If Not for My Baby

by Kate Golden

“Devoting your entire life to the pursuit of another person, when human beings are all so inherently flawed, and expecting said flawed human to fix all the broken parts of you just so you can convince yourself that you’re whole is a recipe for disappointment.”

“Jesus. Your voice.” He draws a hand over his jaw. “What a thing to behold.” “Stop.” “I won’t.” He shakes his head. “It’s been a long time since I’ve heard anyone make the music sound like you do.”

Does anyone call you Clem?” I shake my head. “No, actually.” His brows raise slightly and he nods to himself. “Good.”

“Don’t diminish your awe. The world’s a fine place; there’s plenty worth bein’ moved by.”

“But this is her dream.” I can hear the frown in Indy’s voice as she says, “What about your dreams?”

It’s my own fault—at some point I decided it was easier to be a dreamless person than a disappointed one. Except somewhere along the way, I became both.

It’s an attraction that will haunt me.

As if our kiss is the first chapter of a longer story. As if we’re at a precipice of some kind.

If this is having a crush, I want no part of it. I need a receipt. Returning for a full refund, please and thank you.

“Because I think of you nonstop. You’re legging it through my mind daily, Clem. You were long before I kissed you.” “What?” I think I physically stumble backward. “You’re not interested in me.” “I’m not?” A slight smile twists at the corner of his mouth. “You should tell my dreams that.”

“Just because you don’t let yourself dream doesn’t mean you don’t have any.” When he speaks again, his voice has dropped an octave, and I know the creature’s lost. “And you’re as much a formidable, gossamer-draped, apocalyptic witch-goddess as any I’ve known. Your ferocious kindness, those devastating eyes…” He trails off with an exhale. “The songs will write themselves.”

I kissed Halloran twice and now my skin is too tight on my body all the time, and my heart gets hooked up to some kind of generator on overdrive whenever he walks into a room, and I’m constantly dying to ask him every question I can think of and scribble his answers into a notebook that I’ll read each night before bed like a zealot,

I think they’d be disheartened to learn I’m a person just as they are.”

brushing his knuckles over my cheek. “You’re very easy to need.”

You are easy to need, too. So much so, it scares the shit out of me. I think I might be fall—

Tom’s gaze is fierce with affection as he sips his water. He hasn’t stopped looking at me like that all night. Looking at me like he’s falling in love.

“Don’t worry,” I manage. “I’m not going to fall in love with you.” “Clem”—he sighs like I’ve pained him—“that’s just what I’m afraid of.”

“Thank you,” he murmurs after a beat. When I peer up, his eyes are as wintry green as ever. “What for?” He brushes his lips over the crown of my head as he says, “For bringing me back.”

“You, Clementine, have a bad habit of beating the pain before it can beat you. I don’t reckon even you know why you do that, but I’d suggest looking into it. One day avoiding everything that could hurt you might just leave you with nothing at all.”

Avoiding everything that could hurt you might just leave you with nothing at all.

To perhaps be loved by Tom Halloran, and to know for certain how badly I loved him in return.

“I can’t promise you a life free of sorrow. Nobody can. But I can swear to shelter the heart of ye with all I have.”