These Thorn Kisses (St. Mary’s Rebels 3)

I fist my hands in my skirt and nod.

“I met him when I was seventeen,” she begins. “I was in my senior year of high school. We didn’t go to the same school, of course. I went to that horrible boarding school that your parents wanted to send you to. But I met him when I was on vacation. I was at this restaurant with some of my girlfriends and he was this very handsome bus boy. We kept watching him, you know? He was tall, muscular and he had the bluest eyes that we’d ever seen and… he was just magnificent. And well, he was watching us too. Or rather me. I didn’t know that until I went back to the restaurant a few more times just to catch a glimpse of him.” She chuckles self-consciously. “I was so obsessed with him. Even though I knew that my parents would never approve. They wanted me to get together with this other guy that they liked. I hated him though. But yeah, I just… I was crazy for Con.”

She takes a pause here, her eyes glued to something over my shoulders, as if looking into the past.

The past that is my present.

Because I feel the same way.

I feel crazy too. I feel obsessed, possessed. Hypnotized by him.

“Anyway,” she begins again. “We started dating. Although I don’t think you could even call it that really. We were long distance because of my boarding school and so most of the time all we did was just… talk on the phone and stuff. And when I did visit, even then it would be super hard for us to get some time together. And it always had to do with his schedule. His schedule was crazy. His school, work, his soccer practice, his family. It was frustrating. So freaking frustrating because he had other priorities. Other things took precedence for him over me. And so we always kept fighting, arguing with each other.

“But still there was hope. That one day he’d get to leave his town, his family, and be his own man. He’d have time for me then. I’d be his priority. And everyone knew that he was going to go pro one day and I knew when that happened, my parents would accept him. And for a little while, it did look like our life was getting on track. We applied and got into the same college. He got a soccer scholarship. There was talk of scouts already lining up to see him play.

“But then, only a couple of months into our first semester in college, his mom died; she had cancer. And he decided to move back to take care of stuff. His siblings. And…” She shakes her head, breathing sharply. “And I didn’t want him to move back. I wanted him to choose me. For once. Just choose me, choose our future together. Choose his career, our love. We’d worked so hard to be together. We’d gone through so much, and yes, I was selfish. I wanted him for myself. I gave him an ultimatum. I told him that if he chose his family over me again, it was over. I wouldn’t wait for him. And he didn’t care.” She laughs sadly. “He left anyway. He chose his family over me. He said he wouldn’t even dream of making me wait. He said that his family was everything and if he didn’t go back, then he wouldn’t be the man that I fell in love with. And I was so angry at him. So angry that I didn’t stop him.”

Callie told me about their mom’s cancer. That Conrad had been the one taking care of their mom and he hadn’t even wanted to go to college in the first place. But their mom insisted and so he went.

“B-but his mom had just died,” I say, stumbling. “He had to go back.”

“Yes,” Helen says. “But he didn’t have to stay there. He didn’t have to abandon everything. His career, his place in the pros. He didn’t have to abandon everything that he ever worked for. He didn’t have to abandon me. I was so alone in a new city, without the guy who promised to be there for me. But he did. He gave all that up. All of it. And now he’s stuck being a soccer coach. He ruined his own life.”

For his family.

He did that for his family.

For his brothers and Callie, and he did it all alone, didn’t he?

He did it all by himself. He could’ve had someone, her, the woman he loved — that he still loves from the looks of it — by his side but…

“So you didn’t go with him?” I ask again, but I’m not sure why since I already know the answer. “You let him… You let him go alone.”