Page 90 of Crazy Thing

And I’m realizing that she may never feel the same.

“You’re still holding back…” I mutter, and I hear the pathetic disappointment in my voice.

Ziggy’s expression collapses into a frown. “Shit—of course I am, Darius.”

She wiggles out of my hold and the moment between us is over. The fallen leaves crunch beneath her sandals as she puts space between us.

“The fact that we had sex a few times doesn’t changemuch. It doesn’t change anything that happened in the past.”

Fuck. This is not what I want to hear. Not at all.

“Goddammit,” I grumble, tracking my fingers through my hair, pulling at the roots. “I don’t understand.”

I thought I was making progress with her. I thought we were on the same page. But I was wrong.

She shrugs her slight shoulders. “I know this might sound dramatic, but, all those years ago, I had to shut down huge parts of myself after the way you rejected me, Darius. I couldn’t allow myself to feel all that pain ever again. It was too much. I had to slap a whole lot of duct tape over the parts of me that were shattered by the way you treated me. Now, I don’t know if I’ll ever feel safe trusting you.”

The vulnerability on her face wrecks me. She has every right to be unsure about me.

Shit. I’m the one who ruined it for her. I’m the one who made it hard for her to open up in relationships. Yet here I am, asking her to blindly trust me again.

“Ziggy, I want you to know how I feel about you. I genuinely believe that you’re the most incredible woman I know.” I brush her hair back from her cheek with my knuckles. “You’re beautiful and wise and ethereal and downright breathtaking. And I just want—”

“If I’m so freaking great, why did you do what you did, Darius?” she blurts out. “All those years ago, why did you hurt me?”

Her words are a dart straight through my chest. But I can’t go on pretending like our past isn’t the two ton elephant following us around this forest now.

And if I have any hope of stopping the pain bleeding from her eyes, I have only one option. I have to tell her everything my teenaged self was too chicken to say.

There’s no perfect way to word this, so I just open my mouth and let the words start spilling out.

“People around town always assumed that my family had money. My dad was a doctor after all. But in small towns like ours, doctors aren’t exactly rolling around in hundred dollar bills at night. Especially not doctors with six kids to feed.” I drag my fingers through my hair. “I watched my parents struggle financially when I was growing up. I can’t tell you how many late nights I crept in on my dad sitting at the kitchen table with his paper and pen and calculator, trying to figure out how he’d make ends meet. And my mom, she needed hired help around the house but she worked herself to the bone and she’d never complain because she knew we couldn’t afford it. But I had big dreams for myself and I was determined to make them happen. Ineededto make them happen. So I came up with a plan. A plan that included extracurricular activities and academic scholarships and ultimately, a spot at an Ivy League college.”

Ziggy listens intently as I speak, waiting patiently even as I seem to be talking all over the place.

“I worked hard in school,” I continue, “Excellent grades. Study groups. Working for extra credit. All of it. While my brothers were running wild and making havoc all over town, I remained focused on my goals. But it was hard. Sometimes, our house would be so loud that I couldn’t even hear myself think. That’s how I started going down to the waterfall to study.”

“That’s how we started hanging out…” she says with a soft smile, helping me piece my story together.

“You were the most beautiful distraction.” I softly cup her cheek, offering a pained smile of my own. “I loved following you around the forest. Listening to you go on andon, teaching me new things. Sharing perspectives I’d never considered before. From the first day I bumped into you in the woods, I found you fascinating. I became so tangled up in you that I lost track of my goals.”

An ache flutters through my chest as I think back to who we both used to be in those days.

“I had applied for a really competitive internship. According to my research, securing that position would have all but guaranteed that I’d get a full scholarship to the college of my dreams. I had been on the waiting list for the spot, but the organization called one day when I was out in the forest with you.” My eyes fall to her lips. “The day that I first kissed you.”

She inhales sharply. “Shit…” she winces.

“One of their interns had dropped out of the program and they’d called to offer me her position. But since I wasn’t home when they called, the organization moved on and selected someone else for the internship.”

Ziggy is shaking her head back and forth, regret brimming in her eyes. “I’m…I’m sorry, Darius.” A single tear treks down her cheek. “God. I had no idea that I ruined that opportunity for you.”

What?!“Are you for real? You didn’t ruin anything, Ziggy.” I hawk out a low, incredulous laugh. “It wasn’t your fault,” I assure her, stroking a thumb along her cheekbone.” I drop my eyes in shame. “But in my fifteen-year-old head, I couldn’t see that.”

It was never my intention for Ziggy to take on this guilt as her own. But I guess that’s the thing about being an angel like she is—she takes on everybody’s problems. It’s just what she does.

“Yes, I was angry with you that day. I’ll admit it and I’m embarrassed as fuck over that. I was a teenager and Ihandled it wrong,” I tell her. “And by the time I realized how wrong I was, I’d already fucked everything up with you. You wanted nothing to do with me anymore, and I deserved that.”

I’d abruptly stopped talking to her. Then hours later, she’d seen me dancing with someone else. I can’t imagine the things that probably went through her mind.

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