If There's a Way (Lost Boys #2)

by Jessie Walker

It becomes a sort of game then as we continue to sneak glances at one another. At first I don’t realize he’s doing it on purpose, until I catch his mouth twitching, and the laugh shaking his shoulders. I don’t know when I start smiling too. A small, fragile thing that feels as foreign as the weird flappy feeling in my chest. Like my heart’s a bird, banging its wings against its cage. Maybe I won’t burst. Maybe I’ll just float away instead. Maybe I’ll fly into the night sky like Peter Pan.

I’m certain he’s begun to suspect he’s being followed. This is the third time since I’ve entered the store that I’ve caught him darting a paranoid glance over his shoulder. Oops.

Well, all I see is the little boy with the wild black hair from my memories. The boy with the guarded hazel eyes and bird-boned fingers and shaky, dimpled smile. The boy who I’d witness years later standing on the ledge of a 300-foot bridge, telling me he needs perspective sometimes. How he needed to know there’s a way out. The boy who’s spent years desperately chasing his own end—be it down the bottle, the needle, or the barrel of a gun. The boy who can’t love me, let alone—and more importantly—love himself...

Maybe, just maybe, Will will be there, lying by my side with that secret smile and eyes I could drown in.

Maybe this whole night is nothing but a nightmare and it’s still Sunday. Still yesterday. And I’m still brave and happy and all the things I’ve always wanted, but never felt I could reach. Never felt I deserved.

don’t care about much of anything these days. It’s all just… passing thoughts. Ships sailing by, while I’m here. A dinghy run aground. Stuck between a rock and a vast, endless horizon. No land in sight.

It’s where I met a boy with gold-spun hair and big blue eyes, and a sunny smile that made me feel a little less alone. A little less sad. A little less angry. It’s where I had my first kiss. Where I had all my kisses, but especially the ones with that boy with the eyes like the ocean. The one who believed in me…

“He didn’t push you away.” Everything in me stills. “He held you closer, so close I don’t know how he didn’t leave bruises.”

“Ignoring what happened. It was easier, I think, to believe you were okay. That at least one of us was okay. And I-I relied on that too much. I just needed you to be okay.”

“Why?” he says, like it’s absurd. “Fuck, Way, because the idea of losing you, too, terrifies me.”

But we have each other. Not okay, but not alone.

He was sick. He was sick, and we found comfort in one another. We settled for what was in front of us, rather than brave trying to find someone new. Someone who lit our souls on fire, rather than just keeping them warm.

Maybe stop worrying about what he doesn’t and does deserve, and, I don’t know, maybe try to just be what you think he deserves.”

“You deserve better than that, but it’s up to you to climb your way out of this. We can reach down to help, but it’s up to you to grab our hands and let us pull you up.”

And with a sudden, blinding clarity, I know⁠— Nothing is going to stop me this time. Not now. Not here. I won’t let it. I don’t exactly know where this newfound confidence came from, and I know it can’t last, and I’m not about to waste a second of it. Because I’m safe here. I’m safe here. I’ll always be safe when he’s around.

my hands, though, his jaw is all man—rough and hard and perfect, it shifts against my palms. A contradiction I didn’t think could break me, but here I am, on the verge of shattering completely.

All I feel is the boy in my arms—my boy. My guy. My man. The one who’s been there all along, waiting for me—and all I can do is pray that I’m not too late. Please, please, please don’t let me be too late.

See, Will, see. See this heart in my chest. See how it flies for you.

“For a moment I was able to forget what I did—everything I’ve done—and all I saw was you.”

“Well too fucking bad,” I murmur. “You are loved. And I’m not better off without you.”

“And I’d rather feel this burden of knowing and loving you than go even a second without you existing somewhere on this planet.”

“You’re so fucking gorgeous, City Boy. Sorry it took me so long to tell you.”

“Fuck, baby, you look so good like this,” he says thickly. Then, so quietly that I have to strain to hear him, he whispers to himself, “I knew you would.”

“On one condition. You need to promise me something in return.” And to him, I say, “Anything.” His mouth purses, and then he reaches up, spreading his hand over my bare chest, right over my heart. “Keep this beating.” I still. “Just keep your heart beating for me, okay?” His voice breaks,

I might not know love, but I do know my heart beats for him. That much is as clear as day to me.

But here’s this eleven-year-old boy from a big city who decided I’d be his best friend, reading out loud to me from a book he seems to regret ever reading in the first place.

But my back doesn’t hurt anymore, and Will’s voice is soft and soothing in a way I never noticed before. Just for a second, I think. I’ll just close my eyes for a second…

healing is about more than letting go. You can’t fall forever and expect to never land. Eventually you’ll have to learn how to make peace with the ground. Find your legs and keep on keepin’ on.

Bottling it up, burying your head in the sand, running… They’re all just life preservers keeping us afloat in an endless sea as we wait for the next wave to pull us under. And if there’s one constant in this life, it’s that there will always be more waves. So long as the earth keeps spinning, and the moon keeps pulling… There will always be more waves.

That asshole. That fucking beautiful asshole.

Here’s Waylon McAllister, whose middle name might as well be Don’t-Look-Too-Close-Or-I-Might-Fucking-Punch-You rather than something as innocuous as James,

“Maybe,” he concedes. “Or maybe we need to just… embrace it.” “Embrace it?” “Our fears.” He crooks his mouth. “You know, bear down on them and breathe.” I blink hard and long. Did he just…. “Are you seriously comparing facing our fears—our triggers—to anal?”

“City Boy,” he says in a sigh. “Jesus Christ, you think this isn’t killin’ me too? That I don’t die a bit inside every time I push you away?

“Will.” This time, a demand. Jesus, every time he says my name, a little piece of me dies.

He cuts a glance to the others at the table, then leans forward. Holding my breath, I meet him halfway, resting on my forearms. His gaze drops to my mouth, so quick, I would have missed it had I blinked, before returning eye-level. “Whatcha thinkin’ about?” he asks in that low, smoky timber of his. I chew on the corner of my lip and tip my head to the side. “Just remembering this boy I met once,” I say quietly just for his ears. “He hated my favorite book and told me it made him sob like a baby.”

“And what about you? What about your pretty head?” His mouth crooks up, and I already know what he’s going to say before he says it. “You think I’m pretty?” “I think you’re stubborn. And full of yourself. And⁠—” He shoves the helmet over my head, shutting me up. I flick the visor up and glare at his stupid, smiling face. “If you crash and break that big, stupid head of yours, I’ll never forgive you,” I tell him loud enough to be heard, knocking him out of the way and throwing my leg over the seat.

For once, the ball’s in his court, not mine. So if slow is what he needs, then slow is what he’s going to get. I’ll do whatever it takes to prove I’m not going anywhere. Prove he’s not a whim or a fix or any-fucking-thing else in between. He’s the beat of my fucking heart. And that? That’s everything.

How do I tell him that his throat is just sitting there, begging for my lips? Like I might die just looking at him right now, because I’m too far away?

My hand’s pressed over his heart and I am. Still. Too. Far. Away.

Looking up at Will, I don’t know how I don’t crumble. For just one second—one passing beat of my heart—I see it. See him. The boy I once knew who looked at me like I was everything, and the guy I almost had only weeks ago, who watched me like I was seconds from disappearing. The guy who told me he loved me.

In a strained voice, he says, “Or just fighting something that’s really, really good.”

“I want to be burdened by you,” I tell him, lifting my shoulders before dropping them. “I want to be the person you burden.”

“My burden is loving you, but not letting myself have you, because I’m fucking petrified nothing will ever be enough to keep you. And I can’t live with that. I literally cannot live with the idea of losing you, Waylon. So there you fucking have it. I’m not just scared, I’m petrified. Happy?”

All I can do is flinch when the door shuts with a soft click, and wish I was selfish enough to break it down and make him keep talking to me. Make him see he has nothing to be afraid of. I’m right here, City Boy. I’m right here.

How the fuck did I ever deserve something as perfect as that? As him?

Will told me to keep my heart beating, and I will, I will. How can I stay with him if I give into his biggest fears?

Looking across the room at the closed bedroom door, it takes everything in me not to cross the distance and beg him to love me again. To give me a second—fuck, I don’t even know what number chance I’m on at this point, but I want it. Need it. Because I know this time... This time I’m not going to yank it away from him. I’m not going to spit on it or throw it in his face or hurt him with it. This time will be for real. This time will be for always. Whether I’m good and ready for it or not.

Will. Because it always comes back to him. I have to fucking try.

So what if Waylon looks hot as sin tonight? So what if my heart aches to close that gaping chasm keeping us apart, once and for all? So what if I want to believe we actually stand a chance?

Those hazel eyes are bright and clear, if not a little sad as they collide with mine. No sign of that blazing heat I’ve become so well acquainted with these last few months. No sign of that outright hostility I’ve come to expect from him any time I get too close.