“I can’t wait to show you,” he says, and I get lost in his smile.
It’s important to me that Luke know I’m not in his life to change his life, and I don’t want to be the reason he doesn’t go out with his friends and do the things that make him happy. I like him the way he is and I respect his close relationship with his friends. But another part of me is so afraid for him, for all of them; a part of me, as much as I want to be supportive, makes me feel like I don’t know what I’m getting myself into, and more than that, I don’t know if I can truly handle it.
Later I lie curled up next to Luke, listening to the steady sound of his breath as he sleeps, the thrumming of his heartbeat against my cheek, and I don’t recall ever having so many profound thoughts running through my head all at one time. So many decisions that I have to make. So many unavoidable consequences of each and every one of them.
I want to stay here with Luke, but I can’t. I want to prove Seth right about Luke’s persuasive abilities and be stripped of my fear once and for all so I can experience the things they experience no matter how reckless and dangerous, but I won’t. I want to shake Kendra and tell her that she’ll be OK and in order to let Landon go she should talk about him, but I’m afraid. I want to stop spending all my time working and start photographing more, but I’m conflicted. I want to be able to know Landon Everett as closely as Luke and Seth and Kendra because he was so loved by them all and seemed like such an extraordinary person, but I know that’s impossible. But most of all, I want to stop feeling this strange darkness inside of me, this looming sense of fear and worry for Luke, and even Kendra and Seth, because of what they do, but I have a feeling that darkness will never go away.
“Why are you crying?” I hear Luke’s voice in the darkness. I hadn’t realized he was awake.
He rolls over and drapes his arm over my chest, wiping the tears from my cheeks.
“Ummm …” I can’t find the right words.
“Sienna?” He nudges his head closer to me. I can feel his warm breath on the side of my face, exhaling from his nose. “Tell me what’s wrong.”
I sniffle and wipe my tears.
“I uh … well, I was just thinking about your brother.”
“What about him?” he says softly, the pad of his thumb moving deftly across my chin.
Silence fills the space between us. I’m still unsure of what to say.
“I … just can’t get over how he died.” My voice is quiet, distant. “It’s just really sad.”
It was true: I was thinking about Landon, but mostly I was thinking about Luke. Seems there’s something now I fear more than heights or losing my way in the financial world: I’m afraid of losing Luke the same way he lost his brother. I want to tell him—I tried to the morning after we slept together the first time—but something tells me it’s the one thing he doesn’t want to hear. That wounded look on his face, that air of dread and disappointment. I don’t see me being able to hold this in forever. I won’t be able to hold it in for long.
Luke
Sienna is a special girl—my special girl, the one I think I’ve been waiting for all my life. I knew it before. I knew she was the one long before this moment. I knew. With her here, in my arms, I feel peace again that I never thought I’d feel.
But there’s also something there that threatens that peace—Sienna’s worry over my BASE jumping. I can take it from my past girlfriends, but not with Sienna. I need to make her understand how safe I am about it, how OK I’ll be, before she decides she can’t be with me because of it. I need to make her understand. I hope that I can. Sienna is different; I have to believe that she can accept it.
No, I do believe it.
I refuse to believe otherwise.