“I bet it is.”
“You don’t understand,” Kennedy said.
“I do. I understand exactly. Because he put me in the same position 16 years ago!”
“But he fixed it…”
“Fixed what? My life is a fucking mess because of him!”
“I don’t think that’s fair,” Kennedy said. “You’re the one that didn’t come back when you escaped...”
“I did come back!”
“What?” She pushed herself up to face me. “When?”
I climbed out of her bed and started pacing. God, the last thing I wanted to do was relive this moment. I still remembered feeling like I couldn’t breathe. Running to James and Rob’s treehouse. It felt like my life was over. Like I’d lost my whole world.
I shook my head. No. It didn’t compare to what I was feeling now. Because I actually had lost my whole world now. And this was worse.
I was just a kid back then. Matt betrayed me. He didn’t feel sorry. And that was the end of our story. I was young and stupid, and this shouldn’t still hurt so fucking much.
My feet finally stopped pacing and I turned to Kennedy. “When I escaped…I came back to him right away.”
Kennedy shook her head. “That can’t…but he still thinks you’re dead, Brooklyn.”
“We made all these promises to each other. He was the only thing that kept me going, really. Knowing he was out there missing me as much as I was missing him. My dad startedbringing me photos. Showing him hanging out with other girls. Drinking, partying with his friends. But I fixated on his eyes.” I tried to picture one of those old photos. “He looked as sad as me. My dad was just messing with my head. I was sure of it.”
“He was sad,” Kennedy said. “He was barely holding it together. You two must have been feeling exactly the same way.”
I shook my head. “That’s what I wanted to believe. I convinced myself it was true. That he needed me as much as I needed him. But it didn’t look like he was missing me when I came to his house at the end of the next summer.”
Kennedy just waited.
“He was banging some random brunette in his family’s pool.” Her face was permanently etched into my memory. Her laughing. Her hands on my man. And worse, his hands on her. His laugh. His smile. He was so happy.
“Brooklyn…”
“He broke me. And he promised not to do that. He promised me.” I shook my head. He’d promised me a lot of things. And he’d broken all of them.
“He thought you were dead.”
“Yeah. But he didn’t even wait a year. I would have waited a lifetime for him.” It was dumb and naïve. But it was still true. I’d loved him so much.
Kennedy opened her mouth and then closed it.
There wasn’t really anything else to say. I got her point. Matt thought I was dead. So of course he was allowed to put his dick into whoever he wanted. Of course he was allowed to be happy. I just never expected him to move on so quickly. It made me feel worse than being his dirty little secret. It made me feel like I’d never meant anything at all.
And just thinking about that hurt made the knife in my chest ease. I’d made the right choice all those years ago. I wouldn’t undo a second of it. I’d let Matt go. I repeated it over and over to myself until I exhaled slowly. I’d let him go.
“So you didn’t speak to him when you visited?”
“He was a little busy.” I sat down on the edge of her bed.
“I really think you should speak to him now.”
“And say what, Kennedy? We were done 16 years ago.”
She shook her head. “Whoever that girl was in his pool, it meant nothing, I’m sure of it. He was just trying to…”
