Red Hair, Black Soul (Red & Black #1)

41.2 | Killing you

Jed's POV

"No what?" I ask, confused.

"No for the visits. No for Skype. No for the phones. I can't... I can't live like this." She says.

I blink. "But-"

"When I was leaving Scotland, I had a horde of friends willing to 'keep in touch with me'." She starts matter-of-factly. I assess her, not sure where this is going, but let her continue. "We all had those great plans about how we were going to talk everyday and won't even notice that I'm not there with them." Ada continues. I don't like that tiny little sad smile that appear on her lips when she speaks the words. "Two years from then, I haven't had a single call."

"Excuse me, but was I among those friends?" I ask, interrupting her.

The way Ada looks at me tells me she's started to question my sanity.

"Because I'm not like those so-called friends. I'm me. And I won't let us fall apart." I say it in a light way, but it's like an oath to me. Cut my veins right open and tell me to sign it with blood. I will do everything, because I mean every word.

"I'm not saying it'd be your fault." She replies. Suddenly, we've switched roles and it's me who's eyeing her like she's insane. "I never said I didn't get a single call. I said I never had one."

I thought it was possible to frown even more, but that's exactly what I'm doing. "What does it mean?"

"It means it was me at fault, Jed." Ada says, so quietly I have to strain to hear. "They kept calling. Every night for the first two months. But I never answered. All of them kept going straight to the voicemail, until one day they lost their patience and gave up."

"If you didn't answer your phone for two damn months I'd put my ass in the first flight to Ann Arbor and come knocking at your door, ready to take it down if you don't open." I tell her.

And I freaking hate the way her lips twist upwards. I'm not joking.

"That's not the point Jed." A small shake of her head sends her red curls - the curls I love so much - flying. Before I can stop myself, I reach out and run my hand down the side of her face, clasping a strand of her hair between my fingers.

"So what's the point, Fiona?" I ask gently, turning the silky fire around in my fingers. "Tell me, because I don't understand anything anymore."

Ada's chest rises with her breath, brushing mine. I close my eyes at the brief contact, enjoying the fracture of a second of our closeness.

"The point is," Ada starts, her eyes dropping to my fingers, now toying with the ends of her hair. "That I'm not good with long-distance relationships."

Fiona just stabbed me with a blade. She must have, because the pain I feel in my chest can't be anything else.

"Never was. Never will."

No. No, no, no, fucking no. She's not saying what I think she's saying. She isn't rejecting me.

She's not putting an end to us.

"Don't say it." I've entered the stage of begging, but I no longer care. All that matters to me right now is convincing Ada that there is a happy ending waiting for us. That this moment, is not the ending at all. "Please, Ada, don't say it."