Total pages in book: 90
Estimated words: 85569 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 428(@200wpm)___ 342(@250wpm)___ 285(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 85569 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 428(@200wpm)___ 342(@250wpm)___ 285(@300wpm)
The kiss was brief because she pulled away. I wished she had held on just a bit longer, but I understood why it was difficult for her.
I stepped away and swore to myself that the next time I kissed her again, she would not pull away. She would never pull away, because I was going to give her everything she wanted.
She got into her car. Then the engine started. My hands were clenched into fists.
I waited while she turned the car around, and she drove off into the distance. She never waved, she never even looked at me. It was time to leave, time for me to head back into the house and continue on with my life with Anya. My life without Montana. However, I found that I couldn’t move.
My heart was mourning her exit. My heart was waiting for the blue car to return. To say it had been a monumental error. I knew she was not coming back, but I waited a few more moments so Anya did not see me the way I was.
Then I turned around and returned to the house. My chest was tight with pain, but I plastered a smile on my face so Anya would think nothing had changed even though everything had changed. The world was a grayer place than it had been just a few minutes ago.
Chapter 46
Montana
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6dYWe1c3OyU&list=RDfNFzfwLM72c&index=10
-I will survive-
"You are mourning," Pearl said.
She had dragged me out to buy groceries simply because she hadn’t been able to persuade me to go out with the girls the previous night. I had stayed in and eaten a whole bunch of pastries from the bakery and regretted it afterwards.
“I’m not mourning,” I denied and started moving away from her, even though she was dead on the money. Of course, I was. I was never the best person to deal with difficult parents, but this week I had been like a bear with a sore head. I had actually visualized attacking one mother with a pair of scissors! I tried to hide it, but my sadness had been noticed by everyone. From my dad to the other teachers and even some of the students.
The first day after our breakup I went to school nervous about seeing Cole. It was unavoidable, and I spent the entire day bracing myself for it, convincing myself that all I had to do was avoid direct eye contact. But when the moment came and he arrived to pick up Anya, I found that I didn’t even have to ignore him. I didn’t know how he did it, but he behaved as though all the familiarity and intimacy we had shared had all happened in my fantasies.
He was a civil, polite stranger.
I had become Marylin or any of the other women who chased him persistently. He addressed me politely, looked me straight in the eye, and yet he didn’t see me. Or at least, that was what it felt like to me. I marveled at his inhuman ability to pull such an act off. While I hurt so deeply I nearly didn’t know how to contain my pain. I had to escape to my classroom. There I paced the floor for a few moments in distress and confusion. Then I sat at my desk, lay my head on my arms and sobbed.
That was when Pearl came in.
She swore at him until she was blue in the face. I thought I hated him then.
How could he simply wipe me off his mind? It was then I understood. I had been playing at the notion of separation. In my immature, inexperienced mind, we weren’t really separated. We were always going to be attracted to each other and flirt. Sometimes the attraction would get so great we would sleep together. To me the break up was temporary. Perhaps it had even been a way to make him choose. Have all of me or nothing. And he was supposed to come running back and say I want it all because I can’t live without you.
I wasn’t been able to go back to school the next day. It was easy for my father to believe I was sick given how down and sluggish I was the day before. Pearl, Kelly and Natalie had come over outside school time to find me wallowing in the forest. They told me I was in love.
I didn’t believe them.
Or rather, I didn’t want to acknowledge that they were totally right. I told them I couldn’t understand how we could become complete strangers in that way overnight.
Pearl wondered if that was his way of trying to cope as well. But Kelly was more uncharitable. She thought he was being an asshole and completely alienating me so that I wouldn’t get any ideas of proposing a return to what we had before. The most upsetting thing was that he had acted like there was some nonsense magical connection between us. Was it simply because he wanted to get in my pants? My mind was turning dark, but maybe for once I was actually using my brain.