Total pages in book: 97
Estimated words: 96586 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 483(@200wpm)___ 386(@250wpm)___ 322(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 96586 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 483(@200wpm)___ 386(@250wpm)___ 322(@300wpm)
“Doc broke me down until I faced the truth of what I had become. It was at that point he reminded me that in spite of all that bullshit, I’m still alive. That others aren’t so lucky. He encouraged me to acknowledge my past and decide who I wanted to become.”
“To be the one to define yourself.”
“Exactly.”
There’s another flex of understanding presented.
“I had to decide what and who I wanted in my future. I was being given a second chance to rebuild my whole fucking life, and luckily for me, Shelby being born pushed Noah to want me around. He came to see me when I was in rehab and has been helping me ever since I got out.” Ry’s hand rotates so that our fingers can fold together. “I’m not the same guy I was back then either, Pres. Truthfully, who I am now is still being built.” An attempt to smile is made. “One day at a time.”
“It’s hard,” I gingerly announce, frame folding forward, anxious to be closer to him knowing the pain of putting pieces of yourself back together.
“You damn sure make it easier.”
“Was contacting me with that letter you wrote an attempt to say goodbye before you…started out on this…new you journey?”
“Wait, what?” Shock swiftly travels across his face. “You got my fucking letter?”
“Um…yeah? Isn’t that why you mailed it to me? For me to…have it?”
Disbelief lingers in his gaze as he slowly shakes his head. “I didn’t mail that shit.”
“What?”
“I just wrote it and addressed it like it would get mailed, but Doc said the shit like it was just a part of the exercise for closure. Not like he was actually gonna fucking mail it.”
There’s a minor sting at the word. “You wanted closure from me?”
“Fuck no,” he quickly tries to correct. “It was supposed to be the last piece of closure to my past. To the old me. Apologizing to the one person I felt I desperately needed to in order to move forward. I would never close the door on you, Pres.” Blue eyes I’m so grateful to have back in my life soften sweetly. “Hell, there is no door. There are no walls. You are literally my whole world, and I am always willing and ready to be with you.”
Silence swirls between, but to my relief, it’s the strange comfortable type where you know it’s enough to just be in the presence of the other person.
It’s terrifying how easy it is to just slip back into patterns with him after so many years.
I wanna believe our declarations in regard to doing everything different this go around, but it seems questionable considering how quickly we’re already so wrapped up in one another.
However, everything about our unforeseen reconnecting feels like we are meant to try this again.
Like this is an actual new deck for us to play with and not just the old one colored new with a marker.
I have to try to make this work.
I have to see where it can go.
I floated by for so many years not really living.
Not really risking.
I owe it to myself to go after what I want.
And what I want is Ryder Collins.
Chapter 12
Ryder
- “I didn’t expect things to be so different between us.” -
Kara leans her thin frame against me and quietly states, “Thanks again for the ride last night, Collins. I swear that’ll be the last time I don’t drive myself to a fucking party.”
Personally?
I think she’s fucking stupid for going to those in the first place.
I get she’s not ready to do the amount of work that I do every…goddamn…day, but she’s phoning in the little she does do.
These meetings?
She uses every opportunity she can to talk to me instead of listening to the messages.
Changing her daily routine?
Should mean more than buying a new box of hair dye or trying some shit you saw on YouTube.
As for what the fuck you do for fun?
It damn sure shouldn’t consist of you surrounding yourself by the very shit that you went to rehab for.
And yeah, the tiny kick to the dick of irony, that I’m back with the one person that I was pulled away from, which began my spiral into addiction isn’t lost on me.
But that’s different.
Plus, we’re different.
There’s a give and take value we were missing back in the day that I’m growing to appreciate.
Do I love when she pays for dates?
Fuck no.
Do I love that she can?
Definitely.
She not only runs her own fucking company and brings in enough zeroes that would make my big brother hard with envy, but she loves what she does.
She has passion.
She has purpose.
She has a whole fucking life outside of me, and it’s incredible.
And fucking hurts.
I mean I don’t need her obsessing over me or anything…I just…I don’t like feeling like I’m in the way at times.