Chapter Twenty One
Sydney
“Let me get those,” Warren says as he bends to
pick up my suitcases. He carries them down the
steps, and I follow him. Once we make it to his
car, I realize I don’t even know where I’m going.
I haven’t thought this far ahead. As soon as
Ridge told me he needed me to leave today, I just
packed my things and walked out without even a
plan for what I’m going to do for the next three
days. My new apartment isn’t ready, but I’m
wishing I could be in it. I want to be as far away
as I can get right now from Ridge and Maggie
and Warren and Bridgette and Hunter and Tori
and everything and everyone.
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“Ridge wants me to take you to a hotel until
your apartment is ready, but is there anywhere
else you’d rather go?”
Warren is now sitting in the driver’s seat, and
I’m in the front passenger’s seat. I don’t even re-
member our getting into his car. I turn and look
at him, and he’s just staring at me. The car hasn’t
even been cranked yet.
God, I feel so pathetic. I feel like a burden.
“It’s laughable, isn’t it?” I say.
“What?”
I gesture to myself. “This.” I lean my head
against the headrest and close my eyes. “I should
just go back home to my parents. I’m obviously
not cut out for this.”
Warren sighs. “Not cut out for what? College?
Real life?”
I shake my head. “Independence in general,
really. Hunter was right when he told me I’d be
better off living with him than on my own. He
was right about that, at least. I’ve been in Ridge’s
life less than three months, and I’ve successfully
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ruined his entire relationship with Maggie.” I
look out the window, up to his empty balcony.
“I’ve also ruined his entire friendship with me.”
Warren cranks the car, then reaches over and
squeezes my hand. “Today is a really bad day,
Syd. A really, really bad day. Sometimes in life,
we need a few bad days in order to keep the good
ones in perspective.” He lets go of my hand and
backs out of the parking spot. “And you’ve made
it this long without having to go back to your par-
ents. You can make it three more days.”
“I can’t afford a hotel, Warren. I spent my sav-
ings on furniture and the deposit for the new
apartment. Just take me to the bus station. I’ll go
stay with my parents for a few days.” I pick up
my phone in order to bite the bullet and call
them, but Warren pulls it out of my hands.
“First of all, you need to stop blaming yourself
for what’s happening with Ridge and Maggie.
Ridge is his own person, and he knows right from
wrong. He was the one in the relationship, not
you. Second, you need to allow Ridge to pay for
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this hotel, because he’s the one making you leave
without a notice. As much as I love the guy, he
sort of owes you big-time.”
I watch the empty balcony as we drive away.
“Why do I feel like I’ve been taking Ridge’s
handouts since the day I met him?” I look away
from the balcony, feeling the anger building in
my chest, but I don’t even know who I’m mad at.
Love, maybe? I think I’m mad at love.
“I don’t know why you feel the way you do,”
Warren says, “but you need to stop. You’ve nev-
er asked any of us for a single thing.”
I nod, trying to agree with him.
Maybe Warren is right. Ridge is just as guilty
in this as I am. He’s the one in the relationship.
He should have asked me to leave as soon as he
knew he was developing feelings for me. He also
should have given me more than five minutes to
move out. He made me feel like more of a liabil-
ity than someone he’s supposed to care about.
“You’re right, Warren. And you know what? If
Ridge is paying, I want you to take me to a really
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nice hotel. One with room service and a minibar
full of tiny bottles of Pine-Sol.”
Warren laughs. “That’s my girl.”
Ridge
It’s been seventy-two hours.
Three days.
Enough time for me to come up with even
more things I need to say to Maggie. Enough
time for Warren to let me know that Sydney is fi-
nally in her own apartment. He wouldn’t tell me
which one, but that’s probably for the best.
Seventy-two hours has also been enough time
for me to realize that I miss having Sydney in my
life almost as much as I miss Maggie. And it’s
enough time to know that I’m not going another
day without talking to Maggie. I need to know
that she’s okay. I’ve done nothing but pace this
apartment since the moment I lost her.
Since the moment I lost both of them.
I pick up my phone and palm it for several
minutes, too scared to text her. I’m afraid of what
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her response will be. When I finally do type out a
text, I close my eyes and hit send.
Me: Are you ready to talk about it?
I stare at my phone, waiting for her to respond.
I want to know if she’s okay. I want to be able to
tell her my side. The fact that she’s more than
likely thinking the worst is killing me, and it feels as if I haven’t been able to breathe since she
found out about Sydney and me.
Maggie: I’ll never be ready, but it needs
to be done. I’m home all night.
As ready as I am to see her, I’m also scared to
death. I don’t want to see her heartbroken.
Me: I’ll be there in an hour.
I grab my things and head straight out the
door—straight back to the half of my heart that
needs the most mending.
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? ? ?
I have a key to her place. I’ve had a key to her
place for three years, but I haven’t had to ring her
doorbell in all that time.
I’m ringing her doorbell right now, and it
doesn’t feel right. It feels as though I’m asking
permission to break through an invisible barrier
that shouldn’t even be here in the first place. I
take a step away from the door and wait.
After several painfully long seconds, she opens
the door and makes brief eye contact with me as
she steps aside to let me in. I pictured her on the
drive over with her hair a mess, makeup smudged
underneath her eyes from all the crying, and
sporting three-day-old pajamas. The typical
heartbroken attire for a girl who just lost all trust in the man she loves.
I think I would rather she looked the way I pic-
tured her than how she actually looks. She’s
dressed in her typical jeans, and her hair is neatly
pulled back. There isn’t a smudge of makeup on
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her face or a tear in her eyes. She gives me a faint
smile as she closes the front door.
I watch her closely, because I’m not sure what
to do. Of course, my first instinct is to pull her to me and kiss her, but my first instinct probably
isn’t the best. Instead, I wait until she goes into
her living room. I follow her, wishing more than
anything that she would turn toward me and
throw her arms around me.
She does turn to face me before she takes a
seat, but she doesn’t throw her arms around me.
“Well?” she signs. “How do we do this?” Her
expression is hesitant and pained, but at least
she’s confronting it. I know this is hard for her.
“How about we quit acting like we’re not al-
lowed to be ourselves?” I sign. “This has been
the hardest three days of my life, and I can’t go
another second without touching you.”
I don’t give her a chance to respond before my
arms are wrapped around her and I’m pulling her
against me. She doesn’t resist. Her arms wrap
tightly around me, and as soon as my cheek is
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pressed against the top of her head, I feel her be-
gin to cry.
This is the Maggie I need. The vulnerable
Maggie. The Maggie who still loves me, despite
what I’ve put her through.
I hug her and pull her to the couch, keeping
her secured against me as I sit with her now on
my lap. We continue to hold each other, neither
of us knowing how to begin the conversation. I
press a long kiss into her hair.
What I wouldn’t give to just be able to whisper
all my apologies into her ear. I want her as close
to me as possible while I tell her how sorry I am,
but I can’t do that and sign everything I need to
say at the same time. I hate these moments in life
where I’d give anything to be able to communic-
ate the same way so many others take for
granted.
She slowly lifts her face, and I reluctantly let
her pull back. She keeps her palms pressed
against my chest and looks me directly in the
eyes.
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“Are you in love with her?” she asks.
She doesn’t sign her question; she only speaks
it. The fact that she doesn’t sign it makes me
think it was too hard for her even to ask. So hard
that maybe she doesn’t really want to know the
answer, so she didn’t really want me to under-
stand her question.
I did understand it.
I grab both of her hands pressed against my
chest, and I lift them, kissing each of her palms
before releasing her hands to answer her.
“I’m in love with you, Maggie.”
Her expression is tight and controlled. “That’s
not what I asked.”
I look away from her, not wanting her to see
the struggle in my eyes. I close them and remind
myself that lying won’t get us back to where we
need to be. Maggie’s smart. She also deserves
honesty, which isn’t at all what I’ve been giving
her. I open my eyes and look at her. I don’t an-
swer her with a yes or a no. I shrug, because I
honestly don’t know if I’m in love with Sydney.
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How could I be when I’m in love with Maggie? It
shouldn’t be possible for the heart to love more
than one person at once.
She diverts her eyes away and scoots off my
lap. She stands and slowly walks the length of the
living room and back. She’s thinking, so I give
her a moment. I know my answer has hurt her,
but I know a lie would have hurt her even more.
She finally turns to me.
“I can spend all night asking you really brutal
questions, Ridge. I don’t want to do that. I’ve had
a lot of time to think this through, and I have a lot I need to say to you.”
“If brutal questions will help you, then ask me
brutal questions. Please. We’ve been together
five years, and I can’t let this tear us apart.”
She shakes her head, then takes a seat on the
couch opposite me. “I don’t need to ask the ques-
tions, because I already know all the answers. I
just need to talk to you now about where we go
from here.”
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I lean forward, not liking where this is going. I
don’t like it at all. “At least, allow me to explain
myself. You can’t come to a decision about what
happens to us without hearing me out first.”
She shakes her head again, and my heart
clenches. “I already know, Ridge. I know you. I
know your heart. I’ve read your conversations
with Sydney. I already know what you’re going
to tell me. You’re going to tell me how much you
love me. How you would do anything for me.
You’re going to apologize for developing feel-
ings for another girl, despite how hard you tried
to prevent that from happening. You’re going to
tell me you love me so much more than I know
and how your relationship with me is so much
more important to you than your feelings for
Sydney. You’re going to tell me you’ll do any-
thing to make it up to me and that I just need to
give you a chance. You’re probably going to be
brutally honest with me, also, and tell me that
you do have feelings for Sydney but they don’t
compare to how you feel about me.”
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She stands and moves to sit next to me on the
couch. There are traces of tears in her eyes, but
she isn’t crying anymore. She faces me and be-
gins signing again.
“And you know what, Ridge? I believe you.
And I understand all of it. I do. I’ve read your
conversations. It’s as if I was right there, sifting
through it all while the two of you were attempt-
ing to fight whatever was developing between
you. I keep telling myself to quit logging back in-
to your account, but I can’t stop. I’ve read those
conversations a million times. I deciphered every
word, every sentence, every punctuation mark. I
wanted to find the spot in your conversations that
proved your disloyalty to me. I wanted to find the
moment in your conversations where you became
this despicable excuse for a man by admitting
that what you felt for her was purely sexual. God,
Ridge. I wanted to find that moment so bad, but I
couldn’t. I know you kissed her, but even the kiss
seemed excusable after the two of you had that
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open discussion about it. I’m your girlfriend, and
even I began to excuse it.
“I’m not saying what you did is readily forgiv-
able, by any means. You should have asked her
to move out the second you felt compelled to kiss
her. Hell, you shouldn’t have ever asked her to
move in if there was even the slightest possibility
that you were attracted to her. What you did was
wrong in every sense of the word, but what’s so
messed up is that I feel like I understand it.
Maybe it’s because I know you too well, but the
fact that you’re falling in love with Sydney is ob-
vious, and I can’t just sit back and share your
heart with her, Ridge. I can’t do it.”
No, no, no, no, no. I quickly pull her to me,
wanting the comfort of her to subdue the panic
building within me.
She can be heartbroken. She can even be
pissed or terrified, but the one thing I won’t let
her be is okay. She can’t just be okay with this.
Tears begin to sting my eyes as I hold her as if
my embrace is somehow supposed to convince
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her of how I feel. I’m shaking my head no, trying
to get her not to take this conversation where I’m
afraid it’s headed.
I press my lips against hers in an attempt to
make it all go away. I hold her face in the palms
of my hands and try desperately to show her how
I feel without having to pull apart from her again.
Her lips part, and I kiss her, something I’ve
done on a regular basis for more than five years
but never with so much conviction or fear.
Her mouth tastes of tears, and I’m not sure
whose they are, because we’re both crying now.
She pushes against my chest, wanting to speak to
me, but I don’t want her to. I don’t want to watch
her tell me how okay my feelings for Sydney are.
They’re not okay. They shouldn’t be okay at
all.
She sits up and pushes me away from her, then
wipes her tears. I lean my elbow into the couch
and cover my mouth with my trembling hand.
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“There’s more. There’s so much more I need
to tell you, and I need you to give me the oppor-
tunity to get it out, okay?”
I simply nod, when all I want to do is tell her
how hearing her out is the last thing my heart can
take right now. She adjusts herself and pulls her
legs onto the couch. She wraps her arms around
them and rests her cheek on her knee, looking
away from me. She’s still and quiet and
contemplating.
I’m a complete wreck as I sit here and wait.
She unwraps her hands from around her legs
and slowly lifts her head to look me in the eyes.
“Remember the day we met?” she asks.
There’s a faint smile in her eyes, and my panic
eases slightly at the pleasantness in her memory.
I nod.
“I noticed you first, before I noticed Warren.
When Warren approached me, I was hoping he
was approaching me for you. I remember making
eye contact with you over his shoulder, because I
wanted to smile at you so you would know that
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you caught my eye the same way I caught yours.
But when I realized Warren wasn’t approaching
me for you, I was disappointed. There was
something about you that tugged at me in a way
that Warren didn’t, but you didn’t seem to have
that same reaction to me. Warren was cute, so I
agreed to go out with him, especially since I
thought you weren’t into me that day.”
I close my eyes and soak in her words for a
moment. I never knew this. I’m not sure at this
point that I want to know this. After several quiet moments, I reluctantly open my eyes again and
let her finish.
“For the short time I dated Warren, you and I
would have these brief conversations and mo-
ments of eye contact that always seemed to make
you uncomfortable, and I knew it made you un-
comfortable because you were developing feel-
ings for me. But your loyalty to Warren was so
strong that you wouldn’t allow yourself to go
there. I always admired that about you, because I
knew the two of us would have worked so well.
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To be honest, I was secretly hoping you would
betray his friendship and just kiss me or
something, because you were all I thought about.
I’m not even sure I was with Warren for Warren.
I think I was with him for you all along.
“Then, a few weeks after Warren and I broke
up, I began to think I’d never see you again, be-
cause you never came for me like I hoped you
would. The thought of that terrified me, so I
showed up at your apartment one day. You wer-
en’t there, but Brennan was. I think he knew why
I was there, so he told me not to worry, that I just
needed to give you time. He told me about the
deal you and Warren made and that you really
did have feelings for me but didn’t feel right pur-
suing them yet. He even showed me the date you
had circled on the calendar. I’ll never forget how
that made me feel, and from that point on, I coun-
ted down the days until you showed up at my
front door.”
She wipes away a tear. I briefly close my eyes
and try to show her respect by not allowing
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myself to pull her to me again, but it’s so hard. I
never knew she came for me. Brennan never told
me, and right now, I’m struggling with wanting
to let him know how pissed I am that he kept
quiet and how much I love him for informing
Maggie of how I felt.
“I fell in love with you during that year of
waiting for you. I fell in love with your loyalty to
Warren. I fell in love with your loyalty to me. I
fell in love with your patience and your will-
power. I fell in love with the fact that you didn’t
want to start things out wrong with us. You
wanted everything to be as right as it could be, so
you waited an entire year. Believe me, Ridge. I
know how hard it was, because I was waiting
right along with you.”
I lift my hand and wipe a tear from her cheek,
then let her finish.
“I swore I wouldn’t allow my illness to inter-
fere with us. I wouldn’t let it prevent me from
completely falling in love with you. I wouldn’t
let it be my crutch to push you away. You were
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so adamant that it didn’t matter to you, and I was
so desperate to believe you. We were both lying
to ourselves. I think my illness is the thing you
love the most about me.”
My breath catches in my throat. Those words
hurt me more than any words ever have. “Why
would you say something like that, Maggie?”
“I know it sounds absurd to you because you
don’t see it that way. It’s who you are. You’re
loyal. You love people to a fault. You want to
take care of everyone around you, including me,
Brennan, Warren . . . Sydney. It’s just who you
are, and seeing how Warren treated me back then
made you want to jump in and become my hero.
I’m not saying you don’t love me for me, because
I know you do. I just think you love me the
wrong way.”
I run my palm over my forehead and try to
squeeze the pain away. My head can’t take an-
other second of listening to how incredibly
wrong she is. “Maggie, stop. If you’re about to
use your illness as an excuse to leave me, I won’t
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listen to it. I can’t. You’re talking like you’re
about to just give up on us, and it’s scaring the
living hell out of me. I didn’t come here for you
to give up. I need you to fight with me. I need
you to fight for us.”
She tilts her head to the side, slowly shaking it
in disagreement. “I shouldn’t have to fight for us,
Ridge. I fight every goddamned day of my life
just to survive. I should be able to revel in us, but I can’t. I’m constantly living in fear that I’m going to upset you or make you angry because you
want so badly to form a protective bubble around
me. You don’t want me taking risks or doing
anything that causes me one iota of stress. You
don’t see the point in my going to college, since
we both know my fate. You don’t see the point in
me having a career, because you think it’s better
if I just let you take care of me while I take it
easy. You don’t understand my yearning to ex-
perience the things that give people that rush of
adrenaline. You get mad when I bring up the idea
of traveling, because you don’t think it’s safe for
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my health. You refuse to go on tour with your
brother, because you want to be the one to take
care of me when I get sick. You give up so much
of your life to make sure I’m not having to give
up any of mine, and sometimes it’s so
suffocating.”
Suffocating?
I’m suffocating?
I stand up and pace the room for several mo-
ments, attempting to breathe the air back into my
lungs that she’s repeatedly knocking out. After
I’m calm enough to respond, I return to the couch
and face her again.
“I’m not trying to suffocate you, Maggie. I just
want to protect you. We don’t have the luxury of
time like every other couple. Is it wrong that I
want to prolong what we have for as long as we
possibly can?”
“No, Ridge. It’s not wrong. I love that about
you so much, but I don’t love it for me. It always feels as though you’re trying to be my lifeguard. I
don’t need a lifeguard, Ridge. I need someone
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who is willing to watch me brave the ocean and
then dare me not to drown. But you wouldn’t be
able to let me near the ocean. It’s not your fault that you can’t give me that.”
I know it’s just an analogy, but she’s only us-
ing it to make excuses.
“You think that’s what you want,” I sign. “It’s
not. You can’t tell me you’d rather be with
someone who would allow you to risk the time
you have left than have someone who would do
whatever he could to prolong his life with you.”
She exhales. I can’t tell if she’s admitting I’m
right or if she’s frustrated because I’m wrong.
She looks me square in the eyes and leans for-
ward, then briefly presses her lips to mine. As
soon as I lift my hands to her face, she pulls back
again.
“I’ve known all my life that I could die at any
moment. You don’t know what that’s like, Ridge,
but I want you to try to put yourself in my shoes.
If you knew all your life that you were going to
die at any moment, would you be okay with just
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barely living? Or would you live as hard as you
could? Because you’re needing me to barely live,
Ridge. I can’t do that. When I die, I need to know
that I did everything I’ve ever wanted to do, and
I’ve seen everything I’ve ever wanted to see, and
I’ve loved everyone I’ve ever wanted to love. I
can’t just barely live anymore, and it’s not in
your nature to stick by my side and watch me do
all the things I still have left to do in my life.
“You’ve spent five years of your life loving
me like no one’s ever loved me. My love has
matched yours minute for minute. I don’t want
you to ever doubt that. People take so much for
granted, and I never want you to feel that I took
you for granted. Everything you do for me is so
much more than I deserve, and you need to know
how much that means to me. But there are times
when I feel like our devotion to each other is ty-
ing us down. Keeping us both from really living.
The past few days have helped me realize that
I’m still with you because I’m scared to break
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I’m scared I’ll just keep holding you back. Hold-
ing myself back. I feel like I can’t live the life I want to live for fear of hurting you, and you can’t
live the life you want to live because your heart is
too loyal for your own good. As much as it hurts
me to admit this, I think I might be better off
without you. I also think that maybe someday
you’ll realize you’re better off without me.”
My elbows meet my knees as I lean forward
and turn away from her. I can’t watch her say an-
other word to me. Every single thing she’s saying
is not only breaking my heart, but it feels as if it’s also breaking the heart within my heart.
It hurts so much, and I’m so damn scared, be-
cause for a moment, I begin to think there’s a
possibility that she’s right.
Maybe she doesn’t need me.
Maybe I do hold her back.
Maybe I’m not the hero to her I’ve always
tried so hard to be, because right now, I feel as if
she doesn’t even need a hero. Why would she?
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She has someone so much stronger than I’ll ever
be for her. She has herself.
The realization that I may not be what she
needs in her life consumes me, and my regret and
guilt and shame fold in on themselves, com-
pletely devouring the strength I have left.
I feel her arms wrap around me, and I pull her
to me, needing to feel her against me. I love her
so damn much, and all I want right now is for her
to know that, even if it doesn’t change anything. I
pull her to me and press my forehead to hers as
we both cry, holding on to each other with all we
have left. Tears are streaming down her cheeks as
she slides onto my lap.
She mouths, “I love you,” then presses her lips
to mine. I pull her against my chest as close as I
possibly can without crawling inside of her,
which is exactly what my heart is trying to do. It
wants to embed itself within the walls of her
chest, and it never wants to let go.