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“I don’t want to live if you’re not living with me.”
Fear of failing Lily—it motivates me in ways that no one can understand.
But I see how Connor spends his time trying to build me up—so I believe that I’m just as worthy as my brother.
People make mistakes every day, some small and some big, but I just wonder when I’ll stop making them. Or is this a lifelong thing? Do we all just wander through life, fucking up and trying to put ourselves back together only to continue on again?
It’s insane, and I realize how much I love the guy. That’s the funny thing right: He’ll probably never love me.
He made me feel worthy of love even if he never truly loved me.
“Can you believe I’ve been sober for this long?” “Yes,” I say definitively. His light brown hair is dusted with snowflakes, some flutter and land on his eyelashes. His face is flushed more from earlier than the cold. He’s beautiful, seductive even. I could kiss him again. “We’re doing well, aren’t we?” he asks. “This…” He motions between the two of us. “It’s working.”
“Because Connor told me that you yelled at him like ‘a Neanderthal trying to debate higher knowledge’—it was funny.”
“I love him,” Connor says with so much conviction. “I would never intentionally harm Lo.”
🥲🥲🥲🥲
“I just want you to know that if you leave this world, I won’t be in it for much longer.” He’s a piece of me. You cut it off, and it’s like going through life with no lungs. That is how deep our love really goes.
He laughs into a weak, pained smile, and then he shakes his head, his features just shattering. “I don’t want to be the weak one.” It’s one of the most human things he’s ever said.
“No,” Connor says, his usually emotionless expression slowly unraveling. “I would save you.”
Connor and Lo are everything to me actually
“I can’t take your pain away, no matter how much I want to.” He pauses. “This is the best I can do for now.”
“We’re in Earth-616. This isn’t an alternate universe.” I clutch the phone tighter, tears falling. “We’re going to have our happy ending. It’s just going to take us a little while to get there.”
I make everything difficult for Ryke—being my friend, being my brother—but he doesn’t see how much I’ve given him, how much I’ve let him in and how much I fucking loved him.
“You spend so much of your fucking time trying to save me,” I breathe, “and you don’t even realize that you’re killing me.”
“I just wish you could love me more than you hate him.”
But I’m truly sorry that my existence caused him so much pain.
The perseverance to do anything, to be anything. To thrive. Someday, that word will belong to us too. After years of coming up short, it’s all I’ve ever wanted.
