Page 149 of Heartbeat

I watched him, clutching the jacket to me, not knowing how to react.

“Ethan, wait!” I finally said, following him.

I couldn’t let him leave. Not like that.

He stopped as soon as I called out but refused to turn around.

“I didn’t do it to be mean,” I said quietly. “I just—I know you love this jacket, and the—”

“I don’t give a single fuck about a jacket, Tom,” he said angrily.

I didn’t say anything, but I knew I should’ve. I knew him; he’d probably feel bad for the way he’d said it.

I knew him.

“I gave it to you,” he said, turning around and trying to look less mad.

“Technically, I stole it.”

It didn’t work. But he did try to smile.

“Well, it’s yours,” he said softly.

“Thank you.” I put it on as he watched.

“I talked to my mom,” he said after a beat. “She told me we don’t have to be apart if we don’t want to.”

“Yeah, she told me that too.”

“Then why are we?” he asked, sounding so hopeless.

I couldn’t help but sigh. “You deserve someone so much better than me, Ethan. Someone good.”

“What does that mean?”

I rolled my eyes.

“You are good, Tom.”

“I’m not, I’m just—”

“I swear, I’d like to know who did this to you,” he said, rubbing his hand on his forehead.

“Did what?”

“Convinced you that you lack something.”

“I don’t think I lack—”

“I mean, seriously, look at what you did,” he said. “You spent hours trying to save your brother, months trying to make sure everyone else in your life could survive it, all the while nobody giving a shit about what it was doing to you.”

“That’s not—”

“Oh, but it is. It’s the truth, isn’t it?”

“No one knew how to handle it, Ethan,” I said, narrowing my eyes. “I didn’t either. I…I just did what—”

“You did what came naturally to you. And still, you don’t blame them.”

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