Page 211 of Story of My Life
“Look, I just don’t have the time or space for you in my life. I’m sorry if that hurts your feelings, but this thing between us has run its course. We’ve had our fun. Now it’s over. I need to focus on my family and the business without any distractions.”
Hazel gasped. Her bike helmet slipped from her fingers and hit the floor with a hollowthunk. “Distractions?You’rethe one who manipulatedmeinto dating you, intofallingfor you! I didn’t want any of this, but you maneuvered me into it. You made me believe?—”
“What? In multiple orgasms?” I said flippantly.
She recoiled and blinked. “No. You made me believe I hadn’t already lost my shot at happily ever after.”
In a move guaranteed to get a fictional villain named after me, I rolled my eyes like what she was saying was the most ridiculous thing I’d ever heard. “We had an arrangement. No strings. Just sex. I’m sorry if you thought it was more than that.”
She blinked slowly, and for a second, I thought she was going to cry, which would have taken me to my knees. But instead of tears, fire sparked to life in her eyes.
“No. You don’t get to do this,” she decided.
“Do what? We had an agreement. As soon as our arrangement stopped working for one of us, we were both done,” I insisted.
She poked me in the chest with her stabby index finger. “You don’t get to unpack all this emotional baggage and trauma that you’ve been carting around since probably childhood that has nothing to do with me and thenuse it against me.”
“Don’t you dare start analyzing my character when you’re the one who spends your life on the sidelines watching other people live. It’s time you realized we’re not made-up characters in some book. We’re fucked-up flesh and blood,” I snapped.
“You’re damn right we are. And we could have been fucked-up together.”
“That was never going to happen, Hazel. Can’t you just let this go?”
She stabbed me harder with her finger. “No. I’m not letting you off the hook for this one. You’re going to end things after you convinced me to give this a try? After youmademe fall in love with you? And now you’re just over it because it’s what? Messy? Inconvenient? No way am I making this easy for you.”
After I made her fall in love with me. Her words reverberated in the space between us.
“What do you want from me, Hazel?” I asked in a rasp.
She looked at me, really looked at me. But all I saw was disappointment and hurt.
“Nothing,” she said with a sad shake of her head. “Nothing at all.”
She turned to walk away, and I felt the darkness that lived inside me closing in. “We can still be friends, right?” I asked in desperation.
“No, Cam. We can’t,” she said as she slowly made her way to the stairs.
“I’ll still be working in your house,” I pointed out stupidly. Just because I couldn’t love her didn’t mean she had to hate me. She could still be some peripheral part of my life.
She didn’t turn around, didn’t acknowledge that I’d said anything. She just left.
I don’t know how long I stood there watching the spot I’d last seen her. But when I finally looked down, I realized she’d left her helmet at my feet.
I felt sick as a thousand what-ifs flickered through my mind. She needed that helmet. Bad things happened every fucking day. Trouble followed her. It was dark, and all it took was for one little mistake to ruin everything.
I grabbed the helmet and raced after her. But by the time I got out the back door, she was gone and I was alone.
45
LENGTHY WALLOW OVER
HAZEL
IntrepidReporterGuy:
The romance between Hazel Hart and Cam Bishop has officially fizzled. Rumor has it, it was Cam’s desire to become a roadie for the punk cover band Me First and the Gimme Gimmes that ended the budding relationship.
My mattress shifted,and for one bright, stupid second, I imagined it was Cam, prying off his work boots and shedding his clothes before crawling between the sheets and pulling me to him.
