He didn’t take his eyes off her as his hand moved towards the door, searching for the knob.
He found it the same instant he heard the last bell of the day ring, a brutal reminder that the rest of the world was still going on. Time was still ticking and the universe didn’t stop for Asa to learn how to breathe again.
“But I have to hate you, Carmen,” he told her in a pained voice. “Because if I don’t start hating you, then I’ll go on loving you—” Asa’s voice broke and he turned around, vision blurring with unshed tears, “—and I don’t want to love you. Not anymore. It hurts too much.”
And then Asa was running out of there, away from the hurricane that was Carmen West, out into the cold December air, and towards his truck—where he’d no longer find sanctuary but the ghost of a girl with midnight hair and thundercloud eyes haunting the empty passenger seat.
56.
Breaking Free
They never tell you about boys like Asa San Román.
People always warned you about the heartbreaker who was constantly looking for the next girl to damage, or the one who was only interested in your body and a good time, or the one who had a superiority complex.
But they never told you about boys like Asa.
The kind that didn’t do half measures, the kind that believed in giving all or nothing, the kind that knew what he wanted and wasn’t afraid to fight for it even if he was going to be the only one fighting. The kind who gave and gave and gave without asking what the other person was willing to offer.
The kind that when he loved, he let himself fall hook, line and sinker.
The kind that eventually realised there was poverty in allowing his heart to give pieces of itself away too many times.
The kind who one day said enough, and then plucked his presence out of your life, leaving coldness where he’d once brought warmth.
The kind that loved you too much, that the only way he knew how to cope after losing you was to turn all that love into hate.
And Asa now hated her.
He had been the embodiment of the sun’s warmth, and Carmen had let herself soak in it for as long as she was able to until she decided to leave, taking all that warmth with her and turning the place he’d used to occupy in her life cold.
Asa’s absence was cold in the way he never met Carmen’s eyes in the hallways, in the way they would walk past each other with the faintest brush of their arms as if they were nothing but strangers walking in opposite directions.
As if his laugh wasn’t Carmen’s favourite sound, as if his voice wasn’t one that she’d recognise anywhere, as if every time she caught herself staring all she’d hear in her head was a breathless “mi amor mi cielo mi sol” followed by a pained “I hate you I hate you I hate you.”
Carmen didn’t know how to describe it, that feeling in the pit of her stomach when she had to catch herself before heading towards his locker, or before she’d accidentally think of winding her arms around his neck and kissing him on the jaw.
She didn’t know what to name that disturbing knot in her chest every time she couldn’t do something, because she needed to remind herself they were strangers now.
Strangers who’d once been intimates.
Strangers who knew the feel of their bodies pressed so hard against each other that they would’ve moulded into one. Strangers who knew the taste of each other’s lips, who knew how their fingers had found home getting tangled in each other’s hair.
Strangers who knew the warmth of each other’s embrace, who knew one’s obsession with the season of autumn and the other’s love for Harry Potter. Strangers who knew one’s love for art and the other’s addiction to ice cream.
They’d been strangers once before, but it only hurt this time around—which begged the question: what was really meant when someone called someone else a stranger?
Did they mean “Oh, I’ve never met them before, but I think they’re in my Calculus class”?– or did they mean “I used to know them, used to think they were a forever love, but we can’t be in each other’s presence now”?
Carmen didn’t want to be a stranger in Asa’s eyes, but he’d been selfless for so long that if making her a stranger was what he wanted, then she needed to accept that he had all right to do that one thing for himself.
•••
The rest of the month didn’t fly past.
It took its time, the sun rising all too fast so that Carmen couldn’t lose herself to the comforts of sleep and the moon embracing the sky excruciatingly slow so that the hours in between dragged on forever.
By the time New Year’s Eve rolled around, Carmen’s mind had gained some sort of clarity. She was ready to accept the fact that she couldn’t do the healing process alone. She needed help. Help that she was pretty sure her father himself wasn’t in the best position to offer.
She’d spent the better half of the last two weeks weighing the pros and cons of deciding to get therapy, and honestly, it all boiled down to one thing: the simple fact that Carmen was going to need to open up to a stranger, someone who she wasn’t supposed to form an emotional attachment with because they were only going to be temporary. Someone who was going to be gone once Carmen was better and ready to fight her battles by herself.
But she knew she was strong enough to take the next step. She knew she had it in her, and truthfully speaking, Carmen wanted to
