Total pages in book: 104
Estimated words: 98264 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 491(@200wpm)___ 393(@250wpm)___ 328(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 98264 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 491(@200wpm)___ 393(@250wpm)___ 328(@300wpm)
I shot to my feet. “Oh, so it’s just me, then?”
His whole body blanched. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
“I cried myself to sleep last night because I finally got a chance to see you again and I thought you were already taken.”
It was the wrong thing to say.
So, so, so the wrong thing to say.
“You finally got the chance?” he snapped, and from the way it sounded, so did his patience. “You’ve had five years of chances to see me. Every fucking day has been a chance for you to see me. But you took none of them.”
What in the actual fuck was happening?
Camden did not have a girlfriend.
Camden was interested.
Yet Camden was currently yelling at me because I hadn’t reached out to him in five years.
I cocked my head to the side. “Oh, I’m sorry. I must have missed all five years' worth of phone calls where you took the chance to see me.”
“I was giving you space. The last thing you told me was you were working on yourself and healing your head and your heart. You said you were too selfish to let me off your hook. Well, guess what? I fucking suffocated on the hook.”
“You told me not to let you go!”
“Because I thought you’d come back!” He thrust a hand into the top of his hair, his chest heaving. He let out a loud groan and tipped his head back to stare at the ceiling. “Maybe I was just young and dumb, but when you left that day, I thought it was temporary. I loved you. You loved me. The timing was wrong. I understood. We both needed to get our shit taken care of so we could be together. But I thought we were the end game, Nora.”
“We are,” I breathed, reaching out to rest a hand on his chest, but he backed away.
“When?” he thundered, staring me right in the eye, the most agonizing heartbreak carved into his face. “Five years of my life have passed by without you. I graduated from college, law school, started a career, celebrated birthdays and holidays. I went to weddings and watched my friends vow to spend forever with the ones they loved. I took up running, Nora. Come to find out I actually love it. For two years, I gave up meat. Just cold turkey became a vegetarian. Then, on year three, I remembered I really fucking love steak, so that flew out the window. I watched movies and read books I loved and had a six-month showdown with my neighbor because they always vacuumed at three in the morning and it drove me insane. And you weren’t there for any of it.”
My nose stung, and tears welled in my eyes. “I was trying get better for you—for us. I’m still trying to get there.”
“And that’s the problem. You think that a there exists, Nora. Some mythical final destination where we can be together. Meanwhile, our entire lives are passing us by.”
I wrung my hands in front of me. “You deserve someone who’s perfect, Cam.”
“Perfect doesn’t exist! What I deserve is someone who wants to be with me. Not because I’m here. Not because it’s convenient. Not because you need something or I need something. I’m talking someone who cannot physically stay away for one day, much less five fucking years.”
I took a giant step toward him, challenge mounting in my veins. “You think I didn’t want to be with you? You think I didn’t die inside every time I saw a picture of you with some woman on Instagram?”
He let out a humorless laugh and planted his hands on his hips. “What women, Nora? I'm one rung on the ladder away from being a monk.”
“Oh, please. I see the pictures you’re tagged in… Pencil Skirt Barbie, Ski Slope Sally, and my personal favorite: Tattoo Tammy. Come on, Cam. Pick a type!”
“I would if I was dating any of them. But considering Paula is my cousin on my dad’s side, and the girl from the ski slope is married to my friend from college, and Tammy is in a committed relationship with my other friend—Angela—I think it would be in seriously bad form to date any of them. But if you would like to talk about Instagram, I am here for it. I really enjoyed watching your relationship with Forehead Freddy from the IG bench.”
My head snapped back. “Who?”
“The guy with the big forehead who always puts his arms around you and I can never see his fucking hand so I have no idea where he’s grabbing you and it literally devoured me every time you posted a picture of the two of you.”
“You mean Charles?”
He threw his arms out to the sides, slapping them against his thighs. “I don’t know!”
“Oh, good Lord, Cam. Charles is a very, very married art teacher at my school. He helps with the bag lunch program, likes to take pictures, and brings me succulent clippings once a month. That is the extent of our relationship.”