Page 130 of Keeping Score

I knew I definitely wouldn’t feel okay until everything was right either, but a realization had struck me recently that I shared with Cassie.

“I want everything to go back to normal more than anyone, but I’m starting to think it’s selfish of me to even try.”

“What do you mean?” she asked.

“I mean, I broke his heart and told him I wasn’t ready for a future with him. I can’t just tell him that it was a mistake and I actually do want to be with him. He’ll feel like I’m playing a game of tug-of-war with him or something.”

I sighed, staring at the television screen instead of Cassie’s unwavering eyes.

“Maybe if I really love him,” I started, blowing out a breath with the words that hurt so badly to utter, “I need to just… let him go.”

“What! Why would you do that?” she screeched, sitting upright.

“I don’t know! Isn’t that what the poets say?”

“Screw the poets! Show me one romance novel that ended with the heroine ‘letting him go.’ No way.” She shook her head, adamant in her stance.

“Well, we’re not in a romance novel, Cass. This is real life. And I can’t go screwing with his life for the sake of my own happiness.”

“It’s his happiness too, though. Look, you’ve seen The Notebook. It never does any good when you let the person you’re in love with ‘move on’ because you think it’s better for them. Then, it’s just two people with broken hearts missing each other and not saying anything about it!”

“So what do you want me to do? Build Brody his dream house and wait around for him to see me in some newspaper article and come back to me?”

“Interesting that you cast yourself as Noah,” Cass quirked a brow. “But, no. That’s not really the scenario I was going for. I’m telling you, skip the whole decade-long separation and reconcile now, before you have to lose any time.”

I thought about it, but couldn’t come up with any clear answer. I just needed to talk to Brody. To apologize to him, and maybe help him see the position I’d been coming from. I wouldn’t beg him to forgive me, if that wasn’t what he wanted. But I could see where he was at, and we could go from there.

“Do you think I’m stupid?” I asked her. “I was so afraid of being alone, of being left, that I pushed him away before he had the chance to do it. I mean, that’s objectively insane, right?”

“I think it gave you a sense of control that a younger version of you might’ve been desperate for. It’s not crazy. It’s understandable. Don’t you remember how I almost ruined everything by running away from Liam back then?”

I smirked at the memory of her showing up at my apartment, terrified and red-rimmed eyes because she’d just kissed Liam and was afraid of what happened next.

I guess Cassie and I were two sides of the same coin, in our own messed-up way.

“Yeah, Cass. I remember,” I told her with a laugh. “Difference is, you thought you were running away, but my brother wouldn’t have let you get far.”

She snorted.

“I’m serious. That man would’ve followed you to the ends of the earth hoping you might change your mind.”

Cassie blushed, waving away my comment as she continued on her spiel.

“The point is, if I hadn’t pulled it together and started dealing with my crap, I would’ve missed out on all this.” She gestured around her, and I knew she wasn’t referring to the house itself, but the home she’d made with the help of the two people upstairs.

I understood what she was saying, because the thought had been haunting me terribly lately. I wasn’t only mourning the life I’d had with Brody, but the future I might never get to see now.

But I guess that’s just where the cards fell after I played a shitty hand. Once you make your move, you can’t take it back.

“Let’s just watch The Notebook,” I muttered, shifting onto my side again. “I’d rather be depressed about fictional people than my own real, and very pathetic, life.”

“Whatever you want, Mags,” Cassie said, though I could hear the disappointment in her voice as she said it.

She thought I was giving up.

She thought I was throwing in the towel and ruining my life. And maybe I was. But at least I wasn’t ruining Brody’s.

Because the truth was, I knew I wanted to marry Brody. I knew I’d be happy with him and have the life of my dreams.