Page 75 of The Sun
“What?”
She glanced up, and a few tears spilled down her cheeks. “I said, I’m still yours.”
I moved back underneath the blinking stairwell lights. I didn’t need to be any more messed up than I already was, so I refused to accept that answer. “Nah, Sunny,” I said. “You’re his.”
You would think I had just slapped her from the way she looked at me. “Are you kidding me?” And there came the anger reddening her face. “What did you expect?” she said, her voice growing louder. “For me to just sit around and let you and everyone else tell me I was too good for you? And then you get pissed at me for dating someone?” Her face caved in on itself before she shoved me so hard I stumbled back against the wall. “Well, fuck you, Elias Black.” She choked back a garbled word. “Just fuck you!”
She went to push me again, but I caught her by the wrists and held her there for a second, wishing this wasn’t what had become of us. Wishing she wasn’t the good girl who broke my heart. She attempted to jerk away from me just as the bell rang outside the door. The low hum from the hallway fell to a dead still.
“You were already his when I realized that, no matter how wrong I was for you, no one else would love you the way I do.” My voice caught, but I refused to break in front of her. “So don’t you fucking blame me! I’m trying to do the right thing here.”
I let go of her, and she covered her face, furiously shaking her head.
Something on her finger glinted underneath the fluorescent lights. A solid lump formed in my throat when I noticed she had both rings—the sun and moon interlocked—on her finger.
“You asked me if I loved him.” She dropped her hands to her sides and looked straight at me. “I don’t.”
Part of me believed that because had she truly loved him, she wouldn’t have been standing in that stairwell with me. There was maybe an inch separating us, and I closed it with a single step. Chest to chest. Heart to heart. “Then why are you with him?” I asked.
“I don’t think I can make you understand.”
“Try.” One syllable. One plea.
“I. . .” She gulped back a breath. Her bottom lip rolled underneath her teeth and, for a moment in that ratty, stale stairwell it felt like our entire world hung in the balance, teetering on the edge and ready to tumble over a cliff depending on what her next words were.
“I can’t,” she whispered.
“I don’t have time for this bullshit, Sunny.” I turned my back to her and moved toward the door.
“But I love you,” she whispered.
Those words pressed down on me, and for a moment, I understood how the Greek Titan condemned to bear the weight of the world on his shoulders must have felt. For what greater punishment is there than to carry a love you can never have?
Given enough time, I was sure it would break me.
“I love you, Elias.” She said it louder that time like she was begging me to love her—like she didn’t know I always would.
I could have told her I still cared. Maybe I could have spun around and kissed her, but it wouldn’t change anything. Except possibly dull some self-inflicted heartache or guilt she had.
“Did you hear me?” Her voice cracked. More tears fell down her pale cheeks.
Inhaling, I nodded and took another step away from her. “But I suggest you learn to love Brandon.”
Then I left her in the stairwell.
22
Sunny
The first floor of the high school consisted of an art room, a single wall of lockers, and restrooms hidden in the corner by the janitor’s closet. Which is why I chose the last stall of that particular girl’s restroom as my sanctuary for most of third period.
Elias’ voice was cold and indifferent when he told me to love Brandon. Out of all the things he could have said in that moment, that was the cruelest.
I sat in the stall, and I cried until I thought I may throw up. I pounded my fist over the flimsy aluminum door, and I didn’t have to apologize for losing my temper.
I allowed the aggravation over Elias and Brandon and my being too good for anything that was good for me to swell until it grew bigger and angrier, eventually catching fire, smoldering and choking my heart with thick black smoke. And then I cried some more because I realized I was eternally powerless when it came to the matters of my heart. No one can will themselves to unlove a person, and no one can be forced to love someone they don’t.
Resolving that—while it may have felt like my world was on a collision course with doom—I still had to finish the rest of the day. I wiped my eyes dry and forced myself to snap out of it. Two steps into the hallway, I tripped on my shoelace, nearly face planting into the bright-red bulletin board that hadn’t been changed since last Spring.
