“Don’t be sorry,” I soothe. “Just tell me what happened.”
His brown eyes meet mine for a moment, grief and guilt swimming in his gaze, and then they drop back to the edge of the couch between his thighs like he can’t bear to look at me while he talks.
“Savannah ambushed me. She brought her parents to my house while I was out at lunch with you.”
My heart drops straight through my gut to the floor, and my grip on his hands goes slack. Who knew seven words could change the whole world?
“They told Mom and Dad. I tried to explain everything, but her parents kept interrupting me. Dad was pissed, and I couldn’t get anyone to listen. I don’t have proof of anything, anyway, and it just…”
He trails off miserably, shaking his head. His hands slide from my grasp, both of us limp and struggling for thought, much less words. I don’t need to ask, but the words fall from my mouth anyway.
“What did your parents say?”
I’m terrified to hear the answer out loud, but I can’t sit and wonder. It’s bad enough that Savannah would stoop that low, and I can’t imagine how gutted Bo feels, but he’s not the only one getting fucked over here. I know David is a traditionalist, and I know what he’ll expect of Bo, but maybe Hailey will have more sympathy for the situation. For us.
“Dad expects me to marry Savannah.” The words sound like they hurt him to say, but they stab me straight through to my core. “He told me to cut things off with you and go back to being friends and take responsibility for my actions.”
His voice breaks on the last few words, and my heart shatters along with it.
Fresh tears pour from his eyes, and he hunches over as sobs wrack his body, but I can do nothing but watch in abject horror. My vision tunnels until all I see is the man I love trembling in front of me, shadows dancing at the edges of my sight. Am I going to pass out from the sheer shock of it? This can’t be real, can it?
A few words can’t mean the end of things.
It can’t be that simple.
“I feel like I’m being punished for something,” he chokes out, his shoulders shuddering as he sobs. “I don’t even remember it happening, but I feel like fate is punishing me for being a fucking coward and betraying everyone I love and being the biggest idiot in the world, and I?—”
He cuts himself off with a hiccup, coughing through his tears. I can do nothing but stare at him, shock and fear ravaging my very soul. When he lifts his head to meet my eyes again, he lookslike a wounded animal, shivering out in the cold. I can’t find any sympathy past my own dread.
“I’m a fucking idiot, Kenz,” he wails, collapsing back into tears. “I’m a fool and a coward, aren’t I? I strung you along this whole time thinking I could figure this out, and now all I’m doing is hurting you. My dad was right, I need to step up and be a man, but I’m too fucking scared to do it. Maybe he’s right. Maybe it’s better this way. I don’t deserve you, and you deserve better than a coward who can’t even make his own decisions.”
I stare at him in total shock as he blubbers, each word tearing a new wound into my heart. I want to soothe him, to tell him it’ll be okay, but the more he talks, the brighter my anger flares.
“So that’s it?”
My voice is dry and brittle, and Bo looks up at me in surprise. His tears dry up as he stares at me, taking in the way my hands are clenched into fists on my lap. I’m shaking with anger and betrayal, but it’s almost like I’m watching it happen from outside my own body.
“What—”
“I thought you were telling me the truth,” I say over his attempt to talk. “What about everything we talked about like paying child support, or adopting the baby together? What about figuring this out together, Bo? What aboutme?”
My voice raises to a shout the longer I go on, and I have to bite my words back before I start screaming at him. He looks stricken, but more than that, he looks defeated like he’s already given up. On me, on us, on himself. Nothing I can say now is going to change that.
“I can’t.” He shakes his head in loss even as his eyes search my face for any ounce of understanding. I don’t have any to give him, not right now. “I’m sorry, I can’t. I don’t have a say in it anymore.”
A humorless bark of laughter rips its way out of my chest, and I shake my head.
“You’re an adult,” I tell him harshly. “You have a say in what you do with your life like choosing to stand up for me, for us, or you can choose to listen to what your dad tells you to do. I’m not going to try to make your choice for you, Bo.”
He stares at me for a long, drawn out moment, heartbreak and want flickering over his features. It’s useless, though. He’s already made his decision.
He’s going to do what’s expected of him, just like he always has.
“I can’t,” he repeats. “That’s not how the real world works, no matter how much I wish I could just tell everyone to fuck off and do what I want. I have to be responsible for my own actions. I don’t have a choice.”
How many times has he repeated that sentence to himself to justify all of this in his own head. Knowing that he’s doing this all out of a place of fear doesn’t make it hurt any less.
“You do,” I insist. It’s a losing battle, a useless protest, but I can’t stop myself. “You’re making a choice, and it’s the wrong one.”
