but I forced the air in and out of my lungs, trying desperately to make sense of what I was looking at but my thoughts were slow and sluggish.
Everything felt numb as I turned and trudged back down the stairs, my mind still raging in chaos and my chest sore like I’d been stabbed and hadn’t healed all the way, the pain sharp and insistent.
My gaze found Stella standing behind the bar, like always. She wouldn't meet my eyes, keeping hers trained on the spot she'd been cleaning off the bar for the last few minutes but it didn't stop me from stumbling forward.
“St...Stella,” I had to stop and clear my throat before I could go on, “Um, Leo? His apartment is empty. Did something happen? Is he...did he leave?”
She cast me a sympathetic look before answering with a deep, heartfelt sigh, “He cleared out last night. He’s alright, he just left in a hurry that’s all.”
"Did he leave an address? A different phone number maybe?" My breath hitching as I forced the words out. My whole body felt cold like ice had just settled in my veins, "Any other way I could reach him? It's...It's important. I really need to talk to him."
“Sorry, honey,” Stella said, and she really was. I could see it in her eyes, “He didn’t leave anything like that with me. You know how he is.”
“Yeah. Okay. Thanks anyway.”
I turned to walk away but Stella hollered after me, her words making me pause.
“Maybe it’s for the best, you know?”
But all I could do was shake my head. “I don’t think so. I don’t think it is.” I kept walking, forcing my spine to stay straight when all I wanted to do was collapse on the floor in a heap of tears and anger but I made it to the women’s bathroom, pushing open the door and let out a sigh of relief to find that no one else was in there.
I pulled out my cell phone, dialing his number like I had eight times already before and for the ninth time, it rang a few times before going to voicemail. It wasn’t even his voice, just an automated, emotionless robot voice telling me to leave a message after the beep.
I hung up without leaving one. I'd already left several, at first calm, and then pleading. Growing angry, and then back to pleading again. The worst was the not knowing. It ate at me, gnawing at my insides like a sickness, making my stomach tighten with nausea and for the second time in as many days I found myself rushing to the nearest toilet.
It wasn’t until several moments later that I was able to pull myself back to my feet and out of the stall, stumbling towards the row of sinks. I washed my hands, doing my best to rinse my mouth out with the water from the tap.
I met my own tired gaze in the mirror hanging on the wall, takin in the bags under my eyes and the dark smudges like bruises from my sleepless night. I looked haggard and heartbroken.
Because I am, I thought to myself. For the first time in my entire life, I was truly heartbroken. And the fact that Leo had just packed up and left, not a word to me about where he was going or why. You know why.
I met my gaze in the mirror again, swallowing the sense of guilt. I did know. I knew how this would end. I knew that Jonah would eventually find out and do whatever he could to split us up. I just didn’t think he’d be successful.
It occurred to me then, that I'd been asking the wrong person for answers. Whatever had happened here, I could guarantee my brother had been involved. But I couldn't get a hold of him either. It left me with a sense of listlessness. Like I was all alone, adrift at sea with no one and nothing to anchor me, and no land in sight.
I would just have to make it back to shore on my own.
***
Leo
I felt my phone vibrate in my pocket and even though I told myself I shouldn’t, that it was a mistake, I still couldn’t help but pull it out and glance at the screen. Sunshine. That’s what came up on the caller ID, and the sight of it stabbed me like a knife to the chest.
It wasn’t the first-time Quinn had tried to call me since I’d packed my things and left the town of Coral Springs in my taillights and it wasn’t the first time I’d been tempted to answer, tempted to tell her the truth about everything, explain that he’d had no choice but to leave. Jonah hadn’t left me one.
My thumb hovered over the green button to answer the call. I was seconds away from answering but then I remembered Jonah’s threat. I could remember the look on his face as he told me to leave, told me he’d do whatever it took to destroy Quinn’s dream if I didn’t.
Jonah had meant every single word he’d said, and every terrible consonant and vowel that had come out of his mouth had destroyed me just the same.
It felt like I was sawing off my own arm and throwing it away but it didn’t stop me from crushing the phone in my hand before throwing it in the nearest garbage can. I forced my feet to keep walking back out to the gas station parking lot where I’d parked my truck.
Everything that I owned in the world was backed hastily in the passenger seat, but it still felt like I’d left the most important thing back there in Coral Springs. There was a Quinn shaped hole in my life now, and I was terrified there always would be.
I glanced at the horizon. The sun was starting to rise well above the tree line and the air was warm and balmy with a hint of summer on its breath. The open road stretched out wide and inviting in front of me.
Normally, I would be filled with a fierce excitement at the prospect of going someplace new, finding a sweet woman to fill my bed, or three, and forgetting that the past ever existed. But it all rang hollow now.
With a stale taste in my mouth, I forced my numb fingers to open the door of the truck and slid inside but I sat there for a long time before I started the ignition. My thoughts filled with her. Laughing clover green eyes, blond hair like sunshine, full of passion for life and love, and the biggest heart of anyone I’d ever met. Leaving her behind felt like I was peeling off my skin with every mile of distance I put between us.
I glanced at the garbage can. It’s better this way. Make it a clean break.
Better for who? For you, or for Quinn?
I tried to shake off the insidious whisper but they stuck there in my mind like a tick I couldn’t pry loose. It was the only way. Because I knew if I reached out to Quinn, if I heard her sweet voice, heard the pain that I’d caused her, I knew there was nothing on this earth that would stop me from going back to her if she asked. And I knew I couldn’t do that. For her, I had to keep moving on. For her.