Light in the Shadows (Find You in the Dark #2)(75)
Author: A. Meredith Walters

So I cried for the man I couldn’t be. At least not right now. And I felt like in some ways I had been transported back to five months ago when I had made this same realization. Only then it had come with much harsher consequences.

This time, I didn’t cut. I didn’t think of some way to end things so I’d never have to feel this way again. Instead, I clung to my girlfriend. The person who had always been my light in the shadows and who continued to love me even at my worst. Who reminded me that everyone deserved love, even me.

“It’s okay, Clay. We’ll figure it out. Together,” she crooned with my head buried into the soft skin of her neck. Together. That was a word I could live with.

***

I don’t know how long I was at the swimming hole. But I felt like being there, with Maggie, crying like a little kid, was strangely cathartic. By the time we headed back to Ruby’s, it was getting dark. I was more exhausted than I could ever remember being. But that nastiness inside me was thankfully quiet. And I couldn’t help but feel like I had turned some sort of corner. I had been given the opportunity to make a choice and I was proud of the fact that I hadn’t made the one that ended in blood.

Maggie followed me in her car. I knew I had scared the shit out of her, but she hadn’t shown it. It was only because I knew her so well that I was able to see the terror in her eyes. I knew how hard it was for her to see me like that, perilously close to that edge I had fallen off before. Not knowing whether I would take her back down the dark road again.

I wish I could say that I would never do that. But the truth was, I just couldn’t be sure and there lied the crux of the problem. The last two and a half months had been more of a holding pattern. I was existing, thinking I was making progress, but in reality I still had such a long way to go.

On the drive home, I finally made a decision about my future. I knew it wasn’t the one everyone wanted me to make, but it was mine. I had made it. Me. And I felt a measure of pride at that.

Ruby was pacing the living room when Maggie and I walked through the door. “Clay!” she called out, rushing over to me. I was enveloped in her patchouli scented arms and I felt the guilt for making her worry.

Maggie stood in the doorway until Ruby waved her into our hug. My aunt held us both, crying and blubbering. “If you don’t want me to sell the house, I won’t. Clay, I’m so sorry, I had no idea it meant so much to you,” Ruby said through her tears of relief that I was home and in one piece. No life threatening self-mutilations. No drug and alcohol induced benders. Those were Maggie and Ruby’s fears when I lost it like that. And that made the choice I had made in the car all the more clear.

I stepped out of Ruby’s hold. “No, Ruby. You can’t make a decision based on me. I’m an adult, not a little kid. I shouldn’t have taken off like that. I didn’t mean to scare you.” I kissed the top of her greying head.

“If you need to sell the house and shop, then you sell the house and shop. You need to do what’s right for you,” I assured her. Maggie wrapped her arm around my waist and I leaned into her body.

“But if this makes you unhappy, I can’t be okay with it,” Ruby argued and I held up my hand, stopping her.

“You’ve always done what’s right for me, for Lisa, for the shop. This time, do what’s right for you.” And I realized I really meant it. It didn’t take away the pain and the deep rooted fear that I was being abandoned but feeling Maggie’s arm around me I knew it would all be okay.

I looked down at my girlfriend, who stared up at me with tears in her eyes. Would there ever be a day when I didn’t make her cry? I used the pad of my thumb and wiped the wetness from her cheeks.

But she was right. We were in this together. And that made it all okay.

Chapter Twenty-Three

-Maggie-

Five more days and I would officially be a high school graduate. I had finished up my English Lit exam and was ready to start my last weekend as a senior. The feeling of it was bittersweet. I was a jumbled mixture of excited and scared.

My parents had taken me up to JMU two weeks ago for a tour of the campus. I filled out the pile of paperwork and submitted it. Things were set in motion and I felt like it all was going as it was supposed to.

Well most things.

Clay had changed. You would think I would have become accustomed to the multitude of Clayton Reed fluctuations. I had seen him at his highest and at his lowest and every facet in between. I had loved the Clay in the throes of his mania and I had loved the Clay who had tried to end it all.

And then I had loved the Clay who had come back to me, determined to be a better man and to make a life for the two of us together, whatever form that took.

And I loved this new Clay as well. But the newest incarnation of Clay Reed made me nervous. Which was sort of silly. He wasn’t freaking out. He wasn’t angry and defensive. He wasn’t abnormally happy and trying desperately to make things in his world work out.

No, he was just…content. Peaceful even. Like he had come to terms with something that he wasn’t letting me in on. I hadn’t been able to go to therapy since before his breakdown at the swimming hole. My schedule had been so chaotic with track meets and studying for exams and college prep that there hadn’t been time for it. Clay was okay with that. He continued to go to his sessions twice a week.

We continued to spend time together as much as possible, but there was a definite under current now that I couldn’t quite put my finger on. I would find Clay watching me sometimes, seeming as though he were trying to find a way to say something. But the moment would pass and we’d carry on as though I hadn’t noticed the odd look in his eyes.

I hadn’t brought up the community college again and neither had Clay. He had told me about the large chunk of money Ruby had given him. When I had delicately asked what he planned to do with it, he hadn’t been able to give me a straight answer. But something told me that it didn’t include college. I just wish I knew what his plans were, but after his extreme reaction to any and all questions in that regard, I tried to back off and only hoped he’d share with me when he was ready.

“Hey birthday, girl!” Rachel squealed, running up to me as I was cleaning out my locker. I laughed as she launched herself at me, hugging me as tightly as she was able.

“Hey, you. I’d like to resume the ability to breathe, Rach,” I let out as she squeezed me. She let me go and beamed up at me with her contagious smile.