Page 155 of The Design of Goodbye
“I think he was,” I agreed, “so I don’t understand why he’s pushing me away.” I took a long sip of tea, craving the warmth. “I’m scared he doesn’t want to be with me anymore. That he’ll leave and never come back.”
“Did he actually say that?”
“Well, no. He said he needs to recover. He said when we’re together, everything’s perfect and he doesn’t feel like he needs to get help.”
She leaned against her headboard, deep in thought. “I mean...it makes sense to me.”
“Itdoes?”
“That’s his way of saying he relies on you too much. He’s asking you to give him the space to confront his past so he can stop avoiding it. That way, he can finally start to heal.”
“But isn’t it bad he has to push me out of his lifetoheal? Shouldn’t I be able to be there for him through everything? The bad and the good?”
“I don’t think it’s bad. Everyone deals with trauma differently. We don’t know what it’s like to live through what he did, so we can’t tell him the right or wrong way to go about it.”
“I guess,” I said, “all I can do is trust this is what’s best for him and his healing process.”
“Exactly.” She smiled, but there was a sadness behind it. “I think this will be good for you both. Difficult, but in the end, good.”
“Do you think he’ll come back?” I asked.
“I don’t think he can stay away,” she answered easily. “Did you ask him if he would?”
I shook my head, ashamed. “I didn’t have the chance. I ran away. I was hurt and wanted to be the one to leave.”
“I get it,” she said. “I know you’re scared everyone you love is going to leave you—”
“How do you know that?”
“Because I know you. Look,” she started gently, “I think you’ve realized you can’t stop people from leaving you, and that terrifies you.” My stomach clenched at her observation. “Don’t push him away because you’re scared. Some people who leave comeback. But if you push Liam away, he might think you don’t want him to.” She wrapped a strand of pink embroidery floss around her finger. “Do you want to be with him?”
If I didn’t, this wouldn’t be so hard. “Yes.”
“Then, tell him it’ll be okay.”
“But it’s not okay.”
“I know it feels like it’s not,” she said, understanding. “But try and let him leave with the comfort it will be. Make sure he knows you’ll wait for him.”
“I will.” I picked up the embroidery hoop and traced my finger over the linen fabric. “You helped me understand why he feels like he needs to do things this way, but it doesn’t mean I like it. I wish things didn’t have to be like this.”
“I know,” she said. “But I’m confident things will work out.”
“I hope so. I really...”I cleared my throat, taken aback at the word I almost let slip. “I really like him.”
She didn’t miss a beat. While she didn’t call me out on my stumble, she gave me a knowing look. “I know you do.” She pointed to the hoop. “You wanna make something?”
I should go back to Liam, but I needed a little more time to process everything before we talked. I flipped the hoop over. “I haven’t embroidered much.”
Excited, she said, “You’ll be a natural.”
She set a large wicker basket on the bed. It was full of embroidery floss, needles, and books. I flipped through one of the books, searching for a design. My heart flipped when I found the perfect one.
“You know,” I started, after we’d been working on our embroidery in silence for over thirty minutes, “I’m glad my mom told me my sewing was terrible. I never would’ve asked your mom to mentor me if she hadn’t. We might never have become friends.”
“Friends?” She nudged my knee with hers. “We’rebestfriends.”
chapter fifty-eight
