Page 52 of The Oscar Escape
“Oscar,” Aria whispered, her eyes growing glassy with tears.
And just like he could hear the voices from the other side of the curtain, he had the same recall ability when it came to the moment he’d found his mother. She’d collapsed in front of the house with a bag of groceries in her hands. He could see the scattered red apples and tiny squares of caramel surrounding his mother’s lifeless body. His mother’s sister, his aunt Amy, had arrived in town for a visit. His mom had gone out to pick up groceries. They were supposed to make caramel apples as a treat.
He steadied himself and tucked away the memories. “Four years ago, when you asked me what I wanted for my twenty-first birthday, I knew the answer. It was you. I wanted you. I wanted to be the person who kept you whole. And I wanted to protect you. I’ve loved you all my life as a friend. But I wanted more. And then I kissed you, and Jesus, I’d never felt like that—like I couldn’t get enough. Like I wanted to savor each second. Like I needed to photograph every angle and record every sound. But I didn’t need my camera. That kiss imprinted on my heart. It’s merged with my DNA. And then I pulled back, and you smiled up at me. The sweetness of it. The love in your eyes. I felt it from the top of my head to the tips of my damned toes. And that’s when it hit.”
“What hit?” she pressed gently.
Anguish tore through him. “I had to stop myself from loving you like that. The look on my face was disgust, but not with you. It was with me. I realized there was only one choice when it came to how I felt about you.”
“What choice was that?”
A muscle ticked in his jaw as if his mouth didn’t want to form the word. “Distance,” he said, forcing the syllables.
“Distance?” she repeated. Disbelief blazed in her eyes.
He released her cheek and dropped his hands to his sides. “I thought if I put distance between us, it would help.”
“Help with what?” The gentleness in her expression gave way to fiery frustration.
“Help me from falling deeper in love with you.”
“Why would you want to stop that?”
“It’s better to endure the emptiness than to know I failed you.”
“Fail me? Oscar, couldn’t you tell what that kiss meant to me? You said it yourself. You saw the love in my eyes. You knew I wanted more, too. We were on the same page.”
He stared at his feet. “Yeah, and that made it harder.”
“Dammit!” she fumed. She turned and sprinted up the last steps into the lantern room. She stared down at him. “Why can’t you say it? Stop talking in circles, or I swear to you, Oscar Abrams Elliott, I will fake divorce you, put an ocean between us, and force you to leave me alone. How’s that for some distance?”
He couldn’t leave her alone—even if his life depended on it. He followed her to the top of the lighthouse. The wind whipped the glass, hissing through the old structure. The rain pelted the enclosure as the sea roiled and rocked, smashing against the island’s rocky edge. He tensed and absorbed the tumultuous energy.
Maybe it was the charged air, or Aria’s passion, riling him up. Maybe it was the artist in him, unable to restrain his emotions. Like a bolt of lightning, he was ready to strike. He zeroed in on her. “Do you want to know what’s been going through my head these last four years?”
She held on to a worn brass railing that circled the inside of the lantern room. She locked on to his gaze but didn’t speak a word.
The stage was his.
He took a step toward her. “I don’t know what I’d do if I lost you. I love my family, and I love our friends. But you’re like oxygen to me. I thought distance would change that. I hoped it would make me feel less for you. But I was wrong. I’m fucking failing.” He could hear the frantic edge in his words.
Her expression softened, but she remained silent as she tightened her grip on the railing like she was holding on for dear life.
He moved closer to her. “Traveling for work helped. I’d throw myself into the projects. But that didn’t stop me from keeping an eye on you. I obsessed over watching videos of you online. I could tell when you were happy and when you were pretending to be happy.” He recalled his sister’s words about being a smile expert. Maybe it ran in the family. He zeroed in on the angry ocean. “I told myself I was watching to see if I noticed the signs that you weren’t okay. I’ve been studying you from afar for years like you’re one of my documentary subjects. I’ve lived in my car for the last two weeks, following your tour through the northeast. It makes no sense. I put distance between us but spend every second thinking about you.”
She searched his face. “Why did you do this?”
“I can’t lose you like I lost my mom. Don’t you understand?”
She shook her head. “No, I don’t.”
He gripped the railing near where she held it. He’d only have to move his thumb a fraction of an inch to touch her, but he maintained that sliver of distance. “When I heard that doctor tell the kid he saved his mom’s life, I realized I can’t trust myself to protect the people I love. I want to protect everyone. But something is wrong with me. I can’t be sure I could always read the signs. If I’d said something to my mom, if I’d told her I wouldn’t go to school unless she saw a doctor, she might be here.”
“You were a little boy, Oscar.”
“So was that kid on the other side of the curtain,” he rasped, feeling the pain—his familiar companion—seep into his pores.
“What happened to your mom was terrible. I hate that you lost her. But you can’t blame yourself.”
