Page 41 of Over You
“There was only a skeleton of the boy I fell in love with.”
“Oh fuck off, Georgia!” His fingers drew into fists. “Every single thing I did was for us.”
“No. You did fame foryou, Spence.”
“Unbelievable.” He swiped a hand over his face on an incredulous laugh. “There was never a me without you, and you know it!”
Spencer wielded words like a sword. Some of them so beautiful they could make even Shakespeare weep, others left me crippled. The man standing in front of me was proof there was a him without me, and a me without him.
My heart crumbled like a broken empire. “You were mylife, Spencer. It was a last resort. Something I thought would make you realize what was going on.”
“Oh, you made me see, Georgia. You made me realize that you didn’t understand what it meant to love someone, so congratufuckulations.” He slow clapped, and a flood of heat drowned my entire body.
“Andyouunderstand what it means to love someone?”
“I wouldn’t have left you. No matter what. Roaring demons and all, I would’ve stayed.”
The thing he didn’t see, every time he got high, part of him did leave me. He may have been there physically when we lost Bennington, but emotionally, he was a ghost.
My vision throbbed with each pound of my heart. Regret and anger waned into resentment. He didn’t even make it the three months I had begged him for. How much could I have meant?
I took a few steps toward him with my chest heaving. “You didn’t fight for me!”
Spencer shot off the couch, quickly closing the space between us. “You didn’t see the fight I put up because you were thousands of miles away. I was drowning. Could you not see that? I was drowning, and you left me! Do you know what that did to me?” His face was now inches from mine, a storm rolling through the deep blue of his eyes.
For the first time, I realized, maybe we’d ruined one another.
“How many times have you overdosed, Spencer? Did you expect me to just sit back and watch you slowly kill yourself? I tried to fix you.” I lowered my voice barely above a whisper. “I tried and I—”
“Fix me?” His expression grew severe, brows furrowed, nostrils flaring. “So now I’m some broken toy? No, Georgia.” He slapped his chest. His cheeks went red, and I flinched. “You don’tfixthis. Especially not by walking out like every-fucking-body else in my life had.”
My heart wilted like a rose, the last petal floating to the ground. I turned my back to him while my mind tumbled into a tangled web of memories and regrets. I exhaled. Inhaled. Swallowed.
Do not be weak. Not now. . .
I fought the stinging tears, the tremble working from my fingers to my toes. Maybe I had screwed up and made it worse. We’d both lost so much, and while Ifeltabandoned when he was high, I had physically left the person who had once saved me.
We were two people who couldn’t swim, dropped into the middle of an ocean. I couldn’t save him, and he could no longer save himself.
The jars in the refrigerator door rattled. Bottles clanked. I heard the release of air from a bottle opening. The clink of metal on the counter. Spencer was no longer behind me.
I stormed into the kitchen and found him by the sink with a beer to his lips. “What are you doing?” I walked over and snatched a cider Tom had left months ago from his grasp, then dumped it in the sink. The foam bubbled up from the drain.
“If you don’t want to be my wife, you don’t get to tell me what to do.” He yanked open the fridge and grabbed another drink.
I swatted that one out of his hand, and the glass busted to bits on the tile. The stout scent of barley filled the room, and anger flashed over his face. Without warning, he grabbed my hips and pinned me between his body and the sink. The cold blue of his eyes was like the stormy ocean at night, and I feared today would be the day I finally drowned in their murky depths.
“Tell me you hate me, and I’ll sign your damn papers.” His fingers twitched against my skin while his gaze searched mine.
I couldn’t lie. I couldn’t tell him I didn’t love him.
Spencer shook his head. “I know you too well, Georgia Anne. And I know, at the very least”—one of his fingertips tapped over my heart—“deep inside, you’re still in love with me.”
Seconds ticked by as I struggled for words. Warm tears trickled down my cheeks.
The anger fled from his face like receding tides. “You know what the hardest thing about you walking away was?” He placed my hand to his hard chest. Steady thumps beat against my palm. “I could still feel you. Right here.”
I closed my eyes and sensed him inch closer.
