“Calm down for me.”
“I can’t. I can’t. I’m trying, but I can’t. Nobody believes me. I’m so alone. So afraid.”
Our eyes hold and meet. He’s so beautiful.
“Your family is only trying to take care of you. Imagine how this looks for them?”
“They think I’m crazy!” I cry.
“You’re not giving them any other choice.”
“No, you’re not giving me any other choice,” I cry, shoving at his chest. “Why would you do that to me? Why would you just keep coming back? If you don’t want me in your life, then you shouldn’t keep showing up and making things so much worse.”
His eyes flash with regret. “I’ve told you that you shouldn’t be looking for me.”
I cry harder, my body shaking. “Then stop showing up and making this even more confusing.”
“I have to keep an eye on you because I don’t want you to get hurt.”
“Why would I get hurt?” I yell, pulling back and looking up at him.
He studies my face. “Because I know you keep asking about me and continue to mention me. You have to stop doing that.”
“If you’d let me contact you, I wouldn’t have to.”
“I can’t exist in your world or any world right now. Don’t you understand that? I can’t confirm who I am to your family or anyone else.”
“Why?” I yell, exasperated.
“Just trust that it’s how it has to be. Stop mentioning me, Lucy. Stop looking for me. I know about the email to the stadium.”
I flinch. “I was just trying to find out if you were real.”
“Give me your hand.”
He takes my hand and pulls it against his heart. “Do you feel that? It’s a beating heart. You’re not crazy. I’m real. I’ve been here, watching you, doing my best to come into your life when I can, but you’re making it difficult. You need to start trying to fix yourself, and maybe, one day, I can introduce myself for real—but that time isn’t now.”
“I don’t want to fix myself. I don’t want any of it anymore.”
“You have to try, Lucy girl.”
“I can’t,” I stammer and my face grows red with embarrassment.
He looks up, his eye catching something in the distance. “I have to go.”
“No,” I cry, clutching him desperately. “Please don’t go again. I can’t live with it. It’s confusing me.”
“I have to,” he says, prying my fingers from his shirt.
I cry harder. So hard my body shakes.
“Jesus, I’m sorry, honey,” he murmurs, leaning forward and kissing my forehead. “But I have no choice—I hate this as much as you do.”
Something sharp stabs into my neck, and my entire body goes woozy.
“Please, just trust me. This is for the best.”
My mind spins and I’m not cold anymore.
“Don’t leave me again, moment.”
“Moment?” he whispers, at least, I think he does.
“A fleeting moment. You go as fast as you came. Just a moment I can’t hang on to. Please let me hang on.”
Warm lips graze my forehead and then my world goes dark.
***
I wake alone in my car that’s still parked at the baseball stadium.
It’s daylight.
I blink and sit up, staring down at my clothes. I’m wearing a shirt I don’t recognize, but my pants are the same. I clutch the fabric in my fingers and bring it to my nose, inhaling. Heath. It’s his. It wasn’t a dream. Tears pool in my eyes and I reach up, rubbing my neck. Did he drug me? Did he change my clothing and put me in his shirt? I don’t understand. Why would he do that?
I peer around. The parking lot is still empty. It’s as if nothing ever happened, but his shirt is proof that something did. I rub my face, trying to remember what he said to me but I was a mess and it’s hazy. All I know is that he was here. He keeps telling me to stop looking for him, yet he keeps popping up. How the hell am I supposed to make sense of that?
I turn the key, starting my car, then I glance at my phone, still sitting on the passenger seat. I pick it up, and see it’s on. I narrow my eyes and bring it closer. I turned it off; I know I did. I unlock the screen and my memo app is open. Words confront me and my heart pounds as I read them.
I am as good as a moment, Lucy Girl.
You need to let me go.
One day, we might meet again.
That time isn’t now.
I swallow the lump forming in my throat and hit save.
I no longer have the strength or the will to walk away from him.
I put the car in drive and head home. I know what I have to do; I know what’s fair. Gerard deserves better, and the person I am now is not the person he married. It’s not fair to keep putting him through this.
The very thought of what I’m about to do hurts. It puts an ache in my heart that I never wanted to feel. Once, I thought I could never love anyone the way I loved him. I truly believed that would never change.
But it has.