My heart sank. “I’m sorry you had to go through that, Aston.”
“I’m not asking you to be sorry!” He walked out of the room and sat back down on the edge of the bed. Running his hand through his hair, he looked up at me and said calmly, “I’m asking you to be with me. When I’m distant, bring me back again. When I’m too busy, remind me how much I belong to you. I want you, El, and I want to find a balance.”
How was he supposed to find a balance when all his years were spent chasing after me and then fading into his room for weeks at a time? He had to pick one thing over the other. I knew that, he just didn’t want to accept it.
“It’s not going to work,” I whispered to him quietly. “We wouldn’t last, Aston.”
“Not with that attitude.”
“It’s the truth.”
He looked defeated and desperate. His knee bobbed up and down and I could see the wheels spinning inside his head. “Then I’ll stay,” he finally said. “I’ll stay and be with you.”
“You’re being absurd –”
“So what would you rather do? You want me to listen to Dad’s advice like I already tried doing? You want us to be apart and pine for each other? You expect me to stay there and accept that you might love someone else eventually?”
“There’s nobody.”
“Odds are against me. You’re so fucking beautiful, and you’re funny and you’re…just amazing, El, you’re bound to attract a whole fucking slew of men. Those aren’t odds I’m willing to take.”
I sighed, frustrated. “You can’t use numbers for everything in life, Aston. That’s not how it works. You don’t know that will happen.”
“But I’m right, and you know it. So I’ll pack it all up and come here and be with you, and that way we’ll make it work –”
“No!” I yelled at the top of my lungs. Goddammit, didn’t he understand? “You can’t throw it all away, Aston! You’re meant to get out of here and make something of yourself! And I’m not going to be with you and watch you settle for less. It’d be like watching you degenerate. We can’t. I’m…a fucking mess, Aston. I’ve got rage issues and I’m depressed. I…I am absolutely pathless right now, and I’m terrified of being destructive to you. Being isolated in a city outside my comfort zone is the last thing that is healthy for me right now.”
He looked at me for a painfully long time. He was beaten. I could see it in his eyes. He was beaten and it was killing him.
“So that’s it then?” he said resentfully. “We just go our separate ways.”
I looked away from him. “We…live our lives, Aston.”
“I succeed, build an empire, all the while you’re absent and stuck in this piece of shit town. Does that sound fair?”
I scoffed disdainfully. “Actually, yeah, it does, Aston. It sounds like life.”
He tilted his head to the side. “You are such a disappointment, you know that? You are weak. Weak for not even trying.”
“I’m strong for letting you go live your potential,” I replied evenly, glaring back at him. “Maybe one day you won’t be so fucking selfish and realize that.”
“I’m not selfish for wanting you. For the first time in my life, I’m a fucking idiot for wanting you, El. I should’ve kept you at a distance. Dad would have been alive. You’d have sulked and drowned in your fucking angst, but you probably would have moved on eventually. We’d have been fine, and I wouldn’t be sitting here trying to talk you into being with me and hearing you feed me bullshit about choosing a different path over you.”
He stood and moved to me slowly. His eyes were cold, colder than I’d ever seen them before. I didn’t move as he approached. Despite how much his words cut me to the bone, I stood tall and waited.
“Thank you for breaking my heart,” he whispered, close enough his breaths hit my face. “I’ll leave you in peace and give you what you want. But that’s fucking it, El. I close that door and I’m not going to open it back up again.”
I rolled my eyes in spite of his seriousness. “Don’t make promises you can’t keep.”
“You think I’m talking shit?”
“I think you’re trying to hurt me, and you’ll be back in this room next week, fucking me, holding me, asking me to be with you again.”
“Is that right?”
“You’re obsessed with me.”
“Fuck you, El.”
“Yeah, whatever. You know it’s true.”