Page 4 of You & Me: Part Two

I see Riley behind the bar once I am back upstairs and ask him if he’s seen Cami and Alex. He points in Cami’s direction with a concerned look on his face. I don’t give him a chance to ask if I am okay, but I do ask him to call us a cab and I turn to find my best friend.

I find her talking to Devon and Gabby and it only takes one look for her to know I need to leave. She knows me better than anybody and with a quick goodbye to the happy couple and a text to Alex—who will get a ride home with her boyfriend that met her there—she and I are out the door. I hate that she was with Devon. I hate that he could see how upset I was and I am sure will tell Jonathan. This night just keeps getting better.

I manage to keep it together until we’re in the cab, but the moment the door closes, the tears fall.

“He hates me, Cam. I knew he would and he does,” I sob into my hands. Cami brings her arm around my shoulder and pulls me into her so she can hold on to me while I fall apart.

“Emily, he doesn’t hate you. You were just the first bad thing in a string of worse things that happened to him, and I’m sure seeing you brought it all back to the surface for him,” she says as she pulls away but keeps rubbing my back. I am so confused.

“What are you talking about, Cam?”

Her eyes fill with tears and I can tell that what she has to say isn’t good. Cami is strong, but even this is hard for her.

“Well, Devon just told me that while they were in Afghanistan, Matt was killed in an IED explosion, and as their squad leader Jonathan takes the blame and still hasn’t forgiven himself.”

“Oh God! No! Not Matt…Oh God Cami…Poor Jonathan…Devon too. That’s horrible.” I have this instant need to turn the cab around and run back to him and hold him. But I think he made it pretty clear that’s not what he would want.

“That’s not all, sweetie. Two months later, Jonathan lost his mom. She had been sick when he was home, but she didn’t tell him and he had no idea at all. It totally blindsided him and Devon says he hasn’t been himself since. So you see, chica, he lost you, Matt and his mom in a matter of months. He doesn’t hate you, you just remind him of the worst time in his life.”

“Oh my God, Cami!” I feel like I can’t breathe.

“I didn’t mean that to sound so harsh, Em. I just want you to know that he doesn’t hate you. If he didn’t love you as much as he did, losing you wouldn’t have been up there with losing Matt and his mom, but according to Devon it is.”

I sit in the back of the cab and I sob. No wonder the Jonathan I knew was gone. His mom was his everything and he loved Matt like a brother. The fact that he couldn’t save either of them has to be too much for him to even come to terms with. The fact that I could have anything to do with any of his pain is almost too much for me. My poor Georgia.

“Oh Cami, I feel so horrible for him. I wish there was something that I could do, but I don’t think he even wants to speak to me. He was so cold and was practically seething with anger at me.”

She continues to rub my back while I sob all the way to her apartment.

When we get to her place—that is covered in unpacked boxes from her recent move back home with me—we go straight to her room where she throws a nightshirt at me and insists I change. She puts me to bed and covers me up. She sits next to me on the side of the bed while I just lay there staring at the wall.

“Chica, I am sure this was not the reunion you had envisioned. I know you’re hurting right now, but try not to take it personally. He’s been through so much, sweetie. Seeing you tonight was just as much of a shock to him as I’m sure it was to you.”

“Just the thought that I could have been a part of creating the version of him that I saw tonight is unbearable. I…I…I feel like I need to do something for him, anything. I wish I had been there for him. I was so selfish, Cam. I didn’t even tell him my last name or give him my phone number. I wasn’t there for him when he needed me most.”

I sit up in the bed and throw the blankets off of me. I can’t breathe. Before I know what I’m doing I start pacing the room.

“Em, stop.”

I keep pacing.

Cami grabs me by the arms and yells into my face.

“Emily Grace Jacobs! Stop!”

I stop next to her bed and look my best friend in the face. The person that is always there for me. Some people go to priests. Some go to shrinks. I go to Cami.

“Em. Take a deep breath.”

“I should have told him, Cam. I should have given him the choice. Maybe we could have at least been friends and then I could have been there for him when he needed me most. How could I have been so selfish?”

“Em, you were scared, you weren’t selfish. You, yourself, were at the beginning of something life-changing and you had just been devastated by somebody else the week before. You were in self-preservation mode and it was easier to walk away from him than possibly endure any more rejection than you already had. I get it, chica, and I am so sorry it was a decision you ever had to make but it’s not your fault. Even if you had said yes to trying to make it work, he still would have lost his mom and Matt.”

I know she’s right, but I still can’t help but think that I’m to blame for him turning into the man that I saw tonight. He looked the same, and for the love of all that’s Holy, he still smelled the same. But he was so cold and there was no light left behind his eyes. But I still felt it. I felt it in that first moment that our eyes locked onto each other. That electricity…that connection was still there.

“Cam, I still felt it. The moment I saw him I felt it. Even though he was cold and hurtful it didn’t matter. The moment I touched him…Cam…it was overwhelming and just like it was five years ago. He hates me and I’m still in love with him.”

Cami wipes the lone tear that is slowly making its way down my cheek and then hands me a much needed tissue.

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