Brave.
Did I say brave?
I couldn’t have. I’m not brave. I never have been. I mean, I’m the girl who hides herself. How can I be…
“Brave, huh. So you’re brave?”
His raspy words make me forget my thoughts. Or rather, they complete my thoughts. All these thoughts that are flashing in and out, telling me that holy fucking shit, I’m brave.
I’m brave.
Me?
I get so jarred, like someone punched me in the stomach or pushed me off a cliff. The cliff that I was falling off anyway. I’ve been falling off that cliff ever since I turned sixteen and saw him.
I’ve been falling off that cliff and I’ve been dreaming while in flight.
Dreaming about him and loving him and being brave.
Jesus Christ, I’m brave.
“You’re so fucking brave, Violet. So fucking magnificent that sometimes I don’t know what to do. You’re the bravest person I know,” he chokes out.
I am… fucking brave.
My mouth falls open and I take a sudden step toward him. I grab his t-shirt and crane my neck up to him. “I am. I’m brave. I’m… I’m brave.”
I smile up at him.
I smile because God, how did I not know this about myself? How did I not know that falling in love is an act of bravery?
Giving someone your heart, putting it right at their feet, feet that wear big, threatening hiking boots, is called being brave.
I’ve been brave since I was sixteen, maybe even before that, and I’m only realizing this now, the day I turn nineteen.
Because of him.
Gosh, everything is because of him.
“I’m brave,” I tell him again, beaming this time.
“You are.”
He confirms it but there’s no happiness on his face.
It takes me a little time to understand that.
It takes me a few seconds in which I beam and chuckle and marvel over myself, to understand that he’s not doing any of those things.
He’s simply watching me, flicking his eyes all over my smiling face like he’ll never get to see me after this. His features have become blank again, that wretched defeat that I saw on him when I found him on the couch is back.
Again, he looks like he’s lost. All the battles and all the wars.
I don’t get it.
“Graham? What’s the matter?”
He grits his teeth but otherwise remains silent.
Why does he look like this is the last time he’ll ever see me?
I mean, I’m not going anywhere. I’m going to be still here. In fact, now that all the secrets are out in the open, I’m his. Completely and irrevocably.
I’m his.
Well, of course there’s this minor thing that he can’t love me and that my mom thinks I’m at yoga camp but I’m not. That could pose a problem, but I’m brave. I can figure things out.
In fact, I can figure things out about my anxiety too.
I can get better. I can work toward it. I wanna work toward it. I wanna work on me.
So all in all, this is a happy moment.
I reach up and cup his hard jaw. “Why do you look like this? It’s a happy occasion, you know. I actually looked a stranger in the eyes yesterday. Can you believe that? I kissed you in front of him and I didn’t even have a panic attack. Although, we do need to apologize to him. But oh my God! I’m so badass. And it’s my birthday and someone remembers it and you know everything about me and you don’t think less of me. In fact, you made me realize that I’m brave. So I think you should probably start smiling and not be such a hardass and –”
My words die when I hear a screech outside.
Tires squealing and coming to a stop. A door opening and closing with a bang. Then crunching footsteps across the gravel, leading up to the steps.
I hear the click-clack of heels across the wooden porch and finally, a knock.
Three pounds of someone’s fist on the door and a voice.
A voice I never thought I’d hear, at least not here in Colorado. I never thought she’d come here.
She’s never cared enough about me to go anywhere.
But then, she cares about this, doesn’t she?
My mother cares about me being involved with Mr. Edwards. That’s the only thing she’s cared about in all the years that I’ve been alive.
“Violet, open the door,” my mother says from the other side. “I know you’re in there. Violet, open this door right now. You’ve got so much to answer for.”
Her voice sounds strange to me.
Everything sounds strange right now. Everything looks strange right now.
My hand is still on Graham’s jaw and he’s still staring down at me with that deadened expression.
And in a flash, I understand.
He wasn’t looking happy. He wasn’t smiling, because he called her.
He called my mother.
As soon as I realize this, my hand falls away. His nostrils flare with a heavy breath and he steps away from me.