“I love you, Sienna, with every heart-wrenching bit of me,” Kayden says hoarsely. “But I can’t forgive myself for what happened.”
“But I forgive you! Isn’t that enough?” I fire back, shaking my head. “Don’t go.”
“Please step away,” Kayden says quietly.
“No.”
He squeezes his eyes shut, holding his own tears back in.
“I’m trying to be a good person here.”
“I DON’T WANT YOU TO BE THE GOOD PERSON! I WANT YOU TO BE WITH ME!” I yell with the kind of pathetic desperation I’ve never experienced before. Because despite me finding weakness in begging and groveling for someone like this, I do know that this is worth fighting for.
Kayden is worth fighting for.
I’m shaking so hard when I reach up to cup his face with my hands, searching for any doubt in his eyes that can help me sway him. But Kayden’s expression remains passive and it hurts, it hurts everywhere because I know he wants to be with me despite him saying otherwise. I know it to be the truth, etched deeply in my heart.
“Fight for me, Kayden,” I plead. “Please. Fight for us.
Just let whatever happened in that cage go. Just let it go.”
He looks away, his eyes fluttering shut, each fallen tear a painful reminder that my words don’t— won’t—mean a single thing to him.
“You and I both know it’s not easy to just let things go,” Kayden declares, tapping on my shoulder to show me that he’s giving up the fight. The only fight that matters. I shake my head, wishing that this wasn’t real, that this wasn’t happening right now and my heart wasn’t about to crumble into dust and ash.
But . . . I have to face the hard truth.
I’ve got nothing else left to say that’ll convince him to stay. And he won’t listen to me otherwise.
And this time, when Kayden nudges me aside so he can leave the apartment, I don’t stop him.
I let him go.