Page 59 of The Heartbreak List

I glance at Gray; he has his hands in his hair and a look of absolute pain on his face. It isn’t as simple as walking away. We have so much history. I need the time to deal with this correctly. Give Gray the conversation he needs. End things properly.

Holy shit, did I really just think those words? Do I really want to call it quits with Gray? The man who, until this very moment, I believed I would spend the rest of my life with? Or at least the next few months?

But even with our time limited, I want out. I don’t want to hurt Gray, but doesn’t the fact that I don’t want to spend the rest of my life with him tell me all I need to know?

I don’t have time to waste on a relationship that isn’t making me happy anymore. If that bucket list—if Theo—has taught me anything, it’s that I should choose to do things that make me happy. No matter how messy. Not to settle. Not to accept what I have because that’s what I’m supposed to do… because we can’t keep going like this. It isn’t working for either of us. “I mean it.”

“Okay, yeah. Fuck it.” Theo grits his teeth as he stomps away.

Pez shrugs an apology and he and Lucas follow their friend.

Gray puts his arm around my waist and tugs me into his side. I glance up at him as he guides me into the car. I always imagined Gray was my future. But that future no longer exists.

He climbs into the driver’s seat. He doesn’t start the car. Doesn’t say anything. He stares out the window for the longest time. “This isn’t you, Indy. And this isn’t me either.”

“I know.” I curl my fingers into the lace on my lap.

It’s funny how when it comes time to say goodbye to someone you notice all the little things that have gone unseen. Like the golden prickly growth along his jaw that has become a part of his style these past few months. Like how dark the bags under his eyes really are. The lines have deepened around his eyes too, aging him. They soften my heart. Make me want to cling to the past. But I can’t cling to the past any more than I can grasp for the future. All I have is the present. It’s time we face that reality. “I’m dying and there’s nothing we can do to change that. There’s nothing I can do to stop it from hurting you.”

God, how I want to. But the doctor was clear about my prognosis and my last scans didn’t show any promising changes. There is no miracle this time. No cure. Gray can’t save me by wrapping me up in cotton wool and locking me in his tower. He can’t love me better.

I wish he could. I love that he tried.

“I don’t want you to stop it from hurting, Indy. I’m losing the love of my life. We’re getting married. We were going to have a family. We were supposed to have our entire lives in front of us. And now we’re not. Damn it.” His hand turns into a fist and thumps against the center of the steering wheel. “It’s supposed to hurt. Losing you is supposed to ache so much I can barely stand to breathe. But it isn’t supposed to happen now. I’m supposed to have months to love and cherish you enough for an entire lifetime. That’s what the doctors said. So why are you already out the door? And with that guy?”

My own eyes burn and then spill. I love him so much. I hate that I’m breaking his heart. “There’s nothing between Theo and me. Not like that.”

“Bullshit.” He grinds his teeth. “I’m not blind. Are you in love with him? Is that why you’ve been so sad?”

I scrunch the lace in my hand. I know love. I have Gray’s love. It is rock solid. It is comfort. It is always having him in my corner. And I love that about Gray even now when everything is falling apart. I love who he is and who he has always been to me.

Theo is the very opposite of that. When I’m with him I’m scared, but in a good way. He makes me want to see what could happen if I spread my wings, and follow my dreams, and all those other cliché things that people embroider on throw cushions and are absolutely what make life liveable.

For so long I avoided taking any kind of risk because I didn’t want to hurt my family or Gray. But I didn’t live. And they’re hurting anyway.

“Don’t tell me.” He exhales audibly. “Let’s just go home.”

“I’m not going home with you.” I can barely get the words out. “And I don’t think I can marry you.”

“Baby.” He takes my face between his hands. We’re both crying. Our hearts are breaking in sync. “Please don’t do this.”

“I have to.” I cover his hand with mine and remove it from my cheek. Then I remove the other as I back as far away from him as I can in the confined space. Part of me will always yearn to bridge that distance. “We are not the same people we were when we were happy, Gray. And I want to live. Not protect every last moment like that might somehow change my diagnosis, because it won’t.”

“I can do better,” he says. “Be less cautious. Work on your bucket list.”

“I slept with him.” I blurt it out. I don’t want Gray to hate me, but I think he needs to. That’s the only way he’s going to let me go. He’ll hold on as long as he loves me. So I’ll tell him what he needs to hear to be able to let me go. If I hurt him enough maybe that will ease the pain long-term. “I slept with Theo. When I’m with him I feel alive in a way that I can’t remember ever feeling before.”

His lips part on a harsh intake of breath as he sits there as rigidly as stone. Closing his eyes, he covers his mouth with his hand. Eventually he opens his eyes and peels his hand from his face. “When?”

“While you were in Baltimore.” It’s easy enough to say that it happened the night Theo stayed at the condo. I work my engagement ring up over my knuckle.

“In our home? In our bed?” I can see his heart breaking in his eyes. The confusion in his voice turns to disbelief. “No, baby, you wouldn’t—"

“It happened.” I take his hand and put my ring in the center of it before I open the car door. There is no point in prolonging this torture for either of us. “Being with him is exhilarating and addictive. He encourages me to find happiness in the time I have left. He doesn’t try to stop me from living.”

“And I do?” Gray’s features turn hawklike. His knuckles are white on the steering wheel as he starts to shake. “I used to know you so well. I have no clue who you are anymore.”

“Maybe you don’t.” Who I am is a mystery to me too. I thought I had it figured out. I was his fiancée and EJ ‘s little sister. I was Sharon and Oswald Jones’s daughter. I was a woman with goals and a promising career. And now I have no goals and no career. I have no future with Gray. I am the daughter and sister and fiancée who is dying. I will be the daughter and sister that died before long. But none of those things is who I am.

---