Page 11 of This Life and All the Rest
It wasn’t until Claire called a couple days ago that I was informed that Macon had been discharged.
Just so you know, she’d said,he’ll be here. He’s home for good now. I don’t want you to be blindsided.
It was the first time in a long time I’d been grateful for Claire’s interference.
“What the fuck was that?” Sam asks softly, making me jump. I didn’t hear her climb out of the car.
I shrug, instead of answering. How can I when I don’t know? My lip still tingles in the spot where he pressed his thumb.
He provoked me, and I let him. He wanted me angry, and I fell for it. Macon always has brought out the worst in me.
Astraea, he called me. And that ever-present smirk, like he’s in on a secret joke with the universe, and I’m left on the outside, curious and confused.
For the briefest moment, I was pulled back to my previous life. Younger, and more naïve, and stupidly in love with a boy who broke me over and over again.
He was the boy who broke me, and I was the girl who let him, because I thought I could fix him.
I wasted a year and a half of my life mourning the loss of him, suffering in the damage of him. I spent the next year sifting through the wreckage, trying to find something worth saving.
But I pulled myself out of it. I built something beautiful from the pain. I’m proud of what I’ve accomplished. I like who I am now.
I’m done sacrificing myself for someone who wouldn’t do the same for me. I’llnevermake that mistake again.
He’s also different, though.
He’s gorgeous. He always has been, but it’s cleaner now. More mature. His hair is shorter. I could tell from the way there was nothing curling out the sides of his backwards ball cap. His jaw is sharper and lined with stubble. The full sleeve of tattoos on his left arm didn’t hide the fact that he’s changed in other ways, too. He’s larger. Harder. More sculpted. And even beyond the physical, something else about him feels different.
My heart and mind are racing.
“Ready to go?” Sam nudges my shoulder with hers, and I nod.
“Definitely.”
I follow her to her car and climb into the passenger seat. I’m so fucking grateful she’s here. She’s always picking up my pieces, holding me together when she doesn’t even realize it. I turn my head to tell her as much, but her furrowed brow halts my tongue.
“What?” I ask, even though I probably already know.
She gives me a sidelong glance and sighs.
“I’d be a shit friend if I didn’t press the issue,” she says. “You can always stay at my place. You don’t even have to be around him if you don’t want to. No sense in opening old wounds or whatever.”
I huff out a hollow laugh. As if I’m worried about that happening.
Macon Davis is of no importance to me anymore. He’s just some guy I used to know. My estranged stepbrother. An old relationship from an old life.
“It’s fine. He doesn’t live with Dad and Andrea, so I doubt I’ll see much of him,” I reassure her. “And anyway, don’t you have like some fancy-ass internship to get back to?”
Sam flashes me a sly grin and waggles her eyebrows.
“About that,” she says slowly, keeping her eyes on the road as she drives me to the hospital. “I didn’t want you to spend your birthday alone, so I might have played the whole ‘daughter of a senator’ nepotism card and got the entire month of July off.”
“What? Really?” I turn toward her in my seat, and she laughs.
“Surprise, bitch! I had a place lined up in Paris and everything.” She stops short and purses her lips. “Shit, I should probably cancel the reservation now.”
“No,” I say quickly. “Don’t cancel it yet. I still don’t know how long I’ll be here. Once Dad wakes up, I’ll head back to Paris. I’ve got too much work lined up. I can’t stay gone long.”
And I can’t beherefor my birthday. My mind won’t stay quiet. My anxiety is heightened.
