What if we Drown (46)

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A duck quacked, startling Ashlyn. Releasing Derek's hand, she twisted her fingers into the hem of her shorts, her feet rooted to the patch of grass where she stood.

Guilt flickered across his features as he turned to look back at her, his mask not covering it quick enough. Turning back, he stopped in front of her, his hands awkward at his side. Had it been any other day, she would have taken his hands and sat with him there by the pond. Feather soft fingertips would have traced the lines of his palm and caressed his fingers as they curled around hers. But today wasn't that day.

Swallowing back the acidic regret that burned its way up her throat, Ashlyn sank to her knees in front of Derek. Tucking her legs beneath her, a hairsbreadth stood between them. Neither of them dared to cross that invisible line.

Twisting her fingers in her lap, Ashlyn watched her hands, afraid of what looking at him might do to her heart. Those few seconds it took to cross the street, her hand clasped in his, had messed with her head, the conflicted feelings she was having feeding from this extra tension. His hand had been the same, but the tingle and comfort she'd so often found at his touch was gone. It had been just a hand.

Derek's hands rubbed against his legs, his hesitation rolling off of him in waves. The string joining their hearts tugged, and her hand inched closer towards his, the tip of her finger kissing his. She couldn't help herself.

"I never meant to hurt you like this," he spoke into the silence. His voice was a hoarse whisper against the breaking waters behind them. His fingers reached across the space between them, and hers retracted just as quickly. A loose fist pressed against her chest.

Taking a deep breath, she lifted her head to look at him, the implications of his choice captured in the cracks that framed her face.

I'm not just hurt, Derek. I'm angry at you and myself. Brushing her fingers across her cheeks, she continued. How could you do this? After all those things you said about supporting me and being there for me. How could you go behind my back like this? Side with everyone else who has ever said I was broken?

There was a tremor in his lower jaw, and his eyes were a frightful sight. "Ash, please-"

A strangled cry parted her lips, silencing him. You said you loved me.

Hunching over, her hands slapped against her knees, her palms collecting the tears she cried.

"I do love you." Holding her in his arms, he pulled her against his chest. "I love you so much that it physically hurts me. That's why I had to do this." His lips moved against the back of her head, and her cheek grazed against his shirt with the shaking of her head.

Clutching at his shirt, she tried to push him away while pulling him closer.

"I never wanted you to think you were broken. I would never say that." Gentle hands rubbed her back, coaxing the sobs still trapped inside. "But I can also see that this grief you've been carrying is keeping you from feeling whole. When Zion told me about Dr. Martin-"

Shoving Derek away, Ashlyn fell forward on her hands. His words were a slap to her face and kick to her gut all at once. She felt sick, a heaving gasp for air tearing through her.

Of course, Zion had encouraged him to do this. Her mother had likely helped too. Suddenly everything around her began to spin, the seeds of doubt sprouting in her mind. Everyone had gone against her in this.

"Ash, please." A desperate need marked his words as he reached for her, the shadow of his hands reaching beneath her bent head. Raising her head, she shook it.

I trusted you. Ashlyn sniffed, shrinking back. The tightness in her chest distracted her from the words she wished to say. She'd trusted all of them.

She could almost hear the voice in the back of her head say, 'I told you so.'

"I never meant for any of this to happen. I just thought-" Running a hand through his hair, Derek's eyes were wild as they skirted over her and their surroundings. No words could explain what he'd done, and he knew it. "I just wanted to help you, Ashlyn."

And look what that got you.

"Dammit, Ash. Can't you see that I'm trying!" For a moment, his control slipped, and the father and his daughter by the pond looked up.

Dropping his head, he covered his face, his fingertips grabbing at his hairline. His shoulders rose and fell with a deep breath. Ashlyn's guarded gaze tracked his movements, the hold she maintained on her control slipping through her fingertips. Nails dug into the dirt around her, hitched breaths rising and falling with her chest.

His voice was muffled at first before his hands fell away, and glassy eyes fixed on her. "I didn't have to know your story when we first met to know that something haunted you. That you were fighting some unseen battle." From where she sat, she heard his swallow, and the knots in her stomach tightened. "I saw the way you were with people, always polite but never honest. You withheld, bearing your load on your own. The thought of you continuing like this, alone with your ghosts, terrified me."

There was a tremble in her hands. What are you saying?

"If I could get closer to you, I thought maybe I could help you. Save you."

Ashlyn's expression began to fall, crumbling like dust into the dirt where they sat at the implications of what he said.

"When I looked at you and saw your battle, I kept seeing Liam and all the ways I'd failed him, and I couldn't let that happen to you too. I had to protect you from that."

Her bottom lip trembled with the silent no she uttered.

"I never expected to fall in love with you. But I did. I fell so hard, so fast."

He reached for her hands as he leaned forward. But Ashlyn was quicker, her hands wrapping around her torso as a broken sob wretched through her.

She'd been his project. Something to fix. An object of distraction on his redemptive path.

The knowledge of this stung. It was the sharpest pain she'd ever experienced, more so than the stitches she'd torn below her ribs when she'd moved too quickly, more so than the heartbreak of watching Abel crumble before her beneath the weight of his unsteady heart. This wound cut deeper than all of that, her heart finally knowing the breakage born from love.

How could he sit here now, claiming that he loved her when it had been something entirely different that had drawn him to her? He'd sought her out as someone he could fix, yet now he professed that it was love which had kept him there. It was too much for her to take.

Ashlyn scratched at her arms while his lips continued to move, words meant to declare his love for her, and how it had changed his intentions falling gracefully upon numb ears. The words once said to reassure and soothe now bore the mark of ill intentions and misguided steps. All she heard when he spoke was the feelings he drew upon to justify his actions while discrediting her own.

Love was the balm he thought would soothe the burn of his betrayal, but the wound ran deeper than one betrayal, and he failed to see that.

I've let you into the darkest parts of my heart. You've seen my scars, my fears, my doubts. You know how hard it was for me to let you in.

"I was scared of losing you!" His tone cracked against the serenity around them, and Ashlyn flinched. He didn't understand that by doing this, he already was.

And you thought springing this on me would have me running to you with open arms? Watching him, she could see his torment, his struggle to understand her perspective.

His face paled, and his lips parted with a silent plea. Words failed him because there were no words to explain this away.

That's not how this works, Derek. My life isn't something you can come along and mess around with to make yourself feel better. Rushed motions commanded her hands, the wordless anger she felt seizing her words. She knew that by the speed she moved, Derek wouldn't catch it all, but it didn't matter anymore. He would understand where they stood, and he would know the pain he'd inflicted.

Doing all of this, using me like this, you thought only of what would be best for you.

"No. Don't you dare say that! This hasn't just been about me. It's been about you. About us!" Rough hands gripped her forearms, and she bit her lip against a flinch. She tried to shrug him off, but his hands remained, his thumbs caressing while his fingers tightened.

"All of this has always been about us and protecting what we have. I knew if Dr. Martin could help you heal after what happened to your father, you'd be safe. We'd be okay, and I wouldn't have to worry anymore about losing you too." Glancing at the ground, Derek dug his heel into the grass.

Wiping her eyes, Ashlyn took a deep breath. You said it yourself. You were only drawn to me because you thought you could fix me to appease your guilt. I meant nothing to you then, so how can you say that I do now? It hurt to say it, to accept the truth. A heavy pressure settled over her chest, and with an agonizing slowness, crushed every good thing she'd ever thought to feel towards him. None of it had been true.

"You mean everything to me." His grip tightened, and she whimpered. Shocked by his strength, or perhaps the sound she'd made, Derek released her arms and ran his fingers through his hair.

Looking at her arms and the imprints left by his hands, his bottom lip began to tremble. Ashlyn rubbed at the marks, his troubled gaze affecting her more than she liked to admit.

"I'm so sorry. I didn't, I never, I-" A fractured sob dragged across his lips, and Ashlyn's hands fisted at her side. The need to reach over and assuage his guilt was too strong. Instead, she focused on the truths that had come to light.

Why couldn't you just say something? All you had to do was trust me and tell me the truth from the beginning. Maybe then I would have understood. I could have stood by you.

"I was terrified," he answered with a whisper. Fear was something she knew all too well. It had robbed her of plenty, and it was doing it all over again with them. But fear wasn't all there was to blame.

If Jonathan hadn't shown up, would you still have done this?

Derek hesitated, and it was all the answer she needed. Espresso eyes softened as he watched her, his guilt, and his sorrow for subjecting her to this evident in the lines which framed them. This moment was another weight added to the burden he carried, another notch of guilt to plague him.

I'm not Liam, and you can't treat me like this because of what happened to him. It's not fair to his memory, and it's not fair to me. Her movements were sharp and precise, urging him to understand.

Hanging his head, Derek picked at a clump of grass, ripping it from its roots. "I know."

She didn't believe him. Nudging his foot with her toes, she waited for him to look at her.

What happened with Liam, Derek? I need to know. Ashlyn gulped, her hands sweating as she twisted them in her lap. She needed to understand what made him beat himself up like this, what it was he needed saving from.

For a few minutes, they sat in silence, his fingers continuing to work the soil. The cords of muscle in his arms tightened against the hidden battle he fought while he consulted his demons, and his breathing was labored, interrupted by a round of sniffs.

Ashlyn's heart thundered in her chest, and her temple pulsed with the beginnings of a headache. The silence and the waiting were torturous. She was about to give up, walk away when a small voice spoke—a ghost of a whisper.

"He was sick."

She almost didn't hear him as he spoke to his hands tangled around the blades of grass. Shifting her weight, Ashlyn moved a little closer. Derek sat, his knees bent in front of him, his head tilted forward beneath a guilty conscience's weight. Filling the space at his side, Ashlyn positioned herself so that she ran parallel to him, the side of her knee touching his.

"My best friend was sick, and for months, I didn't know. I didn't see it." The chunks of grass he tore from the soil grew in size, the motion becoming more aggressive as he spoke.

Reaching around his legs, she placed her hand over his and squeezed before her mind caught up with the act. They both held their breath; their mental battles stayed by this brief show of comfort. Slowly, her arm around his legs relaxed, and his fingers unfurled against the grass. Turning his hand beneath hers, Derek threaded his fingers with hers, his gaze fixating on them.

"I still don't even know what it was that he had. Some kind of cancer of the lungs. I never even asked." A lance of pain pierced Ashlyn's heart, as Derek hung his head in shame. "We were getting ready to leave for class one afternoon when he collapsed in the apartment. He just crumbled to the ground, and I thought-" Derek's grasp on her hand tightened with the hitch in his breath.

Ashlyn knew what he'd thought. She'd been there once before. Tears pricked at the corners of her eyes, the discomfort a distraction from the all too familiar aching in her chest.

"When the doctors told me about his cancer, I was so angry, Ash. And I couldn't do anything about it." His snicker was forced and derisive. "You can't be angry at the sick guy."

Grazing her thumb along the back of his finger, Ashlyn sniffed.

"He didn't want to tell me. He wouldn't have told me if he'd had the choice." The words he spoke sounded hollow. An air of regret marked his tone.

Disengaging her fingers from his, Ashlyn rested against his leg and signed. You don't know that. Maybe he was just scared it would change things, and he wasn't sure how to tell you the truth.

The corner of his lips twitched, a sad smile shared between them. "It's true. He told me so. He never even told his family, Ashlyn. He didn't want to burden anyone with it. As if it was a burden he could carry on his own."

Derek's gaze began to wander, his eyes tracking a leaf that fell from the tree in front of him. She knew though; he wasn't watching the leaf. His mind was miles away and long ago, perched at his best friend's bedside.

"He made me promise not to tell anyone. To keep his secret. I wanted to say no, but how do you tell someone no when they're sick, and they're practically begging you to do as they say? I was stupid and afraid, and I listened. I made the stupid promise." His voice was disconnected from the words he spoke.

Ashlyn fell to the side, her elbow hitting the dirt when Derek's knees disappeared from beneath her. A tremor moved through his body as he crossed his legs, his elbows resting upon them. Indecision warred within Ashlyn as she sat up, her hand hovering in the space between them before she finally gave in to her heart's cry and placed it upon his back.

When the tremors eased into sporadic shudders, Derek took a deep breath and continued.

"I wanted to believe that everything would be okay, and for a while, it was. Some days, I forgot he was supposed to be sick. But the minute things seemed to be looking up, the universe came along to screw things up all over again." Reluctantly, he raised his head and looked at Ashlyn.

Wiping the tears from her cheeks, she tried to be strong, so he wouldn't have to be.

"The cancer had spread, and his treatment didn't seem to be working in fighting it." Derek's hands began to shake again, his breath unsteady. "There was a new treatment that he could try, and with how things were progressing, he had nothing to lose by saying yes. I'd thought he would say yes, but then he said 'I'll think about it.'" His voice was void of all emotion as he quoted Liam's words.

"If I'd pushed a little harder, maybe he would've said yes. Some days, I swear the ghost of that day follows me around, haunting me with my failings, reminding me of how shit a friend I was when it really mattered." Heavy hands fell to the grass again, ripping at the grass until his knuckles were red, his fingers stained with green and brown regrets.

A sharp intake of breath crossed her parted lips and stalled in Ashlyn's chest. Listening to him say these words and watching him entangle himself in this web of lies he'd constructed, bore down on the threads between them. A heavyweight settled over her heart, and she leaned towards him, her hand resting on his knee.

Abel had told her to believe in the good in him. And she did. This man he was describing, the one who failed his friends? That wasn't Derek.

"I believed everything he told me, because why would he lie? When he said he'd think about it, I believed him. When he told me that he needed more space to breathe, I gave him space." Another chunk of grass joined the pile, the soil beside Derek broken and bare, just like his heart. "I didn't even see how he was pushing me away until it was too late. But what could I do? He'd asked for space, and I was so terrified of overwhelming or smothering him that I did whatever he wanted. I shouldn't have done it."

Derek's shoulders hunched further forward with each word spoken, the weight of this burden crushing him. Ashlyn shifted at his side, her arm instinctively going around his shoulder as she held him against her. At her touch, the last of the control he held over himself snapped, and he began to shake with the force of the sobs which tore through him.

"I didn't fight for him," he sobbed, his head turning into her throat. "I didn't." Another sob tore through him, his head knocking against her chin. "I failed-" Another pained cry moved through him, a strangled gasp claiming his lips.

Ashlyn's hand moved in circles on his back, her other arm wrapping around his front. Her lips moved silently against the back of his head with sounds meant to soothe the wounded child he harbored inside.

"I left him...alone...the Summer...go back...change things." His sobs stole half of the words he'd tried to say, but Ashlyn understood enough to fill in the blanks.

Derek's lips were wet against her collarbone, his breath hot as he exhaled. Taking a deep breath, he spoke, his words more coherent.

"I was gone for barely two months. He's been gone nearly four years." His voice was distant, and Ashlyn recognized the grief that marred it. Time didn't heal all wounds.

Turning the bracelet around his wrist, Derek's fingers smoothed over the date engraved upon it. He'd worn that moment, that loss, upon his skin every day since. 

"He lied about doing the new drug trial. It turns out he stopped showing up for his check-ups too. He'd given up. I don't blame him either. I gave up on him, so why wouldn't he?" The despair in his voice was too much.

Ashlyn pulled back and shook her head. Taking Derek's face in her hands, she lifted his head to look him in the eye. Running her thumb back and forth under his eye, she stroked his cheek to soothe him.

"The hospital called and told me to come back because he didn't have much time

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