Long Winding Roads Or Vicious Circles?
Dean finally leaves. I hope I've given him something to think about, if I'm honest. I want him to realise that I'm not his anymore and he shouldn't be chasing me. Of course, this leaves me to deal with the smouldering leather-clad disaster stood in front of me.
I never did work well under pressure-impulsive doesn't work for me-and I demonstrate this now, demanding to know why he won't leave me alone. I need time to heal but all I can hear is those three words buzzing around in my head, rubbing salt in an already open wound.
"Rory…" He implores me, searching for confirmation that I'm spinning him a line. I am but I can't take it back now, not after everything that's happened. I want him to leave, to let me break down and cry. While he's here, I have to remain composed instead of being able to grieve for the love we lost. Because we have lost it and I can't see that he'll have a miraculous solution up his sleeve.
"What do you want?"
"I dunno…I just wanted to see you, talk to you…I just…" You just...what?!
I wish he was better at the verbal thing but it's always been a problem with us. Books and movies, we can talk about for hours on end, but give us anything substantial and it's awkward silences and monosyllables all round. I want to shake the truth out of him. But I stand rigid, afraid that touching him with lead to my downfall.
"What?"
"Come with me."
His request throws me so completely that I have to hear it again to believe it.
"What?"
"Come with me."
This is another one of his hair-brained schemes again. I can feel it. I have a vague recollection of the conversation in my car, just before the accident that brought us together, when he told me that he would do whatever he wanted, whenever he wanted and be damned to anyone who told him otherwise. Now he obviously wants me to do the same but I need some organisation, some planning, before I can commit to anything involving him.
"Where?"
"I don't know. Away." His ambiguity is my confirmation. He's just ploughing into another crazy idea, as usual. Good old unpredictable Jess.
"Are you crazy?!" I almost scream at him. I need for him to leave. I need a chance to break. I'm alone, there are no witnesses and the tears can flow freely.
"Probably. Do it. Come with me, don't think about it!" I wish I could do just that but I need a safety net. I need to know that I've got something to come back to if he jumps off the speeding train again. Gets on yet another bus to California without telling me. I don't want to be Luanne Henderson to his Neal Cassady!
"I can't do that!"
"You don't think you can do it but you can! You can do whatever you want!" His unadulterated belief in me pulls at my heart, twisting the knife that he had left in there when he abandoned me for sun-drenched Venice two years ago.
"It's not what I want!" I plead with him, desperately willing him to realise that I'm not ready to do this, to take this huge step in independence and trust.
"It is! I know you!" I don't want to tell him that I'm too scared to trust him but I have to say something and right now, I just want to hurt him.
"You don't know me!" I scream at him, daggers flying through my words. But I don't mean it. He does know me. He knows me better than I know myself.