“It’s like you said,” I add. “I can’t stalk her.”
“I’m not saying show up at her apartment. But there must be a way to talk with her again. Have you tried the chat system again?”
“No.”
“Well… why not?”
I massage my forehead, trying to work out some of the tension there. I’m not sure if it’s the sleeplessness or the passion or something else, but my whole head is pulsing in time with the drumming of my heart.
“Wouldn’t that make me completely batshit, though?” I ask.
“Mate, we’re fighters. We’re not supposed to be normal. I think you owe it to yourself to try. Honestly, I’d be so happy if you found someone. This is the closest I’ve ever heard you come to want to get to know a woman. I think you need to do this.”
“Maybe I will,” I say, keeping my voice as steady as possible.
Even if I shared most of it with Charley, there are still pieces of this obsession I left out. The deep certainty that I’m going to have a family with this woman, the all-consuming hunger to bring that family into existence as quickly as possible….
“Let me know how it goes,” Charley says. “Who knows? In a couple of weeks, you could be engaged.”
He laughs in his typical Charley way. And I laugh along with him.
Of course, it’s an absurd notion, which is why we’re laughing. There’s no world where I live with all this darkness and pain, never once being really interested in a woman – or even a little interested – and then, bam.
Rachel comes into my life.
She changes everything.
We fall for each other.
We get married and have some kids.
That can’t happen, can it?
Now that I’ve thought about it, it’s difficult to think of anything else happening. It’s difficult to think of a world where I don’t make her mine.
“Yeah,” I chuckle darkly. “Who knows.”
CHAPTER SIX
Rachel
Four days since we spoke. Four days of trying to convince myself to let it go.
It’s been four long days with my mind filled with Ryland.
He’s way too freaking easy to access online. All I have to do is tap a few keys, and there he is, the man of my dreams, staring at me from his most recent photo.
He’s standing with his arms crossed, wearing a dark suit, his eyes aimed like sharp daggers at the photographer. The corner of his lips curved just a little as though he knows the punchline to a secret joke, and he was not letting anybody in on it.
As I work, helping a man restart his router, my gaze flits to my phone, to the photo of Ryland.
It was never a realistic fantasy anyway. There was never a real world where I fall for this man – fall so hard I feel like I’ve done the relationship version of faceplanting – and then he somehow feels the same, somehow finds me.
“Stupid girl,” I whisper under my breath, the same way I did in high school when I was too nervous to compete in the talent show. “Get your freaking act together.”
Maybe I’m talking to myself like I’m more unhinged than I want to admit, but I don’t care. All I can think about is the longing that grips me every second, especially when a new customer’s name pops up.
Each time, I stare at the screen, my eyes wide, gripping the laptop so hard it’s a miracle I haven’t broken it yet.
I stare and stare, waiting for Ryland to appear.
Distracting myself, I look out the window, at the afternoon sunlight slanting through the curtains.
Autumn and I are going to the park later. Autumn likes wandering around and taking as many photos as possible, and usually, I look forward to walking at her side, sometimes even singing if there aren’t too many people around.
Now everything feels soured with what never happened.
I need to get him out of my head. I know that, but I can’t. He shapes every thought and redirects every fantasy so that everything always returns to him.
Last night, I awoke with the blanket wrapped around me, sticking to my sweaty skin. I moaned and snuggled closer, pressing my face into the blankets, softly inhaling as I imagined it was his T-shirt. But then sleep let me go, and the dream went with it.
I finish helping my customer. After exchanging a few more messages, I sign off, the same thought bouncing around my head. It’s the one that has captured me fiercer with each passing moment.
Four days.
The longer it gets, the less likely it is that we’re ever going to speak again.
“Stop,” I snap under my breath.
Okay, so talking to myself has gotten a little worse since starting this job. Being alone all day would do that to anybody, surely.
There was never a chance, not for a second. So four days or fourteen or four freaking hundred, it doesn’t matter.