You & I Collide

Paul

I sat on the front steps of the Blacks’ house, a bouquet of pink roses in my hand. I hadn’t seen Rachel in what felt like forever, thought it hadn’t been long since the bonfire. All Jacob could tell me before he had run off with Sam and Embry was that she was visiting the Cullens—had called from there just a few minutes ago saying she was on her way home.

Rachel had been…distant, I think that was the word I was looking for, lately—like she wasn’t fully there. She was absorbed in her thoughts, like she had something huge on her mind. It was beginning to worry me.

When she pulled up in the driveway in her sleek, silver car, I grinned and stood up from the steps. I saw her make an attempt at a smile through the front window, but she turned away from me as she got out of the car, probably hiding something.

I could feel a frown creeping across my face. This was unusual for Rachel. Slowly, she turned to me and headed toward the house.

“Hey, beautiful,” I said, pulling her into my arms. “You look upset; what’s wrong?”

Rachel didn’t speak, she just stared at me with empty, hollow eyes. They were a mask—feelings covering up other emotions, emotions she didn’t want me to see.

“Rachel?” I whispered.

Tears trickled down her cheeks. “I’m sorry,” she breathed. “Know that, at least, that before I say anything more, before you know anything else, I am so sorry.”

“Sorry?” I asked. “For what? What are you apologizing for?”

She sniffled twice, trying to gain control of herself. “I don’t want to hurt you, Paul. Ever. Even if I make choices that you don’t agree with, I never want to hurt you. But, sometimes…I will hurt you, even though I desperately don’t want to. If only there was some way to do this without causing you pain….”

“Do what?” I asked, tasting panic on my tongue. I was beginning to get nervous, and Rachel…Rachel was making a choice? That would hurt me no matter what? My breathing accelerated exponentially.

With tear-filled eyes, Rachel looked away. I still had an arm around her, but I let it fall. She stood less than a foot from me, and yet it was if she was miles away.

“I know that this will be hard, Paul, but…I can’t lie to myself. I can’t run from my feelings. You know that I love you, and I will still love you…in a way. But I love you enough that I don’t want you to hurt over me when…when…when I’m…gone.”

I couldn’t wrap my head around her words. The world tilted at the strangest angle as I wobbled to the side. Carefully, I steadied myself, focusing on a strand of her blond hair fluttering in the autumn breeze.

“So…you’re…you’re leaving me?” I managed to choke out. Immediately, I was overcome by a surge of pain that shot through me violently.

“Paul,” she said, her lip quivering, “I know this will hurt you, but I can’t run from my emotions. I think it’s best if I…if I leave. But I just want you to know that…that I never meant to hurt you, but I need to end this, and I’m sorry.”

“End this?” I halfway snarled, tears welling up in my eyes. “Rachel, please, you can’t! I need you, and I thought that…you needed me, too. I love you. Don’t you want me anymore?”

“Yes,” she whispered into the wind. Then she turned around to face me. “But sometimes you have to choose.”

I inhaled deeply. “Choose.” I repeated the word slowly, tasting the strangeness of it, and weighing it on my tongue. It felt weird. “Choose between who?”

“You and…” she hesitated, and when she did, I knew. I knew that there was someone else. The agony tore me to pieces.

“Rachel, please,” I begged. “Don’t do this.”

She huffed out a hopeless sigh. “It’s too late. I already have. I made another commitment, and now I think…I think I have to end this one. I’m so sorry Paul, but I had to make a choice.”

And then she leaned forward to softly brush her lips to my cheek. I saw her glance down at the bouquet of roses I still held in my hand, and then wipe away her tears.

Rachel….Rachel, the one person I could trust with anything, the person I could turn to when I was broken, the person who was my everything…was leaving me. I couldn’t bear it, couldn’t live through it. After all the times I’d told her I loved her—after all the times she had said she loved me—she was leaving me…for…someone else. I didn’t know who. Maybe it was so that I wouldn’t explode into a wolf and rip him to shreds…whoever he was.

Rachel picked up the roses from my hand and sighed. I inhaled her lavender scent, wanting to keep it in my memory even though dragging it through my thoughts might cause me pain in the future. She dropped the roses on the ground, petals being scattered everywhere, torn apart.

And then I collapsed to the ground in a crumpled heap of weak agony as the other half of my existence turned around and walked away…leaving me.