I couldn’t take my eyes off her, loving her the way I was meant to with pride for her excelling at life without me, joy that she was studying something she loved, affection for the messy blonde curls, and warm-hearted sentiment for the ribbon fluttering in her strands.
The first day of watching her went too fast and, before I knew it, my stalking reached creepy levels until I couldn’t leave unless her bedroom light went out and sleep meant she’d be in bed for the rest of the night.
I’d slink off, hidden in my shadows and shame, crawling into a sleeping bag and dreaming inappropriate dreams full of need, love, and passion.
At dawn, I’d return to her, an itch in my blood commanding me to be close after so long apart.
The next morning, I found her hugging David goodbye on the stoop of the white picket fenced house I could never afford, and her bare legs flashed me where I hid in the trees across the street.
She wore flip-flops, and wrapped around her ankle was the same tattoo I’d paid for on her seventeenth birthday. The one with its matching blue ribbon trailing into its capital R.
A year old and the ink was just as bright, just as damning as the night I cupped her foot and demanded an explanation—begging her to put me out of my misery, all the while knowing she was about to condemn me even more.
The tattoo sucker-punched me with so many things, and I didn’t have the courage to approach her that day. Instead, I drowned beneath everything I’d done wrong and everything I didn’t know how to fix.
The day after that, David kissed her.
It’d been the slap to the face I needed.
It woke me out of the trance I’d fallen into, shaking me with truth that I’d left her for months, but she wasn’t a wilting flower entirely reliant on me to thrive. She was tenacious and brave and fiercely independent. Always had been—always looking after me just as much as I looked after her.
Of course, she wouldn’t wait for me.
Of course, her anger would drive her to find other things…other people.
My insides wanted to curl up and die, but I refused to be weak. I refused to think of myself as the injured party when I’d been the one to walk away.
I’d done this.
I’d pushed her to find comfort from some other man. A man she’d already given herself to. A man who had every power to destroy me, and he didn’t even know it.
When he kissed her, every muscle seized.
She didn’t exactly kiss him back—not the way she’d kissed Tom at the Halloween party—but she didn’t push him away, either.
She nodded to something he said while they stood on the garden path, and he cupped her pretty cheeks like I wanted to, her eyes glowing with a mixture of affection and tears.
I wanted to kill him.
But I was also grateful because he’d kept my Della safe when I had not. I wanted him gone, but I wouldn’t hurt her again.
She’d chosen him.
I had to respect that.
That was my punishment.
I returned to my borrowed shack on government land, unable to stop reliving her kissing him. Kissing the boy she’d lost her virginity to.
Just like when I’d run, I was only thinking of myself.
I should be happy she wasn’t writhing in matching misery.
She was alive.
She was healthy.
She was living.
Who was I to ruin that all over again?
If she’d moved on, then I would do everything in my power to spare her any more pain.
So, I settled in to watch, to study, to make sure what she’d said to me that night—the way she’d stared, and stripped, and kissed me—had been what I’d feared all along: a puppy crush. A silly infatuation. Nothing more than innocent flirtation that I’d turned into something messy and untrue.
I needed to see that so I could let go of these tragic needs driving me into an early grave.
But…if she loved me the way I was learning I loved her…could our relationship evolve? Were our foundations strong enough, our morals good enough, to risk losing everything just for the hope of something more?
A few months ago, my answer had been no. I wasn’t willing to risk it.
But now…now, I knew I’d fucked up everything and lived with the daily torture of what it was like to exist without her.
I wanted her back.
Emotions had been the glue that sewed us together, and I refused to let them be the crowbar to pry us apart.
I’d lost Della the moment I’d walked out the door. I’d decimated her trust, her faith, and her affection, all because I wasn’t brave enough to admit I felt something, too.
And now, watching her kiss men from a distance was all I had left, and as much as I despised myself, I couldn’t stop.
I just could not stop.
I couldn’t be away from her.
I couldn’t survive not seeing her.
I wasn’t proud of it.
I knew she’d become a sick addiction.
And for the first time in my life, I wasn’t fighting to better myself but letting myself slide into a deep, dark place I didn’t know how to climb out of.
Even at Mclary’s, I’d never let self-pity destroy my hope that one day I would be free—either in death or by running away.
I knew what I should do.
Leave.
Like I said I would.
Stop this madness and let Della find her place in the world without me messing it up even more.
But…I couldn’t.
I gave in.
I kept watching.
The days became a blur.
I couldn’t stop myself trailing her to school, to the coffee shop, to the pricey house she shared with David and the girl.
My heartache robbed me of yet more weight because I couldn’t tear myself away to eat. I had no money for vitamins I sorely needed. My body didn’t feel right…it felt sick.
I truly was the villain and slid into even worse territory for stalking her.
It all became much worse the night of a muggy summer’s evening when David led her from the house dressed in baby blue shorts and white open-necked shirt, holding my Della’s hand as her cream sundress with a lacy collar fluttered around her bare legs.
Once again, her ribbon plaited in her hair and inked around her ankle reached into my chest and tore out my pathetic heart.
She was so fucking beautiful.
He led her to a Chrysler parked in the driveway, opened her door, then hopped into the driver’s seat and drove off.
I couldn’t follow them, so I waited in the street-shadows, wishing for something to chase away the time, bowing beneath the weight of constant jealousy, plaguing myself with worry about what she was doing.
I wasn’t a smoker or a drinker, nor did I have money for cigarettes or alcohol, but I would’ve gladly given away every worldly possession to have something to numb my self-inflicted pain.
They returned a couple of hours later, the warm breeze blowing scents of grease and bacon across the street as they climbed from the car, laughing at some joke they shared.
On the quaint garden path, David grabbed her hand and spun her into him. “Happy birthday, Della Ribbon. I hope you were okay with sharing a burger with me and not with him.”
Goddammit, my chest cleaved in two.
Her nickname.
Her birthday.
She’d told him.
I stumbled with a mixture of despair and starvation.
She gasped as David clutched her close.
I winced as my fingers burned to touch her like he was.
She flinched as he bent his head to kiss her.
I barely controlled my growl as his body pressed against hers.
Their lips met, and this time…Della kissed him back. Hot and wet and needy—the same way she always kissed when trying to deny the truth and buy into a fantasy.
The same way the woman from my dreams kissed me. The same way I kissed her: with naked desire that sprang from desperation for love as much as a lust-filled connection.
With wet lips, he kissed his way along her jaw, then whispered something in her ear.
Her back straightened, eyes widened, and indecision flickered over her face.
But only for a moment.
Just a single moment where I knew she thought of me before pushing me out of her life like I’d pushed her out of mine.
And then, she nodded. “Yes.”
Yes to what?
Yes to ripping out my heart?
Yes to tearing apart my love?
They vanished into the house, leaving me in pieces on the pavement.
That night, her bedroom light never turned on.
However, two shadows danced over David’s curtains until late into the evening.