Letting Go (Thatch 1)

“Everything.”

“Really?” he said on a laugh. “Anything I should know?”

Looking directly into his eyes, I embraced the tingling feeling that had started in my stomach and quickly expanded throughout my body. I knew that the words that were on the tip of my tongue were exactly what I wanted to say, and I felt light-headed as I realized how true the words were.

“Babe?”

Jagger’s eyes looked panicked for a few seconds then widened with surprise at my next words.

“I want to marry you.”

He blinked a few times, his lips twitching like he didn’t know if he should smile or not. “What did you just say?”

“I want to marry you.”

Before I could register the way his entire face lit up, his mouth was on mine and he was pushing me back onto the bed so he could hover over me. “When?” he asked through our kisses.

“Whenever. I just know that I want to be with you for the rest of my life.”

He pushed himself up so he was on his hands and knees, and I looked at the way his chest rose and fell with each labored breath. “What brought this up?”

I grasped his shaking forearms, and knew they were shaking for the same reason he was breathing so hard. He was trying to control his excitement, but his bright eyes gave him away. “I’ve loved you my entire life. I’ve been in love with you for . . . I don’t know. Years. Whether I knew it or not. But now that I’ve let go of everything that was keeping me stuck in the past, I’ve realized how much time I wasted with you, and I don’t want to waste any more.”

“I would spend forever with you just as long as you were mine, Grey. Don’t say this because you think it’s what we need to do.”

“I’m not,” I promised. “This is what I want as long as you want it too.”

His signature lopsided smile crossed his face and he kissed me again. “Are you kidding?” he growled against my mouth. “Why wouldn’t I want that? I just want to make sure you’ve thought about what you’re saying.”

Pressing a hand to his chest, I pushed him far enough away that I could look at him fully. “I have thought about it. Jagger, I love you, and I want this. I want you. With our past together, and with how unpredictable life is, I want to start this future with you.”

Moving my hand away, he spread my legs with one of his knees to lie down on top of my body. A deep groan sounded in his chest when I wrapped my legs around him and he slowly pressed into me. His mouth cut off my gasp when he began moving inside me, and I gripped him tighter to me when he backed away to look down at me. “Then let’s start that future, Grey.”

Chapter 16

Jagger

September 19, 2014

I WALKED SLOWLY across the grass until I got to the right stone, then squatted down in front of it. For long minutes no words came as I stared at the engraved letters and numbers and tried to figure out the words to explain the hardest thing I’d ever had to say. Grey was working, and I’d just finished having lunch with her dad and asking him the very thing I was trying to say now, but saying it to Mr. LaRue hadn’t seemed nearly as hard as this.

And that didn’t make sense.

I was trying to talk to a slab of marble. It couldn’t respond and it couldn’t give me a judging look. It couldn’t even give me the permission I was looking for and had already been given by Mr. LaRue. But somehow, asking this stone meant more to me than asking anyone else.

“I can’t imagine what you would say to me or think of me if you were here. There are so many times when something happens, or Grey says something, and I can hear what your response would be. Typical Ben bullshit that we all miss. Always trying to reel me in, to stop getting your girl in trouble, to bash my drawings just so I wouldn’t feel like I was the only one who doubted them . . . so much. So much that I know both Grey and I hear clear as day. But this? I can’t begin to guess what you would say. Probably because if you were still here, none of this would be happening.

“Because if you were still here, I know that you’d be furious. I know that you’d do everything in your power to stop me from being with her, and I know that you wouldn’t give her up for anything in the world—because that’s exactly how I feel now that I have her. But when I try to think about it, all I see is you standing there staring at me. Saying nothing, with no emotion on y

our face whatsoever.”

I sat back and rested my elbows on my knees as I continued staring at the stone, memorizing everything about it as I waited for a response that would never come.

“I love her, man. You knew that, but knowing that you knew doesn’t make any of this any easier. I love her and I’m going to take care of her for the rest of my life. I’m going to marry Grey, Ben. I have a ring and I’m going to ask her to take my last name. And you wanna know the fucked-up thing about all of this? It’s that I hate that you won’t be there when I marry her.” I let out a strangled laugh and shook my head. “I hate that my best friend can’t be there on what I know will be the best day of my life so far, and yet you were days away from that exact same day with the exact same girl. Like I said, it’s fucked up. And sitting here telling a piece of stone all this somehow makes it that much worse. If you were here you’d laugh and tell me I’m insane, and God I feel like it . . .” I mumbled the last sentence to myself.

“I wish you could see her. See how much better she’s doing. There were so many times I thought she’d never get past what happened, there were so many times I was terrified that she was destroying herself—just waiting until she could be with you again. Even now, regardless of how much better she is, there are days when it looks like she’s on the edge of going to a place worse than where she ever was. But she’s strong, and I have no doubt she’ll continue to pull herself out of those places, and keep moving. And I’ll always be there with her to help her.

“I feel like I need to ask your permission to marry Grey, that’s why I came here; but I can’t ask a stone. I can’t ask something that has nothing of you other than your name and dates on it. So this is me letting you know what we’re about to do. This is me saying I’m sorry that you can’t have this chance with Grey, and I’m sorry for taking her. This is me telling you that she still loves you, and we all miss you. And this is me promising you I will take care of her and cherish her forever.” Standing up, I took two steps away from the headstone and shoved my hands into my pockets. “You always have been and always will be my best man, Ben. See you.”