I'm fucking up my entire life.
Miss? Pardon me? Do you have an emergency?
You know what? I think I may have this, sorry to bother you.
That's how it plays out in my head. In real life I sent two words to the message group on all our phones we labelled 911 that is reserved for the all-time worst moments of our life. The words?
Dalton's room
I heard a chair knock over one floor above me. I heard a door fly open and hit a wall and I heard feet on stairs as they came running and I lay there and cried because I'm awful but I did the right thing.
Or rather, I didn't do anything.
If you could only let your guard downDuncan took my refusal of breakfast (or company) as a sign that I wanted to be left alone and made himself scarce, heading back to his room, closing the door probably long enough to dress and then the door opened again and I heard the front door open and close. I heard an engine start and he was gone.
If you could learn to trust me somehow
I swear, that I won't let you go
If you could only let go your doubts
If you could just believe in me now
I swear, that I won't let you go
I sent my text. He would have received it just like everyone else. I'm not sure who is more relieved or more crushed. It's a road you can't turn back from. You can pretend you didn't see what was down that way. You can try but it's never quite the same. Ask PJ. Ask August. Duncan's always going be a weapons-grade threat to me but he's never going to be enemy number one and I'd really prefer to have more friends than enemies at this point, on this point. He would laugh and tell me he'll take that chance and that's exactly what I'm afraid of.
Lochlan's angry regardless. No one's going to blame him.
Stay upstairs. Stay out of people's beds. Jesus, Bridget! Boundaries. This isn't hard. Right and Wrong. It's black and white. It's easy, Peanut. For Christ sake, you've been through so much and you just keep finding more trouble. Just stop. Stop it, Bridgie. Please. You don't have to do this anymore!
I'm staring at him while he shakes me and it's like he's grown taller and blonder. Possessed by the soul of a preacher or maybe it's the other way around and Jake wore Lochlan's soul and maybe they're so much more alike than I ever realized before. Life is so simple to them. Cut and dried. Part and parcel. Black and white and it wasn't until Lochlan said it that I realized he's operating from the same place. Blind and deaf to everything I feel. Unwilling to understand why it's so hard. Why I can't do it. Why I can't just cooperate. Why I can't just stop. Why I can't get over it/knock it off/fall in line/smarten up/straighten out.
It's definitely not the first time I've ever been let down by someone but it's probably the first time I've ever been disappointed by someone and allowed myself to actually feel it. Now I know how he feels every damn day of his life.