“Oh my gods,” I whisper.
“But when push came to shove, I finally realized I couldn’t do that to my girlfriend. So I broke up with her. It was awful, so messy that even today it hurts to think about the pain I caused her. But then I found Moira and begged for her forgiveness. She gave it, no strings attached. And once I allowed myself to open up to the Connection, to allow it to work the way it was supposed to, I’ve never looked back.”
Something in my mind clicks. “Kiah.”
He nods guiltily.
“But Kiah must have known you had a doorway. She knew I had one.”
“She knew. But when people fall in love, sometimes you do stupid, unexplainable things.”
“And . . . now?”
He looks away. “We’re friends. Coworkers.” He clears his throat and scrubs at his hair again. “So. That’s my story. Since you happened to tell me that you and Jonah met in your dreams, I know you two have a Connection. And I’ll be the first person to say that I get why you might have freaked out over Jonah being here. And . . . I’ll even admit that I get why you’re dating someone else. But Chloe—it’s been a few months now that you’ve hidden behind Kellan. Frankly, I’m shocked that you aren’t running to Jonah right now and begging for his forgiveness, like I did with Moira.”
I slump back and close my eyes. “I want to. I really do.”
“Then why go to Kellan first?”
Even though my eyes are closed, I still place a hand over them. “I love him, too.”
The silence is deafening.
“It’s crazy, I know . . . .”
“You don’t love him,” Karl says. “Or, if you do, it’s not the same. It’s simply not possible.”
I choose to ignore this. “He didn’t deserve hearing about this from Cora. It should’ve been from me. Or Jonah.”
“I agree,” Karl says.
“You’re right, though. It’s totally overwhelming.”
“I know.” He hesitates. “I’ve talked to him, you know.”
My hand drops. “Kellan?”
Karl shakes his head.
“You’ve talked to Jonah . . . about me?”
“He’s one of my best friends,” Karl says, a tad defensively. “And he’s been acting . . . well, not like Jonah. Of course I tried to talk to him.”
The pins and needles are agonizing.
“He’s not dealing with this well. I mean, I get why he’s not. He’s not only overwhelmed like the rest of us finding our Connections, but he’s dealing with the massive blow of seeing you with his brother. It’s not uncommon for people to do what I did—to be with someone else in the beginning. That’s . . . I hate to say it, normal, actually. But still, it’s one thing to see your true love with another person. It’s entirely different to see your soul mate with your twin.”
I jerk back as if he’d slapped me.
“Those two . . . .” He shakes his head. “You’ve never seen what they’re like together, not really. They’ve always been inseparable. They’ve had a lot of shit thrown at them over the years, and they’ve only ever had each other to turn to. And now . . . man. They’re not talking. The situation is so screwed up. Kellan knows Jonah is mad and hurt, but Jonah won’t talk to him. And I get that, because when it comes to your Connection, your mind sort of just short circuits. Jonah’s doing everything he can to simply hold it together right now. And he’s doing it, absolutely convinced you’ve picked his brother over him.”
The air in my lungs disappears.
“I tried talking to him about it. But Jonah’s always been the kind who bottles stuff up, even as a little kid. That sort of self-preservation he’d been forced to adapt to . . . .”
I choke out, “What?”
But Karl keeps going. “I asked if he’d confronted Kellan, but he said, ‘What’s the point? She’s made her choice.’ I tried to tell him I didn’t think that was the case, but he wasn’t willing to keep talking.”
The air in the room disappears.
“Did you ever wonder why he was so insistent on getting those things, those Elders, away from us during the attacks that day? He didn’t want them anywhere near you. He was willing to do whatever it took, even if it meant getting hurt, to distract them from pursuing you. You should’ve seen Jonah after you took off with Raul and Kopano. He held it together around the others, but when it was just him and me, he was crazed with panic. And then you went and had Kellan come and get you.” Karl shakes his head again. “That poor guy.”
The air in the house disappears.
“Breathe, Chloe,” Karl says, startled by the expression on my face. He grabs my arms and yells the order at me.
I burst into tears. Right there in front of him.
Karl is clearly taken aback. It’s all well and good to talk to someone about the intricacies of enormous and complex emotions, but it’s an entirely different matter to see them in action. It takes him a moment to collect himself before rushing out of the room.
Just when I figure him to be a goner, he returns with a wad of tissues. He passes them over helplessly.
After about five minutes of watching me sob hysterically while awkwardly patting my arm, he tells me that, just this once, he’s going to let me go somewhere by myself. He doesn’t ask which brother I’ll be seeing first, and for that I’m grateful.
Chapter 28
Kellan’s car is parked exactly where I expect. He’s gone to the beach, the place where we first kissed.
He gives no indication he’s willing to acknowledge me at first, so I stand next to his car, mustering the courage to speak, as I watch him lie on the hood. “We should talk about what happened today.”
I worry he won’t answer, but he does. “Now you want to talk?”
There’s going to be no easy way out, but then, I don’t deserve one. I will myself not to break down into another sobbing, pathetic mess. He’s still refusing to look at me, so I reach out to touch him. “Kellan . . . .”
He rolls off the car and walks over to the guardrails. The waves are crashing in the distance, loud and heavy in the chilly air. “Fine, let’s talk,” he snaps. I flinch, because I’m not used to him sounding like this. “What should we start with? The fact you’ve known my brother for the majority of your life? That you two were . . . are? An item? How I’m the last one to know? You must’ve had a good laugh at that, right?”
“No!”
“How about what it’s like to find out I’ve been betrayed by the two people I stupidly trust the most?”
“I can explain,” I weakly counter, not even remotely knowing how I can.
“Really.” But he waits, knuckles white and tight against the rail.
I fumble for any words that can do the situation justice. “He and I . . . we met in our dreams, when we were little. I never thought he was real, not until he showed up in my math class . . . and . . . it was . . . confusing, because I thought maybe I’d gone crazy . . . and then, with the shifts—”
“Shifts!” he explodes. “That was you? Because of him?”
I cringe. The look on his face is awful, so absolutely awful. I’ve never seen such pain in his eyes before. I want to break down crying, beg for his forgiveness and mercy, but I know I need to stay strong and finish explaining. My voice is impossibly small: “Yes.”
He turns his back on me, leaning forward against the railing. When he speaks, it’s flat and unexpressive. “You’ve known him for thirteen years.”
“Yes.” Each breath is shuddery now, ready to fall apart. “I got even more confused, because I felt . . . feel things toward you, too . . . .”
A series of protective walls seem to slam down around him as his face becomes emotionless. It’s then I realize he doesn’t believe me. He’s got to feel it in me, but he’s so hurt that his emotions are shutting down and his brain is telling him that I’ve lied all along.
Kellan tilts his head away, back toward the black ocean. His words are clipped, clinical. “Did you know, that in all the years you a
nd my brother dreamed about each other, he never once mentioned you?”
I’d guessed it, of course, but even still, it hurts to hear this.
“The real kicker is how I never sensed it. Prior to today, I could’ve sworn I knew everything there is to know about Jonah. Now I feel like I don’t know him at all.”
“That’s not true,” I whisper.
Kellan pulls at his hair. “He hid you from me.” He laughs bitterly. “We never hide anything from one another. We’d hide a lot from everyone else, but never each other.”
My chest hurts from holding all of the sobs back. “I’m so sorry, so, so sorry . . . .”
“I’ve known he’s been angry at me for a while now, but he’s refused to talk about it. I didn’t know it was because of you. I felt the resentment, but . . . .” He stares down at his shoes.
I wait. The air stings as it moves in and out of my tightened lungs.
“He made it difficult for me,” he continues. “I guess I have to admit there was always something I sensed when you two were around each other, but I didn’t know what it was. He scrambled it in a way, to confuse me. And I chose to ignore whatever you projected. I just . . . I guess I was so tired of trying to get him to talk that I gave up and stopped asking.”
I grapple uselessly at the railing.
“We’re twins, Chloe. There’s a bond between us. It’s sort of hard to explain to someone who’s not a twin, but it’s like we’re tethered together. Normally we can feel each other, sense what the other is thinking or feeling. He must’ve compartmentalized you deep within. I never saw you, not once in all those years.” Kellan holds out his hands and stares at them, as if he’s surprised they’re empty. “Jonah’s pretty tight with his emotions and thoughts. I mean, we’re Emotionals, so it sort of comes with the territory . . . But hiding things from me?”
The tears I’ve been trying so hard to hold in break free and drip down past my nose. I snuffle like a dying cow or something.
“I confronted him today, after talking to Cora. Jonah says you two haven’t spoken yet, not once since we moved here. I guess I never really noticed that.” He slides a quick glance my way. “You even asked about that the other day. So I guess the question is, why not?”
It’s hard to sound coherent when all I want to do is bawl. “I . . . I d-don’t know.”
“Have you wanted to?”
I give a tiny nod. I lean against the guardrail, as close as possible to Kellan without touching him. I want to, desperately, but it’s got to be on his terms, not mine. He grips the rail again tightly, his fingers mere inches from my body. “What are you afraid of?”
His fingers are long and beautiful. I like the way they curve over mine when he holds my hand, how they feel in my hair when we kiss, and how easily they catch my tears when I cry. How do I tell him I’ve been afraid to talk to Jonah because I’m afraid of becoming hollow if he disappears again? “It’s killing him to not be able to talk to you.”
The words come out as hiccups. “Did he . . . did he t-tell you that?”
“I know my brother. I know that much at least.”
There is a small scab on one of his knuckles. I stare at it in horror. “Did you two . . . f-fight?”
He looks at the scab, too. “We argued, if that’s what you’re asking.”
I want to let go, allow the sobs to fully break through to release the pressure in my chest, but I can’t. Not here, not in front of Kellan, not even if he can feel the desperate pain in me. “Oh, oh, g-gods . . . I’m so, so s-sorry . . . .”
He bites his lip. “We were once one, you know.”
“One?” I manage.
“Identical twins always start out from one egg. We were a singular entity, even if it was for a tiny span of time. And now . . . .”
I nod like a bobblehead doll, over and over. I want to ask him if Jonah hates me, or if he, Kellan, hates me. But I don’t. I just keep bobbing my head, chewing my lip, and trying to breathe in a way to keep the sobs at bay.
“We moved here because of you.”
The bobbing slows and then stops.
“We moved here,” he continues, “because my brother influenced my father to do so. So he could be close to you. We left Maine, our family, all our friends, our school, the house my mother designed and had built before she died—all because of you. Because of what you mean to him. This all makes sense to me now.”
I feel like throwing up.
He finally turns to face me. “Here’s the thing. I absolutely hate that he’s hurting right now. I hate that there’s this huge wedge between us that’s never been there before.”
What can I even say to that?
“But,” he says, “you’re right. There’s something real between you and me. And he knows it.”
I am a horrible, horrible person. I’ve just hit the grand slam in a game of shitty things a girl can do to the people she loves. “Kellan,” I choke out—but honestly? Nothing I can say is remotely good enough.
He sighs and allows my hand to wrap around his. It’s cold, and he’s tired, so tired that his eyes are shadowed by dark purple-y smudges.
“I’m so mad right now, Chloe. So unbelievably angry at all of this.”
My heart feels too heavy to bear. And then he lets the protective wall around him slip a little. Just enough for me to see the truth of his emotions. His pain, his fears, his anger and sadness, mixed tightly together—and most importantly, the love he impossibly still feels for me.
But still . . . “I need some time away.” He says this even while his fingers slide between mine.
“Wh-what do you mean?”
“This is a lot right now. I need time to think about it all.” His free hand tugs at his hair again.
A nameless, scary emotion claws at me. “When?”
“I think it’s best I go tomorrow. After school.”
Breathe, Chloe. Breathe. “Where?”
He hesitates, but tells me. “Maine.”
“Oh.” The lump in my throat comes right back. I can’t believe he’s going to leave. Even worse, I don’t want him to.
Sometimes I wish he wasn’t so good at sensing my feelings. I wish I could just hide my misery, because then he wouldn’t feel the need to help me when he should be focusing on himself. “I’m coming back, Chloe. It’ll just be for a few days.”
“I know,” I say, and I’m back to the bobblehead doll action. “How . . . ?”
“Airplane. Portals are quick. I want the solo time to think.”
I try practicality and hope it’ll help me stay calm. “Where will you stay?”
“A friend’s. Or even our old house. It’s empty.”
Our hands have begun to grow warm together. Every other part of my body is freezing and on the verge of numbness. But not that hand. Not in his. “Can I take you to the airport?”
He agrees, and I’m not sure if it’s because it’s what he wants or because he thinks it’s what I want or need.
Kellan is leaving. And it’s all because of me.
Chapter 29
Jonah doesn’t come to school the next day.
Kellan and I have lunch together. It’s mostly a silent affair, with the two of us sitting on a bench outside, just sort of staring at random things.
I want to ask him where Jonah is, but that seems cruel. So I ask instead, “The Guard’s okay with you going? I mean, I go to San Francisco, and everyone freaks out.”
“They know I’m going.” Does Jonah? He must, right?
“Will you have a babysitter in Maine? Or is it a sentry-free zone?”
He laughs. Just a little. “I’ll be fine on my own.”
There’s never been any tension between us before, but here it is, acting like a freshly diagnosed illness. Even still, the pull toward him is unmistakable, impossible to ignore. I figure he feels it too—even with the anger, betrayal, and hurt—because he still chooses to be with me when he really should’ve kicked me to the curb.
The sun is shining brightly
in the chilly air when we get to the airport. Karl let me drive Kellan by myself, no arguments. I think he knew we needed this small slice of alone time together.
Not really being able to meet his eyes fully for any extended period of time, I ask, “Do you have any idea how long you’ll be gone?” A man dragging two suitcases behind him pushes past us, knocking me right into Kellan.
He freezes when we touch, as if he’s lost his breath. I quickly right myself and he pulls a hand through his hair, looking towards the airport doors. He ignores my question. “I should go and check in.”
My lip starts quivering, and I hate myself for it. “Okay.”
He sighs loudly, looking up toward the sky. “I’ll miss you.”
“Me, too,” I say, and it’s true.
Kellan pauses for moment, unsure. It’s such a rare sight that the guilt in me grows even bigger.
And there I am, standing in front of him, hating that he’s leaving, hating it’s because of me, loving him so much it hurts while at the same time knowing that the moment he’s gone, I’m going to go find Jonah.
Because it’s time.
I decided that last night. Good or bad, all the cards need to be laid out on the table. Jonah and Kellan had their talk. Kellan and I had ours. Now it was finally mine and Jonah’s turn.
I don’t tell Kellan this, though. What I do instead is open up my heart as I wrap my arms around him and let him know how much I care. I can’t say those words to him, not when things are so confusing and complicated. Not when I can’t promise that when he comes back, there’ll still be something between us to come back to.
We stand like that for a long time before he leans down, his lips barely brushing against mine, the tiny butterfly wings fluttering whisper soft against my heart. And then he grabs his bag and walks through the doors without looking back.
A Matter of Fate Page 22
