“Take a sip, baby,” I nudge him, but he’s frozen in time, silent tears running down his face with no end in sight. Eventually, I take the glass from his hands and place it on the counter.
“I think I should go home,” Kayden says quietly. “I think…” He eyes me with uncertainty. “Yeah, I think I’m gonna go home.”
“Please stay.” I reach for him, but he takes a step back.
“I can’t. I need to think, and I can’t think when you’re around.” I knowwhat he means. It’s hard for me to think when he’s around, too, but I’m afraid that if he leaves right now, he’ll change his mind about us. That Sal’s words will dig their way into his heart and that they’ll settle there, and that he’ll believe them. This isn’t about me, though; it’s about Kayden.
So I nod, a tug of war going on inside me. “Call me later?”
“Okay.” He offers me a small smile, but it doesn’t reach his eyes.
“You need a ride?”
He shakes his head. “No, I’ll walk.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah.” He bends to pick up his fanny pack, and I’m seconds away from dropping to my knees, clinging to him, and begging him to stay, but I don’t.
I walk him to the door and watch as he leaves, down the driveway, and turns to the right in the direction of town. He looks so small and frail, defeated almost. I fight the urge to run after him while my heart slowly shatters into a million pieces. As I watch him disappear out of sight, it feels like the end of something. It feels like the end of us.
It’s almost ten at night when the text comes in. My living room lies in darkness, my world so quiet without him. My phone vibrates, the sound cutting through the silence like a knife. I reach for my phone on the coffee table, pulling up the new message.
K:I’m sorry
K:I can’t do this
K:I can’t come between you and Dad
I stare at his words, but I don’t think my mind quite registers what they mean. I read them again and again, then decide to call him, when another message comes in.
K:Please don’t call me
K:Please
I stare at the ‘please’ while I wait for something more from him, but after a while, I realize this is it. One month and it’s over. In a matter of hours, I’ve lost everything I care about.
Chapter Twenty-One
Kayden
Something warm and soft wraps around me from behind, squeezing me tight. I sigh into the embrace.Caleb.I don’t know how he found me, but he has. He’s come for me. I’m torn between keeping my eyes closed, shutting the world out, and turning around, throwing myself at him.
“Hey, sleepyhead,” Emily whispers against my neck, and my heart breaks all over again. “I made coffee. And French toast. Cardamom instead of cinnamon. Just the way you like them.”
I bury my face in the pillow. I don’t want to wake up to a world without Caleb in it, to a life he isn’t a part of. My eyes sting. I thought I was all cried out, but the tears come all on their own anyway.
“Hey,” Emily coos, caressing my cheek. “Don’t cry. If you don’t want French toast, I’ll make you something else instead.” I know what she’s trying to do, but I can’t even summon the strength to throw something back at her. I love French toast a la Emily. It was our go-to student-budget comfort food when we both went to school. It was what I used to make for her when she was all heartbroken over some guy whose name she probably doesn’t even remember now. It was what she made for me when I hated myself, my body, my life. My stomach rebels at the thought of eating, though.
“You want a shower first?” I shake my head. I’m still in Caleb’s clothes, and it feels like they’re the last thing keeping me connected to him. “You wanna go back to sleep?” I suck in a breath and wince. My chest hurts from crying. My mind is all fuzzy, like I’m not truly awake yet, like my body is refusing to wake up to a world without Caleb. I shake my head again, my voice broken when I speak, “No. What time is it?”
“It’s almost four.” Emily sweeps the hair out of my eyes.
“Four? In the afternoon?”
“Yeah. You went out like a light yesterday. I checked on you from time to time, but you were lost to the world.”
“Oh.” It doesn’t feel like I’ve been sleeping for that long. My body feels numb, exhausted, like I could sleep forever and still it wouldn’t beenough. It feels similar to the time before I transitioned, when I would just lie in my bed and hide away from the world, finding comfort in sleep. “You just got back?”