Ugly Love(70)
Author: Colleen Hoover

She inhales and then looks back up at me with slightly redder, glossier eyes. “You deserve so much more than what you’re allowing yourself to have.” She stands on the tips of her toes and places her hands on my shoulders, then presses her lips to my cheek. “Goodbye, Miles.”

She turns and walks toward the elevator, just as Corbin steps out to meet her. I see her lift one of her hands to wipe away her tears.

I watch her walk away.

I shut my door, expecting to feel even the slightest ripple of relief over the fact that I was able to let her walk away. Instead, I’m met with the only familiar sensation my heart is capable of feeling: pain.

“You’re a goddamn idiot,” Ian says from behind me. I turn around, and he’s sitting on the arm of the couch, staring at me. “Why are you not going after her right now?”

Because, Ian, I hate this feeling. I hate every feeling she evokes in me, because it fills me with all the things I’ve spent the last six years avoiding.

“Why would I do that?” I ask as I head toward my room. I pause with the knock at my front door. I expel a frustrated breath before turning back to the door, not wanting to have to turn her away for a second time. I will, though. Even if I have to lay it out in terms that will hurt her even more, she needs to accept the fact that it’s over. I let it go too far. Hell, I never should have allowed it to even begin, with us knowing it would more than likely end this way.

I open the door but find Corbin in my line of sight rather than Tate. I want to feel relieved by the fact that it’s him standing here rather than her, but the fuming look on his face makes it impossible to feel relieved.

Before I can react, his fist connects with my mouth, and I stumble backward toward the couch. Ian breaks my fall, and I steady myself before turning to face the door again.

“What the hell, Corbin?” Ian yells. He’s holding me back, assuming I want retaliation.

I don’t. I deserved that.

Corbin trades looks between the two of us, finally settling on me. He pulls his fist up to his chest and rubs it with his other hand. “We all know I should have done that a long time ago.” He grips the doorknob and pulls the door shut, disappearing back out into the hallway.

I shrug out of Ian’s grasp and bring my hand up to my lip. I pull my fingers back, and they’re tinged with blood.

“How about now?” Ian says, hopeful. “You gonna go after her now?”

I glare at him before turning to stalk off to my bedroom.

Ian laughs loudly. It’s the kind of laugh that says, You’re a goddamn idiot. Only he already said that, so he’s kind of just repeating himself.

He follows me to my bedroom.

I’m really not in the mood for this conversation. Good thing I know how to look at people without actually seeing them.

I take a seat on my bed, and he walks into my room and leans against the door. “I’m tired of this, Miles. Six f**king years I’ve watched this zombie walk around in your place.”

“I’m not a zombie,” I say flatly. “Zombies can’t fly.”

Ian rolls his eyes, obviously not in the mood for jokes. Good thing, because I’m not really in the mood to make them.

He continues to glare at me, so I pick up my phone and lie back on the bed in order to pretend he isn’t here.

“She’s the first thing to breathe life back into you since the night you drowned in that f**king lake.”

I’ll hurt him. If he doesn’t leave right this second, I’ll f**king hurt him.

“Get out.”

“No.”

I look at him. I see him. “Get the hell out, Ian.”

He walks to my desk, pulls out the chair, and sits in it. “Fuck you, Miles,” he says. “I’m not finished.”

“Get out!”

“No!”

I stop fighting him. I get up and walk out myself.

He follows me. “Let me ask you one question,” he says, trailing me into the living room.

“And then you’ll get out?”

He nods. “And then I’ll get out.”

“Fine.”

He regards me silently for a few moments.

I patiently wait for his question so he can leave before I hurt him.

“What if someone told you they could erase that entire night from your memory, but in doing so, they also have to erase every single good thing. All the moments with Rachel. Every word, every kiss, every I love you. Every moment you had with your son, no matter how brief. The first moment you saw Rachel holding him. The first moment you held him. The first time you heard him cry or watched him sleep. All of it. Gone. Forever. If someone told you they could get rid of the ugly stuff, but you’d lose all the other stuff, too … would you do it?”

He thinks he’s asking me something I’ve never asked myself before. Does he think I don’t sit and wonder about this stuff every f**king day of my life?

“You didn’t say I had to answer your question. You just asked if you could ask it. You can leave now.”

I’m the worst kind of person.

“You can’t answer it,” he says. “You can’t say yes.”

“I also can’t say no,” I tell him. “Congratulations, Ian. You stumped me. Goodbye.”

I begin to walk back to my room, but he says my name again. I stop and put my hands on my hips and drop my head. Why won’t he stop with it, already? It’s been six damn years. He should know that night made me who I am now. He should know I’m not changing.

“If I would have asked you that a few months ago, you would have said yes before the question even left my mouth,” he says. “Your answer has always been yes. You would have given up anything to not have to relive that night.”

I turn around, and he’s heading toward the door. He opens it, then pauses and faces me again. “If being with Tate for a few short months can make that pain bearable enough for you to answer with maybe, imagine what a lifetime with her could do for you.”

He closes the door.

I close my eyes.