Page 97 of Until You Found Me

“Don’t be mad,” he says sadly. “Not now. Don’t want to end things mad.”

“End things. So you’re giving up?” Her face cracks, nose scrunching with emotion as she swallows her anger and dips the mattress with her weight. “I’m not mad. I’m scared I’m losing you. I don’t understand why you won’t let me do this. We’re out of options.”

There are finger marks around her neck, creasing it red and he reaches up to graze the area with a shaky touch. Her pulse jumps, and her head tilts to nuzzle against his palm. “You said you remember.”

“We can talk about that after, I promise. I’ll tell you everything. Anything.”

“You remember, but you still want to do this? Even knowing what you know? You still signed the papers to come here and let them cut you open?”

“Of course I did.” She frowns. “You think this changes anything? It doesn’t. It changes nothing. I’m even more certain now.”

He wondered, while knowing it was pointless rumination, if she would feel differently when she got it all back again.If his Tessa was only a figment, while the real one might take her first chance to leave him. She deserves so much better, but she’s telling him that nothing has changed and he so badly wants to believe. His lower lip wobbles and he hates himself for it, biting it in an effort to stop. He should be the one comforting her after all that’s happened, but here she is wiping the tears off his cheeks and squeezing his hand in her lap.

“What if you need it someday?” he protests again.

She gives him a sad half-smile. “I have another one. It’ll be enough.”

“Need you to understand what you’re in for if we do this. Might not be able to afford the drugs to keep it working. Could all be for nothing and if it is, then they won’t let me give it back, it doesn’t work that way. This is a one and done situation.”

“You’re worried I’ll regret it?”

“Yeah.” The idea of anyone giving him such a valuable gift and not regretting it is impossible. “When I can’t take care of it and it breaks again, then yeah. When I do something stupid, and I will, and you’re mad at me, then absolutely. When you wanna leave and—”

“You’re breaking up with me now? Or you’re already that far ahead that you’ve decided for me that I’ll break up with you at some undetermined date?”

Sounds silly when she says it like that. “That’s not what I mean.”

“Maybe you’re right that I’ll get mad when you do something stupid because I’m starting to feel that right about now. You’re making decisions for me and I don’t appreciate it. I know what I want, who I want, and if I decide to give mykidney away, that’s my choice.”

The last thing he’s trying to do is control her. He only wants to keep her safe and healthy, but he’s screwing it all up and he deflates with a shoulder-slumping sigh.

“You really don’t want it?” Her voice is filled with doubt that he unintentionally put there. “Or you don’t want me? Now that things are different. Now that I’m different?”

“All I want is you. I’m only trying to protect you.”

“Well, stop that.” When he doesn’t answer quickly enough, she sniffles and levels him with a hollow stare, some deep memory playing out behind her eyes that she doesn’t share aloud. Sadness filters into her voice all the same, weaving into his soul with every syllable, begging him to understand. “I’ve lost everyone I love, Logan. I don’t want to do this life without you. Please don’t make me.”

“They cleared you for this?” he asks firmly.

Her brows raise in hopeful anticipation. “Yes.”

“I mean, they did a scan or an MRI or whatever has to be done? You don’t have a concussion again? You don’t need to recover first?”

“I’m good, I promise. My neck hurts, but no concussion this time. Nothing’s wrong with me that’ll keep this surgery from moving forward. I can find the doctor and he’ll tell you the same thing.”

In the end, it’s the lovestruck, watery look she gives him that shifts his decision. He didn’t expect to see that once her past slotted into place again, but there it is like it never left.

There’s an alternate reality being offered to them, he realizes. One where he has full access to that look without any time limit ticking away. One where they live a normal life together. Sail on the boat, walk the dog, make out whilewatching movies, and then make love until they pass out tangled together. All of it free of looming threats or constant health crises.

He used to be apathetic about his survival. That was simple when everyone who claimed to care about him made him feel like a burden, a hassle, an afterthought. It was easy to believe those opinions as truths after hearing them since childhood. He kept putting one foot in front of the other when defiance fueled his refusal to die, but more than that bare minimum felt pointless.

There is so much more at stake now. So much more to keep him going.

He’d be an idiot not to try.

“Okay. Let’s do it.” He nods his agreement, grabbing for a chance at that coveted normal life with the woman he loves.

She gasps, stabbing the call button for the nurse with a quick finger. “You have to sign again. They said the first one didn’t count because you were drugged. Shit, why are they taking so long?”

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