Suddenly, I can’t take it anymore. Can’t stand the uncomfortable weight of the air between us, can’t stand the awkward way Ash is looking at me. Can’t stand the fist gripping my insides like it’s just waiting for the chance to crush my heart all over again.
“Come here, Ash.” I hold a hand out to him, wait for him to put his hand in mine before I pull him down next to me on the bed. “We were friends
first, right? So this shouldn’t be so awkward.”
He closes his eyes for a second, a rueful smile on his face. Then he leans over and presses his lips to the top of my head. For a second, I think about what a mess my hair must be, but then I decide, fuck it. I don’t have cancer and I get to keep my hair for a while longer at least. I’m going to celebrate that and forget about the rest.
“Trust you to go easy on me, Tansy.”
“Why should I do otherwise?” I look at him, baffled. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”
He makes a low, choked sound of disagreement. “I did everything wrong, actually.”
“No. Ash, I wouldn’t ask anyone to deal with—”
“I love you, Tansy.”
Of all the words he could have said, those four are the ones I least expected to hear. “Oh, God. Don’t tell me that, Ash.”
“I do. I know I was a total douche. I know I walked away from you when you needed me most and I’m sorry about that. I’m so sorry. But I love you and I don’t want to live without you. Even if you’re sick, even if I can’t have you for long, I want you, Tansy. I want you for as long as I can have you.”
“No, Ash. No, don’t say that.”
“Why not?” He gets on his knees in front of me, clasps my hands in his, being careful not to squeeze my IV. “It’s the truth. I love you. Nothing else matters.”
“Ash.” Tears are pouring down my face and I go to wipe them away, but Ash beats me to it. His hand cups my jaw while his thumb tenderly wipes at the tears. “Damn it. I never used to cry before I met you.”
“I’m sorry. Let me back in, let me love you, and I promise I won’t make you cry anymore.”
That’s all it takes to have me breaking into sobs. “No. You don’t understand. I’m not sick now—”
“You’re not?”
“No. The doctor says I’m fine. Just a virus.”
“Oh my God, Tansy, that’s amazing!” He leans forward and kisses me before I can stop him. I try to push him away, but I can’t. He feels so good. He feels like safety, like comfort, like Ash. But that’s the problem. He can be all that for me, but I can’t ever be it for him.
It’s that knowledge that gives me the strength to push him away. “You don’t understand. I’m not sick now, but that could change at any time. I could get sick again in six months or a year or five years. I’m never going to be free of this disease, not really. Not the way I need to be if I’m going to love you.”
“If you’re going to love me?” Ash asks. He’s staring at me with those blue eyes of his, the ones that look right through to the heart of me.
“All right, I do love you. But that doesn’t matter. It can’t matter.”
“Of course it matters,” he tells me. “It’s the only thing that matters.”
“Do you think this is a fairy tale? Do you think everything is going to turn out all right in the end?”
“Actually, I already think it has. I love you. You love me. You’re not sick. What else is there to worry about?”
“That’s what I’m trying to tell you. I’m not sick now. I’m not sick yet. But that doesn’t mean in the future—”
“Fuck the future.”
Okay, if anything could shock me more than the I love you he just dropped, it’s those three words. Ash, the man with the plan? The guy who is always thinking ten steps ahead, just said fuck the future? What the hell?
I reach out, run a hand over his forehead. “Are you running a fever?”
He laughs. “No.”