Gardens Of Eden (A Harry Styles Story)

60. A Ghost in the Flesh

I felt totally blindsided.

Harry, of all people, should've been tactful enough to let me prepare for something like this. I thought Aaron Ashbury was a long forgotten relic from my childhood.

Yet here he was, tall and broad with laugh lines and those startling blue eyes. Swallowing hard, I reached down to pick up the hot coffee from the table.

"Everlee..." my name sounded foreign on his lips, but here we were. This was happening. He took a breathe and tried again.

"I want to start by saying how glad I am that you are okay. I've clearly handled this situation terribly from the start."

I felt the childish urge to laugh, because truthfully, "I wouldn't even know where to begin."

The man sighed, tentatively lowering himself into the seat across from me.

"Maybe I should start from the beginning." He offered. "Would that be okay?" I hesitated.

I'd only just begun to make peace with my past, I didn't necessarily want to go back. On the other hand, my unanswered questions could've filled a memoir.

Like a magnet, my eyes looked for Harry, who waited over by the wall. He was nervous and adorable and I just wanted to roll my eyes at him, but I resisted, instead nodding him over.

"Be my guest." I finally said, as Harry sat beside me, intertwining our fingers. Maybe ripping off this bandaid wouldn't be so bad.

Besides I wouldn't have slept worth shit if I'd known this was what I'd be waking up to.

Across from us, Aaron nodded and appeared to be trying to figure out where the beginning was.

"Well, as you know, your mom and I split when you were... well you were young."

"I remember everything." I clarified.

"Right."

"You left us, it killed her."

"I know. It's haunted me for a long time. I really loved Jade." He dropped his head and the sentence faded out. It seemed to pain him to look me in the eyes and say it.

"I was still a kid. There's no explanation that can resolve what happened, but the truth is, I was young and in love. I didn't know what to do when she told me she was pregnant. My family didn't support us, that was clear. Jade didn't have status, or wealth, or anything else they considered worthy of their family name... so I hid her. And you." He looked shameful. I swallowed the hard lump in my throat.

"And then you left us."

"I tried to make it work, Everlee, for five years, I tried. But I was a coward. My family had all the power, and when they found out she was the reason for all my disappearances, well." He gave me the look kids give when they're dealing with their insufferable parents. I let out a humourless sound. "Things with your Mother were hard, because I couldn't be around as much as she wanted. Things with my family were strained. I didn't know how to fight them, so I convinced myself you would both be better off without me."

"You really believed that?" I hardly did. Surprisingly, he shook his head.

"Fuck no, I drank to stay ignorant." He pursed his lips, fully admitting his faults. "If I could do it again, I'd do everything differently. But no, I married the girl my parents chose, and I became the lawyer they raised."

And I spent my life paying for those mistakes.

...that was the truth...

So why did it feel like it belonged in the past?