Adam's List(54)

His thumb grazes over my forearm, sending my hormones on a collision course with my willpower. “Why do I get the feeling there’s something more to it that you aren’t telling me?”

I turn away from him to watch the skyline of Chicago lazily drift past. My eyes fall on the Sears tower. Jason tried like hell to convince me to stand in the clear glass box at the top that overlooks the city. Just the thought of doing it, however, threw me into a panic attack. There was a terribly long line for the elevator to go back down, so we dashed down the emergency steps for a few floors until we collapsed against a wall, eventually laughing at how ridiculous we must’ve looked to the other tourists.

Whenever I have the worst nightmares involving Jason where I wake myself with wailing sobs or panicked screams, I try to lean on those kinds of memories. I try to recall the way his cheeks pushed up when he smiled, the way he held me on his parents’

porch, or the way his lips felt when we kissed.

I’ll do anything to avoid the memory of breaking up with him, or the devastating call I got three days later.

Adam touches my arm. “Would you look at me, please?”

Fluttering my lashes, I look down. “There was a guy I dated junior and senior year.

His name was Jason. We were the kind of couple everyone thought would end up getting married and living happily ever after. I was the captain of the cheerleading squad, he was the quarterback. It was like we were living some kind of stereotype.”

I wipe at a few stray tears. “Jason was a great guy. Everyone loved him. They all thought he was a hero when he signed up for the Marine Corps our senior year. You’d think I would’ve been proud of him, but I was secretly pissed that he did it. I went on this self-pity trip where I wondered how he could do such a thing to me. I was so worried what I would do while he was over in Afghanistan. I didn’t understand how I was expected to just wait around for him for five years while he was off being a hero and I was stuck in the same spot, going to the local college and trying to figure out how to be my own person instead of being half of this amazing couple everyone held on a pedestal.”

Adam’s fingers trail up and down my arm. “You don’t have to tell me this.”

I shrug, still unable to look him in the eye. “You wanted to know. Anyway, while he was over there, I messed around with someone one night. It wasn’t anything more than kissing, but I was mad, and lonely, and a little drunk, I guess. It doesn’t excuse what I did to Jason. I was too much of a coward to tell him, so I told him we were finished. I was having fun in college, and didn’t want to worry about my boyfriend on the other side of the world. It was selfish. He was off defending our country, and I was busy hitting keggers. You can’t get any more shallow than that.”

“You’re being too hard on yourself.”

I wipe at my face and shake my head. “Just wait, there’s more. I got a call from his mom a few days later, saying there was an accident involving Jason and an IED. She was crying so hard I could barely understand her. At first I thought there must be some kind of mistake, or that they were joking around and Jason was coming home to surprise me because he was really upset when I broke up with him. He kept texting me and sending messages on Facebook, saying he didn’t want it to be over between us.

When I pulled up to their house and saw all the cars in the driveway, I knew it was real. I knew he was dead. I spent the night driving around. My parents had to find me using the GPS on my phone. I blacked out in a park downtown.”

I tried everything I could after Jason’s funeral to suppress the visions of him wearing his dress uniform inside his coffin, but I slipped into an arresting state of guilt that took over for months afterwards. Whenever I remember his mom’s call, or how I broke up with him, I feel the dark tentacles of depression sinking into my brain, threatening to pull me back under.

Adam reaches up to pull stray hairs from my face, his expression tender. “Jewels...”

I spin away, letting his hand fall from my arm. “You don’t understand. Right before he died for our country, I kissed someone else. I dumped him when he was on the other side of the world, homesick and dodging bullets. I should’ve been his emotional support.

I should’ve been there whenever he needed me. Instead I told him I couldn’t wait around for him. So now you know exactly what kind of a royal bitch you’re galavanting around with. I won’t blame you if you want nothing to do with me.”

Adam wraps his arms wrap around my waist and rests his chin on my shoulder, his body pressed up against mine. “I’m sorry he died. But you didn’t know when you broke up with him that it was going to happen. How could you? It was just shitty timing. You can’t beat yourself up over it.”