Page 3 of Back to December
Like Holden does.
Andoh my gosh,I’m so selfish.
I groan. “I don’t know what to do.”
“Talk to me, honey. You’re making me worried.” He slides his hand under mine so my fingers curl over his, then presses a kiss to my knuckles. Then another.
I close my eyes as tiny little pinpricks skitter across my skin.
“I can’t think when you do that.”
“Maybe that’s a good thing. Turn off your filters and just tell me the truth of whatever brought you here.” He tugs me forward a little, pressing a kiss to my wrist.
“Holden, this is serious,” I murmur, opening my eyes again.
He’s gazing up at me with a wicked smile, pressing another kiss a few inches higher on my forearm. This is a delightful distraction from my spiraling.
“Cara Mia.”
Beloved.
My head drops forward in equal amounts of frustration and amusement. We were going to be Gomez and Morticia for Halloween this year, and my heart breaks for what feels like the fiftieth time today. I had the perfect wig and everything.
I don’t deserve someone like Holden. I really don’t.
“Holden.” His name comes out almost like a plea.
He pauses at my tone, and his expression shifts. “Tell me, then.”
“We’re leaving.”
Holden freezes, caught between our previous playfulness and my underlying heartbreak. It’s that moment on a roller coaster where you’re suspended in time and space, right before the big drop.
I hate that I’m about to cause thebig drop.
“What does that mean, Laila?”
“Mom said we’re leaving tonight. For good.” Even as I say them out loud, they don’t feel real.
“Leaving?” he repeats, disbelief cracking his voice and his calm demeanor.
“She says Enchanted Hollow is a waste. That we’veoutgrown it and it’s time for bigger and better things for the Mitchell women.”
He changes our positioning, so he scoots close and our legs press together, his jeans against my layers of fancy fabric. It’s a bittersweet physical representation of how different we really are. Maybe it’s for the best.
I’d break his heart, anyway.
“So this really isn’t about Ella,” he whispers. “It’s about your mom.”
“I wish I had a choice. A way to stay.”
It’s the closest I can get to saying,I don’t want to leave you because being with you is when everything makes the most sense.
“We could find a way,” he says. “Maybe?—”
I shake my head. “She’d never allow it.”
And I’ve spent every minute this afternoon running through the stages of grief on repeat. I’ve flipped through every option I can think of, but since I’m only a sophomore in high school, I’m not old enough to make that choice.
