Good thing there’s a wall behind me, or is it the lone dresser in his room?
I can’t tell.
All I know is that I’m very glad that I have something to lean on. Because my knees have gone weak. My knees are trembling. They’re knocking against each other.
And I wish I could simply collapse.
I wish I could… touch him.
Gosh, I want to touch him. So,sobadly.
And now that I know why it’s very hard to stop myself.
But I feel like if I do, he might break. He’s so tightly wound in this moment.
So tightly coiled, as though revealing this one vulnerable thing about himself might ruin him.
It might ruin me too.
So I wait and ask, “You know it was wrong, though, don’t you?”
“Yeah.”
“You hurt me. Even though you didn’t want to.”
“I know.”
“You used itagainstme, Reign. You used my deepest, darkest thoughts against me.”
His chest shudders with a breath. “I know and I…”
“You what?”
And then I do break him.
Without laying a single finger on him, I watch him crack.
I watch him shift on his feet.
I watch him yank his hands out of his pockets and rake his fingers through his spiky hair. He even tugs on a few strands as he replies, “And I regret it, all right? I fucking regret using it against you. I fucking regret ever touching your diary. Touching something…” His features ripple with disgust, self-recrimination as he takes a couple of steps toward me and then back. “I regret touching something so precious and pure. But I… Like an asshole, I couldn’t stop myself and then you were… you wouldn’t listen. Youwouldn’t…”
Finally, he sighs, his shoulders rolling up and down, and stares into my eyes, his own swimming with torment. “What I said that night was bullshit. That fucking ultimatum crap. I did it to scare you. I did it so you’d run and you’d run straight into his arms where you belong. But here you fucking are.Again. Here you are, being a good fucking girl, trying to save me. I don’t need you to fucking save me, all right? What I need from you is to go. Go run off to your boyfriend and live your happily ever after. What Ineedfrom you, Echo, is to stop coming after me. With your big brown eyes and your goddamn pink dresses. I don’t even know why you’re wearing pink tonight or why your lips shine like that. Like, what is that shit? Why’s your pouty mouth glittering like a fucking target, like something that I can’t look away from. I don’t know and I don’t fucking care. All I care about is that you leave me the fuck alone. Because if you don’t, I’m going to do worse things to you than just reading your fucking diary. Do you understand?”
I do.
I understand that he was trying to scare me that day. I mean, he’s the guy who’s kept my secrets, big and small, over the years. I always knew that he’s never going to out me.
That’s why I want to smack him and punch him for trying to push me away like that.
I also understand that he’s in pain. That I’m making him hurt.
Probably like he hurt me when he read my diary. Probably more than even his bruises. Because I’ve seen him handle them well.
But this…this, he isn’t handling well.
Me being here in my pink dress and my pink lipstick.
His ex-best friend’s ex-girlfriend. That he’s wanted for so long and hated himself for it.