Just Friends(77)

Immediately I push through them.

The cool night breeze hits my senses, and breathing feels easier for a moment.

I fish my phone from my purse and dial my mom. It doesn’t feel like a conscious choice, rather muscle memory taking over. But I feel panicked and now that it’s started, I don’t know how to tamp it down. I just need to get away from Gwen’s assessing glare and Declan’s hope-filled expression. I need space to think.

“Blair?” She answers on the first ring.

“Hey, Mom. Can you come pick me up?”

“Uh.” I hear her standing up and rustling around. “Yes, sweetie. Hold on.”

I text her the address and she confirms that she can. We hang up and I cross my arms. I squeeze my eyes shut and try to focus on the ocean’s frigid breeze hitting my cheek.

“Blair?” Declan says, footsteps sounding from behind me. “Hey, are you alright? What just happened in there?”

Tears start streaming down my face at the sound of his voice. I hate how quickly his mom’s words got in my head. But they’re in there now, and I need space to untangle the yarn-sized knot forming in my thoughts.

“I’m so sorry, Declan,” I whisper, hardly meeting his eyes as he steps around me.

“Blair, look at me.” He places the nail of his thumb under my chin and lifts. “What’s going on? You can tell me anything. No more running away, remember?”

I’m doing it again, my mind taunts. You ran out the first time, and you’ll keep doing it because you don’t know how to let him love you. So, don’t let him love you. Another tear streams down my face and over his hand.

“I can’t do this right now.” I ping-pong my finger between us. “I’m such an emotional wreck, I don’t even recognize what’s happening to me most days. I can’t drag you through that, too.” The words scrape out of my throat like a jagged thing trying to break free.

“What?” Declan shakes his head like a physical attempt to reject the words. “You don’t believe that, do you?”

“Of course I do. I’m proving that with how I’m acting right now,” I cry. “I feel fine one second, and then the next it feels like my world is tilting, and I can’t breathe anymore. I can’t prepare for it. I can hardly name it while it’s happening. It’s like this foreign object has taken residence in my body, and I don’t know what it is, and I want it out, and I just can’t—” I take a gasping breath.

“Breathe, Blair.” He steps toward me and takes my writhing face in his hands. “I need you to breathe.”

“I—” I hiccup painfully. “Can’t.”

I try to force air in, but it feels like I’m sucking through a tiny straw. The right side of my face starts tingling. I try to suck in air again, and it comes in two staccato bursts. The first, shallow and abrupt, and then another quick, jagged gasp.

“Come here,” he whispers and uses his palm to cradle my head as he pulls me into his chest.

His body is warm, and I concentrate on the pressure of his palm on the back of my head. It feels like he’s protecting me from the entire world with that one hand. I quiet enough to hear his heart beating. And finally, I exhale. My next breath in is steady, uninterrupted by involuntary gasps. He caresses my back with his other hand, slow and firm.

“You’re okay, Blair,” he says softly into my hair. “You’re okay.”

“But I’m not,” I whimper. “That’s the problem, Declan. I’m not.”

He goes silent and my face crumples into his chest one last time before I do what I need to do.

I push away from him and look up into his eyes, hardening mine. “Thank you for tonight. It was perfect. You are perfect. But I can’t do this right now. I need space from us because I can’t—” He looks like he’s about to interject, and my voice rises on instinct. “I just can’t choose this right now. I don’t know if I’m thinking clearly, and I don’t want to hurt you again.”

“Blair, what—what are you doing? What is this? Did my mom say something to you?”

I press my lips together and shake my head.

He takes a step toward me.

“Don’t do this,” he pleads, reaching for my hands.

I take a step back and wrap my arms around my chest. “I just— I need a few days to think. I feel like—” It feels like my head is about to combust, so I blurt exactly what I’m thinking. “How am I supposed to know I’m thinking clearly if I’m not thinking clearly?” My voice breaks, desperate with longing to finally, for once, do the right thing. To not hurt him again.

His eyes soften like he sees the war going on in my mind. And it’s not one waged against him. Or even us. It’s against myself.

Declan looks like he’s about to say something, but my mom’s car pulls up to the curb and I run to it like it’s a red buoy in an endless sea.

“I’m so, so sorry, Declan. I just need some space to think. That’s all. I’m so sorry.” I repeat it pathetically as I open the passenger door and step in. I’m still repeating it in my head when I arrive home.

I’m sorry, Declan. I’m so, so sorry.





Chapter 24