by DC Renee
And I needed to make it right. I needed to spend the rest of my life making it up to her and showing her just how truly wonderful she was. Who better to do that than the person responsible for her self-doubt in the first place?
Like a final blow to an already dying man, she walked out, and I didn’t follow. “You can’t lose something you never had.”
The thing was, though, I had her. I know I did. And that made her mine. I just had to find a way to get her to see that too.
CHAPTER SIXTY-NINE
Present
Genevieve
“HOLY SHIT, YOU actually did it?” Amanda asked as I walked into the apartment. It was still early, but I knew Amanda had some schoolwork to do before the birthday spa day she’d planned for us. “You really told him everything?” she asked after looking at my appearance.
I knew I looked like I’d been steamrolled over. My clothes were most likely disheveled from how quickly I’d put them on; my hair was definitely a mess since I hadn’t run my fingers, much less a comb through them since I’d woken up. The terms “bedhead” and “sex hair” described me at that moment.
But what was probably the dead giveaway that something bad had happened was my crestfallen face, my perpetual frown, and my sad, red, puffy eyes.
I’d cried at Cam’s place as I lashed out at him, but that seemed like child’s play compared to the body-wracking sobs that came out of me as I made my way home. It had taken me twice as long to get to the apartment.
“Not quite,” I said through tears.
“That motherfucking asshole broke up with you?” She screeched so loudly I was sure the tenants two buildings over heard her. “On your birthday?” she yelled.
“I slept with him,” I blurted out.
“That explains it,” she mused before perking up. “He hurt you. I’ll kill him,” she said, and I had a feeling she was two seconds away from walking out of the door and going over to accost Cam.
“No,” I told her to calm her down. He had hurt me, but not in the way she had assumed. “But now he knows,” I said dejectedly. I had no more energy to argue or explain or even speak at a normal volume. “He knows everything. And I left.”
“And he let you?” Amanda asked, and as odd as her response was, I’d actually questioned the same thing several times. I hadn’t wanted him to follow me. I hadn’t wanted him to come after me or stop me, but at the same time, I hadn’t wanted him not to fight for me either. If he loved me, truly loved me, as he said he did—as Cam, not Tyler—then shouldn’t he have fought a little harder and tried a little more? I wouldn’t have caved, but I felt like I needed that. I had come a long way from the scared little girl, but my confidence hadn’t ever made a full recovery. No matter the circumstances, no woman—or person—wanted to think that they were easy to let go. It was the perfect catch-22.
I didn’t respond to Amanda. I didn’t need to. My appearance said everything there was to say about the entire situation.
“Oh, Gen,” she said with sincere empathy as she opened her arms, and I stepped into them easily.
We stayed like that for quite some time, only shifting to sit on the couch, her arms still cradling me like a child when we got tired of standing. I cried for the past and for the memories that still haunted me. I cried for the girl I’d been, and the woman I wasn’t finished becoming. I cried for the pain Tyler had inflicted, and the pain Cam added. I cried for trying to break Cam’s heart when I only succeeded in breaking my own. I cried that I cared and that Cam didn’t seem to. I cried for it all and so much more.
And when I had no more tears to shed, I told Amanda all the details—from the moment I’d walked into Cam’s home until the moment I left.
She said nothing and just listened, which was exactly as I needed her to do even though I could tell she wanted to say so much. Sometimes, you just needed someone to listen and not give advice. Especially if the advice came from a biased person.
“Okay. Enough crying and enough moping. It’s your birthday, and we have plans.”
I tried to argue and tell her I wasn’t up for it. I didn’t want to go anywhere; I just wanted to stay home and crawl into bed, but Amanda was persistent. And she insisted that a relaxing spa day was exactly what I needed.
And you know what? She was right.
The tension didn’t leave me all day, but at least I had other things to focus on, and with Amanda practically glued to my side, I couldn’t dwell on anything for too long. She wouldn’t let me.
So just for that day, I could have a tiny reprieve from what my life had come to. And then come tomorrow, I knew it would all hit me again.
CHAPTER SEVENTY
Past
Cameron
One week earlier …
What did a guy do when his heart had literally been ripped out of his chest, but he knew he deserved it? He apparently wallowed in self-pity for a good day. Not my finest moment, but I doubt that topped the list of shitty things I’d done in my life.
I hated watching Gen walk away from me, and I knew I wasn’t going to just let her go. I knew that with everything in me, but knowing it and getting your heart and mind on the same page was another thing. I felt like I didn’t deserve her; like maybe she would be better off without me. Maybe this was fate’s way of stepping in and stopping her from being saddled with a lowly piece of shit like me. And then I’d remember that I had been the one to cause all her pain, and I’d have to be the one to fix it. But then doubt would creep in. I’d hear Charles laughing at me, telling me I was nothing—and what could nothing do to help heal a broken woman?
This lasted for a few hours or maybe more like half a day before I finally found the courage to do what I needed to do—win my woman back.
The problem was that I had no fucking idea how to do it.
I started with the basics. I texted her and called her the entire way I drove like a madman to her apartment. She didn’t respond to my texts and didn’t pick up my calls. It was absolutely no surprise she didn’t open the door for me. I vaguely recalled that she had a spa day planned with Amanda … on her birthday.
God, I was such a fucking asshole. I’d broken her on her birthday. As if I didn’t feel like a piece of shit already, I’d ruined the one day everyone deserved to feel extra special. Not that Gen didn’t deserve that every day, but this was worse.
I didn’t know if she had actually reached the spa or if she was huddled in the apartment avoiding me. I waited by the door for over an hour, hoping and praying she’d open it. I continued to call, continued to text her, continued to call out her name, and continued to bang on the door. I finally had to leave when a neighbor came out and threatened to call the cops.
I didn’t stop calling, though, or texting. I did this constantly, all day, all night, every day.
And I didn’t stop showing up at her place. The only difference was that most of the time, Amanda was there, opening the door to shove me away and not let me in.
“Haven’t you done enough?” she’d ask. “Can’t you leave her in peace?”
“I love her,” I’d respond.
“You don’t let people you love just walk away without a fight.”
“I’m fighting now.”
“That remains to be seen.”
It was the same conversation with different words each time.
Sometimes, Amanda wasn’t there, and no one answered, and sometimes, the neighbor saw me and glared at me until I retreated. If I wasn’t in class, I was at practice, and if I wasn’t at practice, I was desperate to reach Gen.
If at the end of all this, she turned me away, then so be it, but she needed to hear me out; she needed to hear everything I should have told her that day—everything she deserved to know about me, about who I was, and about what had happened to me.
If who I was inside made her cringe when she looked at me, then I’d know it was over, but she couldn’t make that kind of decision until she knew me—the real me.
I thought I’d at least catc
h her at her classes. We didn’t share any this semester, but I knew her schedule like I knew my own. I waited at each one, skipping some of my own classes and not giving a damn. But she never showed. It was like she’d turned into a ghost and disappeared into the wind.
I needed a better plan to figure out how to find her and get a hold of her, even if it was just for a minute. That was all I needed. I just needed a minute of her time, and I prayed that would lead to more. I just had to figure that out first.
CHAPTER SEVENTY-ONE
Present
Genevieve
“YOU CAN’T IGNORE him forever,” Amanda said after my phone pinged with a text message. I didn’t have to look to know it was Cam. “Hell, you’re not just ignoring him; you’re ignoring life.”
After my birthday, Amanda had voiced her opinion, and she hadn’t stopped voicing it ever since. She hurt for me, I know she did, and she was angry Cam had let me walk out and didn’t automatically “fight” for me. I think she was irked more about that than anything else that had happened.
“You said you were letting the past go,” she told me. “Yet the minute it comes back, you let it control your life. It was a dream, Gen. A dream,” she emphasized. “You said yourself he’s different, so why not accept that? Why not accept that Tyler and Cam are two different people? Heck, if I can stop calling him Tam, you know that’s something, right?” she joked, trying unsuccessfully to lighten the mood.
“But they’re not,” I argued. “I had a moment of weakness when I let my guard down, and then my mind kicked back in and reminded me of who he truly was.”
“That’s not true. You got scared, and you ran away.”
“Please, Mandie, I need you on my side,” I begged.
“I’m always on your side, Gen. I just don’t always like being there.”
For the past week, she’d turned him away, telling him to leave me alone. She had my back but hated it the entire time. “Just hear him out,” she said as she read the text message.
They say a coward deleted messages without reading or listening. I say those people were dead wrong. A coward read them and listened to them because they didn’t have the courage to shut the person out completely. That was me. I read each text and heard each plea.
They were all some variation of the same. His words and his voice begged me to talk to him, pleaded with me to see him, and asked me to give him time to explain. With each passing day, my resolve to shut him out dwindled.
Would it really hurt to just listen to what he had to say? Would it really do more damage than it already had?
I wasn’t sure of the answers, but I was sure of one thing—I would break if I saw him, and not the life-ruining kind of break, but the cave into him kind. Despite all the pain, despite my hatred of Tyler, despite the hurt I’d felt toward Cam, I still cared about him. Still wanted to be with him. Still … dare I say … loved him? He’d told me he loved me, and I believed him. Amanda told me I loved him, but I didn’t believe her. Now … the loss was so apparent it felt as if my heart was no longer in my chest—it laid by my side all week, slowly beating to the rhythm of agony. Was that love? Was what I’d been feeling all along love? Had I fallen for Cam despite Tyler?
I didn’t believe it even then.
“Fine, whatever, don’t hear him out,” Amanda huffed. “But at least get out of the house,” she all but demanded.
“I do get out,” I protested.
“No, you sneak out when you know Cam has class or has practice. And you only go to get food or something when I can’t bring you back anything.” It was true. I’d been avoiding everything that had to do with everyday life, even skipping class. I sent my professors emails explaining that I was sick. What they didn’t know was the sickness I suffered was called a broken heart.
I’d say it was a broken spirit, but Tyler had already claimed that pain in high school. Ironically, it was Cam who had built it back up. And now everything had fallen apart.
“Gen, I love you, but what you’re doing … It’s not right for you or him. If it’s over, then tell him, tell him to his face, so he knows it once and for all.”
“I did.”
“No, you argued and then walked out without giving him a chance to fight.”
“He didn’t say a damn word.”
“He was in shock,” she told me. “You had plenty of time to process the truth, yet you didn’t give him any. Look, I don’t like him just taking your shit and watching you leave any more than you do but give him some credit. He’s been making up for it all week.” She sighed when I said nothing. “All I’m saying is you need to face him one way or another. The longer you wait, the harder it gets. And this, what you’re doing here, isn’t letting go of the past; this is living right in it. I got to get to class, but please think about what I said,” she told me before walking out.
The thing was I’d already been thinking about it. I had been teetering on the edge of two decisions, and Cam’s not giving up, along with Amanda’s constant words, were pushing me toward one side. I just had to find the courage to take that final step.
CHAPTER SEVENTY-TWO
Past
Cameron
One day earlier …
“AMANDA, PLEASE,” I begged after I practically ran her down on her way to class from her apartment. I wasn’t above pleading at that point.
“Gen’s my friend,” she said after I told her I needed her help.
“Which is exactly why you should help me.”
“I want to,” she admitted. “I really do, but I can’t betray Gen’s loyalty.”
“I just need five minutes,” I told her. “Just five minutes to explain everything. To tell her why I did what I did to her. To make her understand that I’m not that person anymore. To share everything about myself. And if she still decides she doesn’t want anything to do with me, then I’ll leave her alone.” Not likely. I didn’t mention that part. Although I probably should if she didn’t want anything to do with me after she’d learn the whole truth. She didn’t deserve to be saddled with an asshole like me in the first place, but especially not if she couldn’t handle the crap brewing inside me.
“You think I haven’t been trying to convince her to hear you out? She needs time, Cam.”
“I understand that, but the longer she doesn’t know the truth, the longer she’s hurting. I can’t have that. I won’t have that.”
“Funny coming from the guy who caused all her pain in the first place.” She snorted and then had the decency to look appalled at her words.
“I deserve that. It’s true, but goddammit, Amanda, I love her. I don’t want her hurting.”
“You can start by apologizing. Ever tried that?” she responded somewhat sarcastically.
“I did. I tried that years ago,” I told her.
“What? She never told me that.”
“I don’t think she knew. I didn’t know her, not really. It was a while ago anyway, and I was apologizing to a nameless girl. It doesn’t matter now.” I brushed it away. “I want to apologize to her now face to face, but she won’t hear me out.”
“She’ll come around,” Amanda said as she patted my shoulder.
“I can’t take that chance.”
“Look, Cam. I believe you. I do. I believe you’re not really a douchebag. I believe you love her. I believe you have your reasons for what you did. And I believe that you’d hurt yourself before hurting her ever again. So trust me when I say I’m on your side. I’ve actually tried telling her that she needs to let go of the past and give you a chance. She’s hurting now, really hurting. She’s reliving it all, and when she thinks of you, she thinks of who you were, not who you are now. She won’t listen to anything I say, so the only thing I can think of is giving her time to decide her next steps.”
“If she just gave me a few minutes, I know she wouldn’t need any more time, whichever direction she goes.”
“And how do you propose you’re going to get her to give you those few minutes?”
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“That’s exactly why I need your help,” I responded, and when I saw a spark of interest in Amanda’s eyes, I knew I’d get my chance. I just hoped it would work. And I hoped that when she heard me out, she wouldn’t run for the hills because God knows I’d be chasing her right over them.
CHAPTER SEVENTY-THREE
Present
Genevieve
“YOU NEED TO SEE this,” Amanda told me as she shoved her phone in my face. I briefly saw Cam’s Facebook profile, and I pushed the phone away.
“There’s nothing there I want to see,” I told her.
“Do you trust me?” she asked with raised eyebrows, challenging me to tell her anything but, “Yes.”
“Mandie, please. This week has been hell as it is. I can’t go out because I’m afraid I’ll see him. I can’t sleep because I keep thinking about him. I can’t function because the pain is unbearable. Don’t make this harder on me. I was just thinking of finally getting out of the house today.”
“That’s exactly why you need to see this.” I should have known she was up to something when she stormed into the apartment like someone was chasing her. She hadn’t been in the door more than two seconds before she practically attacked me with her phone.
