Exposed

Ethan leaves early—a little while after we make love—slipping out of bed after a few minutes of cuddling with a kiss and a murmured I love you. He thinks I’m sleeping and I let him. Not because I don’t want him to stay, but because I do. Being separated from him for the last week has felt like losing a limb. Like losing myself. Now that I have him back again, there’s a part of me that wants to hold on to him. That wants to squeeze him so tightly that our bodies merge into one. That we merge into one and I can feel his love, his light, inside of me forever.

If he knew I was awake and watching him walk out, if he knew how empty I feel when he’s not with me, he would never be able to go, even to make the arrangements for our wedding.

And I need him to go, at least for a little while. I need to think. To figure out what my next move is. In some ways, it’s so simple. Ethan and me together. Forever. That’s my endgame, his endgame—and this time I’m not going to let anyone f*** it up. Not Brandon, not Ethan’s mother, not myself. When he showed up at my door last night, I knew that was it. Turn him away then or be with him forever. I love him, adore him, need him like I need air to breathe. There was no choice—not the first time I met him, not last night when he humbled himself before me, not now.

But that doesn’t mean marriage to him is going to be easy.

I don’t know how to do this. How to love Ethan when he’s so hell-bent on revenge. My past is . . . dirty. It’s dark and bloody and so painful that some days I can barely look myself in the mirror. I’ve lived the last few years by burying it. By ignoring it. By making a new life for myself, away from my family. Away from what happened to me.
Maybe it wasn’t the healthiest way to do things, but it worked.

I functioned.

I went to class, got good grades, landed one of the most prestigious internships in the world.

I survived.