What we fear losing most, we almost always wind up losing because of that fear.
That was something I’d learned over the past month from talking to someone about my issues stemming from my dad’s departure. Those same issues I’d spent years convincing myself I’d tucked away so they didn’t affect me, were the same ones that had been steering my life’s ship for years. I’d tried so hard to put him behind me, and in so doing, I’d only given him that much more power in my present.
Of course I’d realized that a month too late to do any good for my relationship with Soren, but as my counselor reminded me, if I hadn’t lost something so big, I might never have realized I had a problem that needed to be addressed.
That was what was on my mind as I climbed out of the subway tunnel near the apartment. It was a hot, muggy day, a stark contrast to the first day I’d arrived.
My fear of being abandoned had driven him away before he could leave of his own choice. The better-to-leave-than-be-left mentality of people who struggled with the issues I did. It had cost me dearly, and I never wanted to pay the same price again. I wanted to fix myself as much as I could. That was why I talked with someone twice a week and currently had an impressive, virtual stack of self-improvement books on my e-reader. I’d made it through most of them already too.
I wasn’t foolish enough to think that spilling my guts to a therapist or devouring self-help books would cure me of my demons, but they’d opened a window to healing myself. It was up to me to keep clearing the dead spaces to make room for new life.
As I climbed the steps to the sixth floor, I found myself taking each one slowly, almost savoring them. This would be the last time I’d ever climb these endless, decrepit things. Funny how the things we thought we despised could become nostalgic through the scope of new eyes.
I hadn’t been back to the apartment since the night I’d left it in such a hurry a month ago. I’d been in France the whole time. He hadn’t tried to call or make any kind of contact. Why would he? I’d pushed him away, and he’d stayed where I’d driven him. Away.
He must have been in Miami by now. I didn’t know for sure, and another wave of nostalgia overcame me when I reached the top floor and accepted that the person I’d cared so deeply for had a life I had no claim in anymore. I didn’t have the right to know where he was or what he was up to or how he was doing.
That was exactly why relationships were so damn hard. One minute, a person could be your everything, and the next, they were gone.
As I turned the key in the lock, I found myself glancing down the hall toward Mrs. Lopez’s apartment. I wondered, now that we were both gone, if anyone gave her a hand. I hoped so. From the way her door looked freshly painted, I guessed someone had stepped into the empty space Soren had left.
Steeling myself before entering, I reminded myself I could do this, then I moved inside the apartment. I was surprised to find myself feeling relief instead of the opposite as I breathed in the familiar scents and took in the familiar sights. It was the sensation of coming home.
To say good-bye.
I’d brought a few boxes to pack up my belongings—the old duffel I’d arrived with could hold the rest. I’d put this off until the last possible day. Tomorrow was the last one of our lease.
When I glanced into the kitchen, I was surprised to find some dishes and cups still scattered around the counter. I saw the same thing when I came into the main space. All of Soren’s things were still there—at least most of them.
The ache in my chest that manifested from seeing an old pair of his sneakers against the wall sent me back a few steps. My eyes traveled to his favorite pillow he used to share with me—or swing at me, depending on the mood we were in—still resting on the mattress.
He’d left it all behind. He didn’t want any of it.
Accepting what he’d left made me wonder what I was doing there. What was I there for? I’d left nothing of value to be packed. Clothes, secondhand dishes, a mismatched assortment of décor.
Memories.
Those were here too. In everything I looked at. Each and every item had some memory attached to it, and there was its value. That was what I was packing to take with me.
The memories. They were all I had left of Soren Decker. They were more than I was entitled to.
The first box had just been folded and taped when the sound of the lock turning over in the door made me still. It was probably the furtive landlord come a day early to check on the place, but when I heard the first few steps move inside, I knew who it was. I’d memorized the way he moved before I’d accepted that I’d fallen for him.
He moved into the room, distracted by the mail he was sorting through. He didn’t notice me until he was passing by the table. He stopped abruptly, his whole body stiffening. When his head turned, his hands curled around the mail.
“What are you doing here?”
Those were the first words he’d said to me in thirty days. Not hello. Not good-bye. Not how are you doing.
What are you doing here?
It made me ask myself the same question. What am I doing here?
Trying to act like the pain of seeing him wasn’t about to murder me, I got back to pretending to arrange items in the next box I had sitting on the table. “Packing. I’m sorry. If I’d known you’d be coming back today to pack too, we could have worked out different times so we didn’t have to . . .” I swallowed. “You know. Do this.”
“I’m not here to pack.” Soren’s voice was guarded as he stayed where he was, a distance away from me.
“Then why are you here?”
“Because I needed a shower.”
When he motioned at himself, I noticed the state he was in. Dirty, sweaty, disheveled—like he used to come home from practice. Instead of the red-and-white one I was used to seeing him in, he was wearing a black-and-white uniform today. The gear bag had changed too. A different number was embroidered below his name.
He must have caught me staring because he patted the new number before dropping the bag on the floor. “I got drafted.”
“To which team?”
“You already know which team, right? That’s what you shouted at me over the phone last month, at least.” His eyes refused to come my way, his body seeming of the same mind. I noticed him backing into the wall behind him.
“I owe you an apology for that call.”
“You owe me an apology for a hell of a lot more than just that call.” As soon as it was out, he grimaced, grinding his jaw.
“So the team in Miami?” I stayed focused on packing so I didn’t fixate on the pain surging inside me.
“Good luck to them. They’re going to need it when playing against me.”
My head lifted.
His shoulders moved. “The Miami team was hoping to sign me. Hoping. If I made it to number three in the draft.” That was when his eyes finally met mine. They didn’t stay there long. “I went number two.”
“Number two?” I repeated, struggling to make sense of what he was saying.
“Some leftie pitcher got the number one pick.” Soren huffed. “Too bad for him, because Texas sucks in the summer.”
My hands were still wrapped around the vase I’d been setting in the box. “You aren’t leaving?”
He scooted his hat farther down when I caught his forehead creasing as he watched me pack. “I’m not leaving.”
He wasn’t lying or messing with me. I could tell by his face. I’d been able to tell from the very beginning, actually. Soren was the open book—I was the sealed shut kind.
“But . . .” That was all I could come up with. I had nothing else.
“You have no idea how the draft works, do you?”
“You get drafted?” I said, still reeling. I might have known a bit more from what I’d learned from Soren, but not much.
“I explained it all to you.” He shoved off the wall and wandered into the kitchen. “That one night after . . .”
Thankfully he was in the kitchen, so he didn’t see the heat rush into my face from what he was getting at. Having the mattress right in front of me made it that much easier to picture.
“I might have fallen asleep,” I said. “Like I tended to do after . . . that.”
He snorted. “Probably not the best time to go into a drawn-out explanation of the complicated draft process.”
My feet shifted. “So you have no say at all?”
“In team? Not really.” His voice echoed from the kitchen. “But I do when it comes to saying yes or no, and I meant what I said when I told you it was a conversation we’d have together if I got drafted by a team way the hell away from here.”
When he emerged from the kitchen, he had a couple bottles of water and a fresh package of his favorite food. I’d never been able to pass a display of Nutter Butters in a grocery store and not think about him.
“Of course we break up and I get drafted by a local franchise.” He ripped open the end of the bag after setting the waters on the table. “God, I hate irony.”
Letting go of the vase, my hands curled around the edge of the box. He wasn’t moving to Miami? A local team had picked him up?
Everything I’d feared happening hadn’t happened at all.
I’d lost him, but for all the wrong reasons.
I shook my head as I got back to packing, pretending my life wasn’t falling apart all over again.
“You got picked second?” I asked in an attempt to carry on a casual conversation as I finished what I needed to get done.
“Pretty great, right?” His chin lifted as he pulled a handful of cookies from the package.
I gently placed my favorite coffee cup into the box. “Actually, I can’t believe you didn’t get picked first.”
He was quiet for a moment, watching me. “See? That’s what I love—loved—about you.” He cleared his throat and took a drink of water. “Always thinking I was better than anyone else did. Even myself.”
“That’s because you are. You are better than anyone else.” My hand gestured at him, but I was having a difficult time looking at him. It was hard to look at what I’d lost—especially when it was three feet away. “I’m sorry for what I said—the way things went down. I should have given you a chance to explain instead of ruining this—us.” A sigh sneaked out as I focused on packing one item at a time. “The best thing I had going for me in my life.”
“Also had that international supermodel standing, too.” Instead of stuffing his mouth with that handful of cookies, he set them on the table. It was the first time I’d seen him too distracted to devour a fistful of his beloved cookies.
“What we had? So much better.”
“Dream lost its shine now that you’ve achieved it?”
My head shook. “No, I still love what I do. I just loved us, you, that much more.”
He was staring at me, standing so close. My body felt like one aching bruise from having him so close yet accepting he was totally out of reach. I needed to finish packing and get out of here before I said or did something truly pathetic that would end whatever dignity I still had, and put him in the uncomfortable position of letting me down gently. Or not so gently, as I supposed he’d earned a right to.
“Are you not packing up your stuff?” I asked, indicating the two other boxes I’d brought along but wouldn’t need. “Isn’t this the last day we have on the lease?”
Soren slid into one of the mismatched chairs circling the table. Not his old favorite, I noticed. Instead, he’d picked the one that used to be mine. “It was. Until I renewed it for the next year.”
“You renewed the lease? On this place?” I thought he was joking until I saw his face. He wasn’t. “Why?”
He rolled his neck, staying quiet for a moment. Then his eyes wandered the apartment. “Because of the memories. Because it’s where I met you. Where I fell in love with you.” His brows squeezed together like he was reliving something painful. The emotion ran its course quickly. “Where we did something I didn’t think physically possible against that very wall.” Now he was smiling at the wall opposite us, his brow rising at me. “How could I just let someone else move in here with the history I have with that patch of wall?”
That wall. This table. This whole apartment. It was all connected to some moment, some memory. Some piece of us. “Soren—”
“Plus, I’m going to be making crap for the next two to three years minimum,” he continued. “So at least I know I can afford this place.”
“You just said you were the second pick.”
He blinked twice at me. “You really didn’t hear a word I said that night, did you?”
I gave him a sheepish look as I scanned the memory bank. Other than knowing there was a draft and that draft applied to him, that was the extent of my knowledge. “Would it make you feel better if I said, the better the sex, the harder I go out?”
“A little,” he grumbled, twisting the cap off the second bottle of water and sliding it across the table toward me. “So yeah, I’ll be making dick working my ass off for a minor league team for a couple of seasons minimum, but thankfully, my signing bonus will keep me well stocked in Nutter Butters and Pop-Tarts.” He patted his adored cookie package.
“So you got a signing bonus at least?”
“Seemed the least they could do for paying me fifteen hundred bucks a month for the next couple of years in this city.” He was smiling as he said it because I knew Soren wouldn’t care if they paid him in peanuts—he loved the game. He would have played for free.
“How much?” I asked before catching myself. “I don’t know—is that not a question a person should ask someone?”
“You’re not a person asking. You’re you asking.” Soren adjusted his black hat back on his forehead, still fussing with it like he couldn’t find just the right spot for it. I guessed it would take a while before this one was as broken in as his old red one. “Three and a half million dollars.”
My eyes went wide. “Three and a half million dollars? And you chose to live in this dump for a whole other year?” My nose creased as I scanned the small, outdated apartment.
“Where else would I go?” He paused just long enough, it was almost like he was giving me a chance to reply. “What about you? Have you moved into that flat in Paris yet?”
“Actually, no. I sold it. I decided after my contract ends with this client, I’m going to stay Stateside for a while.”
He was quiet, watching me pack. When I glanced up, I wasn’t expecting to find the expression on his face I did. He looked upset—tormented.
“Fuck irony,” he said, smacking his hands on the table hard enough it made it shake. “You and I both wind up back in goddamned New York in the end, and we’re no longer together to make it count.”
My eyes stung, but I forced a smile. “Yeah”—I nodded once—“fuck irony.”
Soren forced his own smile, lifting the package of cookies toward me. “Want a Nutter Butter? I’ve attempted a lot of self-soothing with these over the past month.”
“This calls for two.” I wrestled a couple from the package and took a bite out of one right after the other. Somehow, they’d become my favorites too. “I’m with a different agent now. I’m not working with Ellis anymore.” I finished my bite and packed the last couple of things away. “You were right about him. So right.” I took the roll of tape he was holding out for me.
“Good,” he said, watching me tape the box shut as his forehead creased again. “At least that’s one less thing I’ll have to worry about when I think about you.”
Unsure what to say next, I moved around the box to lift it. I’d come here planning on packing up so much more, but I couldn’t stay another minute longer. They rest would have to stay here, with him, because I couldn’t.
As I started toward the door, choking on the good-bye trying to rise, I heard him shove out of his chair. The sound of his footsteps followed me.
“Hey, Hayden?” His voice. This was the one I remembered. This was the one I heard in my dreams. “Before you go”—he paused for a fraction of a second—“I still love you.”
My heart. It couldn’t take any more. It wouldn’t survive this. Glancing over my shoulder, I knew how to say good-bye now.
“I still love you too.” Taking one final look at him, I finished the last few steps to the door.
“Then what are we doing?” His voice chased me, the sound of his feet doing the same. “Why are you moving out? Why are you walking away?”
The doorknob. It was within reach. Just open the door and leave.
My hand fastened to the doorknob, but I couldn’t twist it open. “I don’t know.”
Suddenly, he was there, right behind me, his hand dropping over mine on the door. “I don’t want you to go.”
His touch was my undoing. It had been before, and it proved it still was just now. Squeezing my eyes shut, I whispered, “I don’t want to hurt you again.”
His fingers forced their way between mine, removing my hand from the doorknob. “I’ll take my chances.” His fingers knotted through mine, our palms pressing together. “I’m not going to leave you. I’m not him.” He lifted our combined hands in front of me. “If this isn’t proof, I don’t know what is.”
“I know you aren’t him. I always knew that.” Warmth spread up my arm, nestling deep into the rest of my body. “My fear was bigger than my faith.”
Holding my stare, he took the box out of my arms and set it down against the wall. His hands found mine, one at a time, and pulled me to him at the same time he brought himself to me. When our lips connected, I felt all of the fear I carried melt away. In its place, courage swept in.
My head barely had a chance to haze from the kiss before he broke it, moving toward the door with me. “We need a redo. Let’s take this from the top. From the start.” He threw the door open, a grin on his face as he guided me just outside of the door.
“Take what from the start?” I asked, letting him place me where he wanted me.
“Just knock on the door like you’re showing up on that first day again.” He waved at the door, still hanging on to one of my hands.
“I didn’t knock on the door. You found me standing around its general area after you emerged from Mrs. Lopez’s apartment with your fly down.” I motioned down the hall. I guessed I had my answer as to who had applied that fresh coat of paint.
His eyes lifted as he stepped back inside. “Just play along. You’re ruining my whole vision of this.”
When he closed the door, though not entirely, I decided to go along with his crazy scheme. Rapping on the door, I waited a whole half second before it flew open.
“I heard you were looking for a roommate with benefits.” Flashing a grin, I stuck my thumb into my chest. “I’ve come to apply for the position.”
He fought a smile as he reached for my hand. His eyes were lighter than they’d been when he’d first entered the apartment. “Hayden Agatha Hayes,” he said all solemn-like, his gaze intense, “will you be my roommate?”
My mouth twitched as I gave him a funny look. “Um, yeah?”
He leaned in to whisper, “You’re supposed to say ‘I do.’ Or, ‘I will’—whatever feels truest to who you are. Let’s try it again.”
Leaning back, he cleared his throat, flashing a wink when I shook my head. Crazy. I loved him for it too. Every last crazy, insane, irrational fiber of his being.
“Hayden Agatha Hayes”—his hand squeezed mine—“will you be my roommate?”
Standing up straight, I gave my answer just as formally as he’d voiced his question. “I will.” We stood like that for a moment longer before I glanced over his shoulder. “Can I come in already and get unpacked while you explain what this was all about?”
He slid aside to let me pass, flagging me inside. “Just practicing.”
“For what?”
He had the door closed the instant I cleared it. “When it comes time to ask you another question.”
My feet froze to the hallway floor. “Soren. I’m nineteen. I’m not becoming a teenage bride.” When I glanced back so he knew how serious I was, the grin on his face wiped the serious right off of me.
“Always ruining the romantic mood I’m trying to set.”
My finger lifted in a stern way, since I couldn’t hold my serious face. “I will not say yes until I’m in my twenties. You can ask all you want, but you’re not hearing a yes until I’ve officially reached that milestone.”
As he locked the door, his brows moved. “So I’m getting a yes?”
When I realized what I’d just given away, I groaned. “Soren . . .”
Both of us smiled. How many times had I sighed his name in that exasperated tone? Those were memories too. Good ones. Some of the best. As he took my hand and led me by the boxes, I realized we didn’t have to pack any of them and carry them away. They could all stay here—with us.
“Just come here for a minute. I want to reenact something over here, too.” Turning into me, his body pressed into mine, backing me up into . . . “Right here against this wall.”
My hands tied behind his back as he lifted me into his arms. “What is it with you and this wall?”
“It’s not the wall. It’s what I’m holding between me and it.” His arms secured around me tighter, feeling capable of carrying me through whatever challenges would come.
“Me?” Other than air, there was nothing between him and this wall he was so fond of. “The person who did everything you warned me not to and made a huge mess? The person who destroyed the great thing we had because I stumbled on a few pieces of paper and assumed I knew what they meant? The girl who let her fear of losing you be the very reason she did?” I had to take a breath. “Is that who you’re referring to?”
“You.” His lips touched mine. “Also known as my whole entire world.”
I gave him the most convincing look of apology I could, tying my legs around him tighter. I wasn’t letting go. Not for anything. “I’m sorry your whole entire world is such a hot mess.”
He chuckle rumbled in his chest. “If the person you love doesn’t want to make you breathe fire and pull your hair out every once in a while, she’s not the right one.”
My eyebrows knitted together. “And what’s your logic behind that?”
“Because I want her to love me so damn much, she wants to roast my corpse over a spit for lying to her—for even thinking I’m lying to her,” he added, catching the protest rising from my lips. “I want her to care about me—care about us—so much it drives her up a fucking wall.”
“Roast corpse. Up a fucking wall,” I counted off, debating a moment before giving a nod. “Accurate assessment.”
Soren pressed closer, like he was trying to leave his imprint on me. But he already had. Months ago. On the first day I moved in and knew all of my dreams were about to come true.
“Good,” he whispered against me, “because I feel the same damn way about her.”