: Chapter 34

Payton

Before, May

His callused hands wrap around my torso, tugging me closer, and I go with a smile. All I can think is I want to stay here forever, wrapped in his warmth, in the strength of his arms and the heat of his body, wrapped with mine.

But I know it won’t last.

Soon, I’ll wake, and he’ll leave me like he always does.

“Deaton?” I whisper, flipping to face him, but the room is too dark.

And he never whispers back…

A touch so featherlight it sends tingles through my body, creating a trail of warmth along its path. They start at my shoulder, continuing down my arm at the slowest, most tender of paces. I wait for the feeling to return, for his touch to trail back up and start over again, but it never comes.

With an effort I don’t want to think too much about, I force my eyes to open, startled in the best way by the contentment in the ones staring back at me.

“It’s a little after seven,” Mason finally whispers. “Noah will be here to pick you guys up soon.”

Scooting a little closer, I clasp his hand in mine.

His gaze moves between my eyes, the smile that curves his lips sending a sliver of pain through my chest. Not because it’s tense or forced but the opposite. It’s real, raw. It’s promising and accepting, and because of this, it’s a bit startling.

My thoughts must show, because Mason’s eyes soften, and he reaches up, running his hand through the tangle of my hair, gently tucking it behind my ear.

“Pretty Little, there’s nothing to be sad about.”

“You’re being so good about this.”

“I only had hope before, wishing one day you could really be mine, but now I know you will be. Maybe not tomorrow or the next, but one day.”

Trying not to cry, I press my lips to his wrist just as his phone chimes behind him.

“That’s him.” He rolls over, picking up the phone and frowning at the screen. “He’s on his way from Ari’s dorm.”

I push up, accepting the sweater he passes me, and tug it over my body, slipping into a pair of sweats. “I should have gotten up sooner so Deaton doesn’t have to get in his car seat right after waking.”

“He’s been up for a little over an hour now.”

My head snaps up, and Mason shrugs.

“I wanted to play with him for a bit before you had to go.”

My insides melt, and I nod. “How much did he eat?”

“Little over half the big jar, but I didn’t give him a bottle yet. Figured maybe that would help him fall asleep again on the drive.”

“That’s perfect.”

Mason turns away. “I’ll…um…get him buckled in his seat and take the playpen down to the porch.”

“K” I whisper, and with every step, I remind myself this is right. I need to do this.

As I move through the motions of the morning, I do my best not to think. I focus on my toothbrush and the taste of the mint toothpaste. I note the bristles of the hair brush with each swipe through the crazy curls my braids left behind. I count the seconds it takes me to slip my socks and shoes on, and when I walk into the living space, Mason is on his butt in front of the car seat playing peekaboo, and the sadness I was expecting doesn’t come. Instead, gratitude is what winds through me.

Silently, we make our way outside. Only once we’re alone on the porch, the rest of the house still asleep this early on a Sunday morning, does Mason allow me to take the car seat from his hand.

I don’t want him to walk us to the car. It will feel too final.

“You can still change your mind, you know. I won’t be upset.”

“Oh no?” He tries to tease.

I shake my head. “You’re a handsome man in college.”

“Don’t forget the quarterback part,” he whispers.

A low chuckle leaves me, and we stare at each other for a long, heavy moment.

“You’ll text me when you get home?” he asks, and I hate the hesitance in his tone, but I understand it.

“I will.”

“And I’ll see you when I come to Oceanside next week?”

“Of course,” I breathe.

Finally, Mason sighs. When he steps forward, his right hand gently brushes along Deaton’s curls while his left cups my neck, drawing my forehead to his.

“I love you, Pretty Little.”

All the air whooshes from my lungs.

“I will wait forever for just the chance you’ll love me back.”

Mason pulls away, turning before I can look up into his big brown eyes, and I’m stuck, standing there on the porch as I watch the man I never saw coming go.

I can’t move.

I can hardly breathe.

I stumble slightly, lowering the car seat to the ground and thrusting my hand out to catch myself on the wall.

My lungs burn, my throat is clogged, and I desperately seek the air they refuse, but it doesn’t come.

A hand presses to my back, and I jolt.

“Close your eyes,” Noah says calmly. “Close your eyes, and count to ten. Come on.”

My chin wobbles, and my body shakes, but I do as he says, and the fog clears when I get to eight for the second time. Opening my eyes, I look into Noah’s.

There’s an understanding there, a softness as he nods, grabs my elbow, and lifts the car seat from the ground. “You don’t want to stand here like this. If I know what he’s thinking and how he’s feeling right now, he’s only seconds from coming back out this door. And if not him, someone else will.”

“He told me he loves me.”

Noah smiles softly, gently urging me to move. “I heard. That’s how I know we don’t have a lot of time. I don’t know what’s going on, but I do know you have to decide if you want to wait for him to come back or if you want to be gone when he does.”

I don’t want to be gone when he does.

I have to be.

I allow Noah to lead me to the curb, and we climb inside.

Just before we take the right turn off the street, my eyes flick to the mirror, and sure enough, there he is, standing at the edge of the driveway.

When the car turns, tearing him from my sight, it’s like a crack in the earth’s surface, a thundering boom that jolts deep in my chest, and I suddenly regret everything I said last night. I want to take it all back.

That’s what he does to me, though. He makes me forget everything I’ve lost, because with him in my life, I’ve gained so much more.

Why would I ask for time?

I don’t need time.

No, that’s not right. I do need it, but I need more of it with him, not without. “I think we should go back.” I turn toward Noah.

Noah looks over at me, a sorrowful expression on his face, as if he knows what I’m going through. He understands the overwhelming emotions that come with love and loss and everything else both bring. He lost everything, too, hit rock bottom before he found a way to start the climb back up.

Noah pulls to the curb, speaking softly. “We have a little wiggle room, so long as we’re on the road in the next half hour.”

“That’s perfect. I need…just five more minutes.”

Just five more minutes.

That would only make you want five more.

My entire body locks tight, my vision blurring as a weight like I’ve never known falls over me.

My mind reels as I search for the memory those words live in, but it’s not a memory, at least not a real one.

They’re from my dream.

My dream of Deaton.

I grip the door handle, my knees bouncing.

Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god.

Deep brown eyes and soft dark hair.

Strong hands and callused fingers.

I close my eyes and concentrate.

And there it is.

There he is.

Mason’s handsome face, right there across from me. Beside me.

Above me.

My body starts to shake, months’ worth of dreams assaulting me, one after another.

“You should have seen the sunset…”

“I did.”

“He is so going to be one of those beach boys when he grows up.”

“I look forward to seeing that.”

“He’s you, Payton, and maybe he’ll be a bit of me one day, too.”

“Why are you so far?”

“I’m right here, baby.”

A choked cry escapes, and I slap my hand over my mouth.

It’s him.

It’s…Mason.

He’s been the man in my dreams, not Deaton.

But for how long? When did I lose him?

Tears fall in steady streams, rolling down my cheeks in quick succession as a cold, hard hate creeps through my veins.

How could I?

“Payton?” A soft hand brushes my arm, and I jump, remembering where I am.

With panic in my eyes and guilt so goddamn heavy I might pass out, I meet Noah’s gaze.

“What do you need from me?” he gently asks, a knowing look in his eye.

“Drive,” I manage to choke out. “Please, drive.”

Noah says not a word, but the vehicle shifts into motion, and my mind spins with each turn of the wheels.

I don’t know how I missed it.

I should have known, should have seen it coming, but I didn’t.

I was blindsided, now smacked into reality with the hardest, rawest of truths I ignored but can no longer deny. It’s a reality so painful, I’d swear my heart was literally bleeding if I didn’t know any better.

The love I hold for the boy who is no longer here…is but a spark to the flame of the man who is.

And that’s the ugly truth right there. That’s where the fear takes root.

The death of Deaton left a hole in my heart, but that hole has been filled.

It overflows now, liquid warmth pouring through my every vein and covering me in a blanket of belonging I’ve never experienced before.

It’s completely and utterly terrifying in an entirely new way.

Because what happens if that blanket is ripped from my back and I’m left exposed and colder than ever?

What happens to my innocent baby boy if I fall to my knees, and this time I can’t get back up, because that is exactly what will happen. There isn’t a doubt in my mind. If faced with the loss of Mason Johnson, I will shatter into a million tiny pieces, never to be put back together again.

Losing him would be my undoing, the final blow to my already battered being.

He put me back together, but if he was gone, no one could repair the damage that would cause.

He’s everything I didn’t know I needed and more than I ever thought I’d have, so again…

What happens to me, to my little boy, if the cold cruel world were to take him from me?

If he himself decided to go?

I can’t allow myself to find out.

I have to protect myself, and there’s only one way to do that.

Mason’s beautiful face slips to the forefront of my mind, and I sob silently.

I have to break my promise.