Total pages in book: 34
Estimated words: 31414 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 157(@200wpm)___ 126(@250wpm)___ 105(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 31414 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 157(@200wpm)___ 126(@250wpm)___ 105(@300wpm)
And it wasn’t like eloping was my first solution. I brainstormed and discarded half a dozen plans before landing on this one, but none of those options seemed right. They were all sad, cowardly compromises, and she deserves so much more than that.
She deserves a man who’s willing to lay it all on the line for her, and I am.
I turn to tell her as much, to assure her that I’ll rearrange my life in whatever way she deems necessary to make this work. But when I see her bone white face and wide, frantic eyes, all I can do is reach for her hand and beg her to, “Breathe.”
“I am breathing,” she gasps, her fingers clinging so tightly to mine that my bones grind together. “I think.” She sucks in a breath and exhales a wheezing sound.
“What’s wrong? Are you afraid of flying? Do you need some water or—”
“I don’t know your middle name,” she pants, her lips draining of color, too. “Or how old you are. Or your favorite color or food or song or if you’re secretly a gaslighting psychopath who will slowly erode my sense of self until I’m a shadow of the person I used to be, isolated far from the people who love me and too broken to realize I have the power to free myself from our toxic relationship.”
I laugh, I can’t help it, but immediately regret it when her eyes begin to shine.
Smile vanishing, I shift in my seat to face her, releasing her fingers to cup her face in both hands. I lean in, holding her gaze as I promise, “I will never hurt you. I swear. I’d jump off a building first. I only want to celebrate you and support you. I think you’re…amazing. The most incredible person I’ve ever met. You’re so funny and honest and sexy and smart. You’re a light in the cold, dark room I didn’t realize I was living in until I met you. Why on earth would I do anything to snuff that light out?”
She blinks faster, but her breath begins to come in deeper inhalations and exhalations and the color slowly returns to her lips.
“And my middle name is James,” I add. “My favorite song is anything by Hozier, my favorite food is Korean barbeque, and my favorite color is…” I search her expression, feeling like I could stare at her for the rest of our lives and never get tired of watching her thoughts and feelings play out on her pretty face. “The exact color of your eyes,” I add, knowing it probably sounds cheesy, but it’s true.
Her lips tremble at the edges. “My middle name is Ann.” She exhales a nervous laugh. “Obviously. And I love Tori Amos and olives, all kinds, green and black, and my favorite color is soft, buttery yellow, like the sunrise in winter.”
“Hozier and Tori Amos go well together,” I say, letting my hands drop to take hers again, relieved to feel that her fingers are much warmer than they felt before.
“They do,” she agrees. “They’re both so unique and intense and…brave.”
I nod. “They feel it all and they feel it hard.”
Her eyes widen. “Yes. Exactly! I used to think that if I felt half as much as Tori Amos felt in a day, I wouldn’t survive past ten a.m. I loved hearing her sing about feelings, but I wasn’t a fan of feeling them myself. I intuitively sensed that if I gave them an inch, they’d take a mile. That if I let my curiosity about that part of life run wild, it might…” She winces and gives a little shake of her head. “Never mind. I’m being melodramatic.”
“No, please, I—” I break off, waiting until the captain has finished announcing that we’ve reached cruising altitude and thanking us for our business to add, “Please tell me. Don’t ever feel like you have to hold back with me. I want to know everything about you. Truly.”
She chews her bottom lip for a moment before apparently deciding to trust me. “I thought if I indulged my curiosity about human emotion, it might…damage me. Mentally. I’ve always prided myself on being analytical and logical, but there’s nothing logical about the way people behave. Trying to understand why people feel what they feel and what drives them to feel that way…” Her brow furrows. “There’s so much pain and suffering in the world, so much pointless, senseless loss, so many broken people that would have led beautiful lives if they’d received one solitary drop of kindness instead of injustice and cruelty, over and over again. There’s no logic to any of it, no rhyme or reason or pattern that makes any sense. I knew if I let myself get too close to all that, it would change the way I think forever and…probably not in a good way.” She flashes a tight smile. “Not in a way that would make me a good data analyst or statistician anyway.”