Come Back To Me

Chapter 17

I carefully step over the glass and pick the chrome emblem up off the floor.

“What is that?” Gavin asks, stepping forward.

I open my palm and show it to him. His brow furrows and he takes it from my hand.

“Where’d this come from?”

“It’s from Reid’s car,” I tell him.

“I know what it is Hadley,” Gavin’s tone is clipped, “why is it here?”

“After the accident, I went to the wreck yard…the mechanic, Kevin actually, gave it to me.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I don’t know,” I shrug, “I didn’t want to upset you.”

“Okay, so why is it lying by the window, or is that where you normally keep it?”

“I don’t know.”

I frown at him and grab the emblem out of his hand.

“I usually keep it on my dresser.”

I carefully place it back where it was before.

“Here’s a weird question, why was it so cold in here?” Gavin asks, but I don’t think he expects me to know the answer to it.

He steps over the glass and puts his face near the window.

“It was colder in here than it is outside.”

I think I know the answer, but I keep my mouth shut.

“Here, hand me your trashcan,” Gavin says, holding out his hand.

“I can clean that up Gavin, don’t worry about it.”

“I don’t want you to cut yourself, just hand it to me please,” he sighs.

I grab the trashcan and bring it over, and then I get down on my knees to help. Gavin shakes his head at me but doesn’t argue. We’re quiet for a while, both lost in our thoughts. Reid was here, and Reid is mad. Obviously he knows that Gavin is here, and maybe he seen us on the couch together. Maybe that’s why he did this, but I thought he could only be in my bedroom…although I guess after what Taylor told me tonight, that is no longer the case. I wonder if he’s still here right now, watching us. What he must be thinking right now. I knew this was a bad idea. We throw the last piece in the trash and Gavin stands up.

“We should vacuum the area for smaller shards we can’t see,” he says.

“I can do it. You should go home Gavin,” I glance at my alarm clock, “it’s after five in the morning.”

I also need him to leave before sunrise. I need to try and talk to Reid.

“Kicking me out?” Gavin asks, and I nod.

“Did I do something?”

“Why were we spooning on the couch?” I ask him, and his cheeks actually turn pink.

“During the movie, you passed out, and you were shivering. I was tired and figured, what the heck? I just wanted to make you warm and hold you. Sorry if it upset you, I didn’t mean to cross the line. Are you mad at me?”

I stare back at him, not sure what to think. I find that I’m not mad.

“I’m not mad,” I say.

“I’m glad. So what’s the problem then?”

“It can’t happen again.”

“Why not?”

“Gavin, I know I said tonight was a date, and I guess we could still classify it as such, but I’m not ready for all the other stuff. Kissing, cuddling, and whatever else comes with having a relationship. My heart can’t let go of Reid yet, and that wouldn’t be fair to you.”

My chest tightens, and I swallow back the urge to cry.

“Well I don’t think we could classify tonight as being a successful date. I barely saw you at that party, and it’s not exactly what I envisioned for the first time I took you out. As for your heart, I don’t expect you to ever really let him go Had, but I know there’s room in there for me too.”

Gavin steps towards me, and I step back.

“I think I just need some space right now. I need to think about all of this.”

Gavin nods in understanding.

“Fine, I’ll uh…I guess just call me when you’re ready to talk about this.”

Gavin takes one last look at my window.

“You might want to cover that up or something.”

I nod in response. Gavin smiles weakly at me then he turns and leaves my bedroom.

I stand there and wait until I hear the front door open and close. After a few seconds, I close my bedroom door and flick off the light.

“Reid, I know you’re here, we need to talk,” I say to my empty bedroom.

“I’d say we do.”

I jump at the sound of his voice behind me. I turn around and I’m face to face with him.

“Did I scare you?” he asks, his voice carries a hint of anger.

“Just startled me,” I whisper.

I take a seat on the end of my bed, my legs feeling like jelly. Reid starts pacing in front of me. I watch him and wait. I know he’s upset, that much is clear, but I want to know what’s going on in his head.

“Talk to me,” I plead when he still doesn’t say anything.

“I don’t even know what to say Hadley,” he growls, “I’m…I’m…” he can’t get the words out.

“Mad?” I squeak, and an incredulous laugh escapes Reid.

“Mad? I don’t know what the hell I am right now,” he mutters.

“Why’d you smash my window, Reid?”

Reid stops pacing and comes over to me. He bends down so that we’re face to face, and his green eyes are blazing, his voice is deceptively soft.

“I know I told you to move on, and I meant it, but I didn’t realize it’d be so hard to witness...” he pauses and stands, running his hands through his hair.

“And with my brother!” he shouts, making me jump.

“Gavin, Hadley? Gavin?”

“Nothing happened,” I whimper, and tears start flowing.

Reid stares down at me then drops to the floor on his knees, grabbing my hands in his, which are ice cold.

“I want you to be happy, I want nothing more than to see you happy, Hadley. That’s all I ever wanted. I just didn’t realize that you had moved on…with Gavin. I know you guys are friends, but you never told me just how close you were.”

“Reid, I didn’t even know how Gavin felt about me until tonight.”

“Really? And how do you feel about him?”

“I’m not sure how I feel yet. All I know is…he’s not you.” I sob.

Reid sighs loudly.

“Last night, it was my best friend Cole that asked you out…and now my brother…Dang, I should have been keeping a better eye on them huh?”

I look at him through my tears and now he’s smiling at me. Now I’m confused.

Reid stands and then sits down next to me on my bed.

“I’m sorry I freaked out on you Hadley. I just…seeing you two on the couch together, him holding you like that. You looked so at peace, more than I have seen you look since…since it was me making you feel that way, before I died.”

“I didn’t even know he was holding me until I woke up to the sound of glass being smashed.”

“Again…sorry. I actually didn’t mean for it to break. I didn’t even know I could shut it with that much force. I’m usually pretty stealthy.”

“So what about the emblem on my floor? What was that about?”

“During my tantrum, I picked it up and chucked it across the room. I didn’t actually want to break anything, but I wanted to let it be known that I was pissed.”

“Reid, if you’re not okay with me hanging out with Gavin, I won’t see him anymore,” I say, but the thought of not hanging out with Gavin anymore, hurts.

“That’s not what I want Hadley,” Reid shakes his head, “I want you to be with whoever makes you happy, even if it is my brother…and hey, at least I know he’s a good guy.”

“What does this mean for us though? I still want to be with you Reid.”

“I want to be with you too Hadley, but that can’t happen…I’m gone.”

“You’re right here.”

“No, I’m not,” Reid brushes my hair off my face, “I know it feels that way, but you know I’m not.”

“So, how are you able to be in other places now?” I then ask.

“Other places?”

“Yeah. First you said that you could only appear in my room, now all of a sudden you can go as far as the living room...and even more confusing…Gavin’s room.”

I watch his face, but it remains composed.

“Gavin told you I was in his room?” he whispers.

“No, Taylor did. She told me that she saw you, and you basically threatened her into being nice to me, which worked by the way. She wants to be friends now.”

Reid starts laughing.

“You should have seen the look on her face. She was terrified. I’m glad my scare tactics worked.”

“As much as I appreciate that Reid, I want to know what’s changed that enabled you to do that? Do you visit Gavin often, has he seen you this way?”

“My guess is that, the longer I’ve been this way, the better I’ve gotten at stretching my boundaries. It started with just your room, then your house, then I decided to try my house, and it worked.”

“And Gavin? Has he seen you?”

Reid’s jaw tightens, and then he nods.

“What? He never told me this. You didn’t tell him that you saw me either did you?”

“No.”

“So Gavin wont tell me, thinking that I would think he’s crazy, and I won’t tell him, thinking the same thing?”

“Yeah, I guess that seems a little messed up doesn’t it?”

“Reid, I’ve been keeping this a secret for so long, and now I find out that I could have had somebody to talk about it with?”

“That’s why I didn’t tell you guys about the other. I didn’t want the fact that I’m a ghost be the thing that you guys focus on every time you get together. I wanted to keep it so that when you’re together, you just have fun, and forget for a little while, so please do me a favor and keep it that way?”

“Do you visit him often? Do you visit the rest of your family?”

“I haven’t appeared to my parents or Maddie. I think it would do more harm to them then good. Gavin’s different, but even so, I don’t think he thinks that I’m really there, he’s convinced he’s dreaming when I’m there, and it’s only every few weeks, not like with you where I’m here most nights. You, I can’t stay away from, even if it’s for your own good it seems.”

“So, what do you talk about with each other?”

“That’s just between us brothers,” Reid says, shaking his head.

“He never mentioned his feelings for me?”

“Well, he never said the words to me, no. But to tell you the truth, I kind of had a feeling he did. Just by the way he would talk about every time he hung with you, and then some. I just didn’t know he’d do anything about it. I think he’s been fighting an inner battle with himself about it for a while now.”

“So if you knew he felt that way, why were you so surprised?”

“Because it’s one thing to know it, and another thing to see it in action, and then find out that you might feel the same way. That’s the thing, even though I knew how he felt, you never gave me any inclination that you felt the same about him.”

“Reid, I don’t even know for sure how I feel about him. Like I said, he just told me tonight, and before that, I didn’t even realize that I had any feelings toward him that was more than a friendship. This is all very new to me, because I’ve never ever considered the possibility of being with somebody other than you. Then last night, when you told me I had to open myself to it or you wouldn’t come back, I had to decide who I felt more comfortable with, and there was a vast difference in how I felt about going out with Cole, or going out with Gavin.”

“So there is something there then? You admit that you have feelings for Gavin?”

“I feel like I’m betraying you though, like I’m…cheating on you Reid. I don’t know how I’m supposed to feel about anybody besides you.”

“You’re not cheating on me Hadley, I’m dead.”

“Yes, you may be dead, but you’re not gone, so we have basically continued on with our relationship. So how could it not be wrong for me to have feelings for somebody else? How do I balance my life with you, and my other life out there, without feeling like I’m hurting you, or Gavin for that matter?”

“There is no life with me,” he says softly, and I groan loudly in frustration.

“You keep saying that…but here you are!”

“You want me to go?”

“No Reid! That’s the thing. I don’t ever want you to go. I can’t let go of you; you can’t let go of me. Life is knocking on my door, asking me to move on, and I…can’t do it yet.”

“So maybe my ultimatum wasn’t the way to go about this,” Reid says. I don’t know what he means by this. I just stare at him in confusion.

“It was too abrupt a transition. I get it. One night you’re with me, and we have the ability to fool around,” Reid chuckles, and then bumps me with his shoulder, “then I tell you to go out with somebody else. It’s an emotional hurdle.”

“Okay…where are you going with this?” I ask.

“So, I won’t stop coming around yet, which I was kidding myself with by the way…but I do think we have to stop being intimate.”

“What? No intimacy? No kissing? No touching? Nothing?”

“Well, we don’t have to stop touching, but the kissing, making out and sleeping together has to stop. I know it seems harsh, but that’s the way it has to be.”

I feel a pinching sensation in my heart.

“Is this…are you breaking up with me Reid?”

“In a way,” he nods once.

I’m about to protest, but he puts a hand over my mouth.

“Hadley, you know I hate this right? This isn’t something I want to do; it’s something I have to do. It’ll make things easier in the long run, it’ll hurt less when the time comes that I’m gone for good.”

I realize that he’s right. I look down at our hands, clasped together.

“You’re the love of my life Reid.”

“And you were mine,” he whispers.

“I’m not anymore?”

“You always will be, but my life is over. We have to realize that. I’m never coming back, and I’m not even supposed to be here right now. But Hadley, your life is just beginning, and I need you to live it, fully and completely. If I didn’t let you do that, then I will have failed you. I know that you will always love me, and I will always love you too, but I’m not it for you, there’s more coming, and it’s going to be great.”

I feel tears falling down my cheeks again, and I wonder how I still have more to shed, it’s like I never stop. Reid reaches up and holds my face between his palms, brushing the tears away with his thumbs. I meet his eyes, and he smiles at me. I can feel the tingly sensation beginning, telling me that it’s time for him to go.

“I love you Hadley,” he whispers, and then he leans forward and presses his soft lips to mine.

I wrap my arms around his neck, reluctant to let go, but the pins and needles get stronger until he’s no longer there, and I’m grasping air.