BARE SOULS: A STEAMY TEACHER/STUDENT ROMANCE

CHAPTER 64 | HARPER

It had been a very lonely week. As much as I wanted to act as if nothing happened, I simply couldn't. I wanted to be with him but couldn't ignore that painful scream from my heart telling me that there was no use to this whole story. 

I wanted him to run after me but appreciated that he understood what I really needed at the moment: space and time.  And I never intended for me to take almost ten long days to come up with a decision.

He was right: we didn't have a future. I guess I always knew it but never truly wanted to admit it to myself because it was easier to pretend that time did not matter. If the decision was mine, I would have simply backed away from Columbia and took a gap year to figure things out. But I knew he would have never accepted that and I also knew he had no desire to move back to the East coast. So as sure as one plus one equals two, the huge slap out of my fantasy was obvious. 

But I was blindly, entirely and desperately in love with him and I was just left with the choice of suffering now or suffering later. As much as the choice seemed obvious from the point of view of a naive teenager, I seriously considered the other option. Why? Because I was different from the Harper I was when I moved in and it was all thanks to him. 

If I had not met him, I would have kept suffering in a poisonous and dysfunctional relationship with Levyn and never realized who I truly was: a curious, passionate and committed person capable to follow her passion and to overcome the obstacles life has put on her path. He taught me how to gain confidence in myself and in my art. He taught me pleasure. He taught me to be honest with my feelings. He taught me how to figure out who I was deep within and that alone was worth the pain that was to come soon. In the end, it took me days to realize that just because we had no outlet did not mean that this relationship was meaningless and I felt stupid for being so childish. 

I did not intend to go to his place that Friday night. I still didn't know how to act toward him and initially wanted to call him and talk over the phone without being tempted to touch him because it was easier than admitting my wrongs. I wanted to be honest with him and explain him properly why I needed that time. I was thinking hard about what to say but everything sounded so stupid that I couldn't resolve myself to press the call button. 

While lost in my thoughts, that scolding Rick gave me a few months back after I found out Zane had sex with another girl, popped in my head. He pointed out the fact that I never pushed to break Zane's walls and try to see behind his flaws. I remembered how frustrated it got me when I realized he was right... and I realized that even if I knew he was right, I still had not done much to push through the barriers he set around him. Even though he let me take a peak through, I never pushed to fully gain access. I knew how Zane functioned. He was the type to always test you to make sure he saw fully through you. And maybe all that was a test... just to see if I would easily let go or just wait until it was actually time to let go.

And suddenly, Rick's words made more sense than ever. I always thought it was up to Zane to figure where our relationship was heading but maybe things had changed... Maybe it was also up to me to help us grow. 

I headed toward his place without even thinking that he was maybe out or busy. It was very late and my chances to meet with a closed door were high but it did not matter. Even if he was out, I would wait until he gets home but I soon found out he was in when I saw his apartments lights on.

When Rick opened the door, I was a thousand miles from considering that he might have not been alone and it felt incredibly awkward to have Rick standing in front of me with an explicit smile translating he knew already why I was here. I felt like backing up and giving Zane a call instead, as I felt my embarrassment growing. But I had already promised myself I would stop running away.