Page 51 of Hollywood King
“Dare I ask what happened?” he said as he gently sat in the negative of my side-turned legs.
“Heath is gone,” was all I could force out.
“I thought you took care of that the other day. He looked pretty devastated before.”
He wiped the tears still leaking from the corners of my eyes gently.
“He came here to offer me something else, a way to be with him without my stipulation that he takes care of me.”
“I’m confused. That seemed to be what you wanted.”
I shook my head, finally looking at him. “He called me his life, his soul. And if I die in three months. If this experiment fails, he’ll lose me again. I’d rather him hate me now, and maybe have a chance at happiness in the future, than watch me die and memorialize me forever.”
He stood and threw up his hands. “You are a fucking idiot. Did it occur to you that this is as much his choice as it is yours?”
Anger threaded through the grief. “No, it didn’t, because it’s not. I made sure it wasn’t.
The disappointment on his face touched something else, a nerve I’d yet to snip with self-sabotage. “Why are you looking at me like that? This is my choice, and that man will never know that I love him. Because he’s more myself than I am. And whatever the fuck I’m made out of, we’re the same. If he loses me, he loses himself, and I’d rather be dead than watch it happen.”
He sat down again, his forehead softening as he gripped my hand. “You’re too late, he started wasting away the second you chose me over him.”
“I didn…”
“You did. And that’s how he sees it. He won’t recover from this, and you will both live out the rest of your lives—you’re very long lives—in misery for nothing more than pride. How is that fair to either of you?”
How could I make him see my side of this?
He squeezed my fingers gently and delivered the killing cut. “You are going to this alone, Cathy. I’m headed to some third world country. You will be going to the east coast to face all of this by yourself. Did you think that through when you forced Heath out of your life?”
“I’ve been alone for a decade. This isn’t different.”
He jerked back and removed his warm grip from mine. The disappointment in his eyes resurfaced. “You are dying. You are dying. You are fucking terminal right now. What do I need to say to get it through your head? And when you do live, I promise, you will regret this.”
He threw some medications on the table and replaced my gallon of water. “Get some rest. I’ll check on you tomorrow.” The hard edge in his tone hurt in a different way than Heath’s.
“Eddy…”
“No, you aren’t going to use me as a shield between you two. And I’m not any more content to sit by and watch you die than he is. I love you, Cathy. Not like he does, but as a best friend. I care. He cares. There are people who love you. I hope you can remember that in the end.”
He left without another word, and I stared after him, puzzled, far longer than I did when Heath walked out.
What about me drove every single man from my life. Hindley never wanted a sister. Heath left. My dad died. And now I’d successfully sabotaged the only healthy relationship I had.
I looked down at my trembling hands and ignored the tears falling again. “Looks like it’s just you and me,” I whispered to myself. “Exactly the way you wanted it.”
But satisfaction wasn’t stuffing my rib cage like cotton. It felt suspiciously like misery.
