Page 103 of Collins
My breath leaves me in a sharp, broken gasp.
I’m going to die right here.
This—this cannot be real.
The music swells, wrapping around me, sinking into my bones. Our song. The one that lives in the quiet spaces between us.
And then I see him.
Collins.
Standing there in the middle of the yard, like he’s been waiting for me his entire life.
Hundreds, no thousands, of warm string lights glow above him. They’re draped between the towering trees, cascading down in soft golden rays. They stretch all the way to the trailer nestled between the house and the lake.
Nan’s trailer.
The sight of it hits something deep and fragile inside me, and it shatters.
Tears flood my eyes so fast I can barely see, turning everything into blurred light and color. My hands fly to my mouth, like I can somehow hold myself together, like I can stop the sob that’s already rising in my chest.
But I can’t.
My breathing breaks apart, uneven and desperate, each inhale catching on the next.
“Oh my god,” I whisper, the words barely there, carried out on a trembling exhale.
He’s smiling.
Just…standing there, hands clasped in front of him, like the world isn’t unraveling inside my chest. Like he hasn’t just tilted my entire universe on its axis.
He doesn’t move.
Doesn’t need to.
Because I can’t look at anything else.
The most beautiful man I have ever seen. He’s lit in gold, wrapped in memory, soul tugging on my own…I can feel it.
And somehow he’s looking at me like I’m his salvation, little does he know, he’s absolutely mine.
I don’t remember deciding to move, but I do.
One step.
Then another.
Like something inside me has taken over, pulling me toward him.
Collins’ hand lifts, reaching for me, steady and sure. My own hand trembles as I bring it up to meet his, the other still pressed tight against my mouth, the only thing holding me together.
Tears blur everything, but I find him anyway.
I always do.
My fingers slip into his, and then?—
He drops.
