No.
He looked down again. The back of his knuckles grazed gently over my skin. His eyes lifted with an unspoken apology and I felt the final straw snap inside of me.
He exhaled a swoosh of air, then said, "Prosti—"
"No," I said firmly even though emotion clogged my throat. My heart dropped into my gut. "Do not say that."
"I am sorry," he said, his chest heaving rapidly as if he was struggling to breathe.
I gripped his arms tighter and held onto him for dear life. "Kova, I'm fine. I promise I'm okay. Please don't stop." I pleaded with tears in my eyes now. "Please, Kova. I love you. We need this. I need this. Don't let your mind go there. We're here, we made it." When he didn't budge, my voice shook with panic. "Kova, I'm begging you, don't do this to us."
He looked at me, but it wasn't enough.
Cupping my face, Kova pressed a kiss to my lips before laying me back and rolling over off me. He placed his hand on his stomach and stared up at the ceiling, looking like he was absolutely wrecked. I broke down and covered my face as I lost myself witnessing his state of emotion.
"I am always going to be a source of pain for you," he said, more to himself than to me. His voice was gut wrenching.
I cried harder, quieter, consumed by the obvious shift in our relationship that struck with force. Pressing my knees together, I drew in a long breath as I watched him sit up at the end of the bed. Kova dropped his head into his hands and didn't move. Each second that passed with his back to me was another layer stripped from my heart. Every breath he took was one he chose to take without me.
I pulled the blanket over to cover my chest and then wiped my eyes with it. I sniffled when he stood up and pulled his shorts on.
"I love you, but this is too big for us to overcome this time, Ria." He faced me with tears in his eyes. "It is only going to get worse. Oklahoma is a good idea. Knowing you are close to me, I would have to find you."
I couldn't take another minute of this and cried out. My heart was about to pump out of my chest and explode. All I could do was try to catch the shattered pieces with slippery fingers.
"I do not want this to end, but I do not see another way for us any time soon. I cannot—will not—keep putting you through all this hurt. I refuse to continue doing that to you. Being in your life while you are going through treatment would only bring more agony."
"You think leaving will make me happy? Don't you understand that the thought of life without you breaks my heart? I don't think I can survive without you, Kova."
He studied me for a moment before replying. "You are much stronger than you think." He was shutting down, withdrawing from the conversation, but his next words obliterated my heart. "I think you should go back to your room."
Kova stepped into a pair of shoes after putting his shirt on, then reached for his cell phone and room key on the dresser. He slipped them into his pocket. I curled onto my side, the chilly comforter cooling down my cheek. Pulling my knees up, I hugged myself as I watched him walk toward the door.
This didn't feel real. This wasn't us. Not after how far we'd come.
Kova was walking away from me. He was taking everything that I willingly gave to him with him. I allowed it, though, because I loved him. I loved him with every bone in my body, and there was not a single thing I could change about that, or would change.
The further he got from me, the more I held my breath. Stopping with his hand on the knob, Kova tilted his head down then to the side. He lingered, then looked back at me.
My lungs seized from lack of air. My stomach was a mess. I wanted to scream at him or call him a coward again, anything to make him stay and fight through this hardship with me.
"Please don't go," I whispered.
He turned back to the door and opened it. A gasp of air expelled from my lungs.
I closed my eyes shut and broke down in his room after hearing the soft click of the door shutting. I knew he wanted us, that wasn’t a question. He just didn’t want us bad enough to walk through the fire to get there.
Forty-Five
Somehow I had made it back to my hotel room.
I had no memory of how, or changing out of my clothes, or retrieving my notebook. Everything had blurred into one.
I'd been writing for over an hour, sobbing my eyes out. My tears smearing some of the ink, but I couldn't stop my hand flying across the paper.
I wrote down every emotion I felt from the moment I walked into his hotel room to now and described what it did to me. Writing was cathartic. I understood why Kova liked to write. It was private, intimate, real. No one judged me, no one gave terrible advice. It was just me and a blank page, allowing me to express whatever the hell was going through my head. I realized through the painful words how much I held inside of me.
Pages and pages later, I was still shedding tears trying to understand how it came to this. It was nearly two in the morning when the door opened and Avery walked in. Our eyes met. I was still a sobbing mess and the sight of her devastated me further.