To the Stars (Thatch #2)(49)
My body relaxed and I felt myself drifting again. “Thank you,” I mouthed before sleep claimed me.
Chapter 11
Knox
Present Day—Richland
I GLANCED AT my phone to check the time again, and finally broke down to call Harlow. She was an hour late. Normally I wouldn’t have waited that long for anyone, and normally I would’ve called if the person I was meeting was a little late, but I already knew how much it scared Harlow to have the phone I’d bought for her. I didn’t want to continuously scare her by reminding her of it every time I started worrying about her.
Tapping on her name, I brought the phone up to my ear and tried to calm the shaking in my arms and legs.
Fall 2010—Walla Walla
I COULDN’T STOP shaking as I waited for her to pick up her phone. The entire last three months had been more of the same: con stant bouncing knees and shaking hands; but it was all about to be over soon. Within minutes, I was going to have the girl I’d been waiting for. As soon as I heard her answer the phone, I looked up at her dorm and couldn’t hide the wide smile that spread across my face.
“KNOX, I’M SO sorry. I didn’t mean for this to happen,” Harlow whispered into the phone a couple of minutes later.
Didn’t mean for this to happen? The girl I’ve waited for just told me she didn’t wait for me. She apologized to me, this isn’t a joke—this is actually happening. The girl I love doesn’t love me anymore.
“Say something,” she begged.
I worked my throat a few times to make sure I could actually speak before saying anything, but even then, I felt dead when I said, “I will always love you. Nothing can change that. Happy birthday, Harlow.”
I couldn’t end the call fast enough. I couldn’t get away fast enough; but I also couldn’t move.
I don’t know how long I’d been standing there in the rain when someone said, “Whatever you did, that’s a good start, man—but it’s only a start.”
It took a few seconds to comprehend the voice was talking to me. I looked up at the guy walking in my direction away from Harlow’s dorm, and gave him a confused look.
He gestured to the flowers in my hand—red poppies. “You look like shit and you’re holding flowers. It’s a good start, but you’re better off buying something she can show off. Know what I mean? Sure way to make them happy and forget whatever happened.” He laughed and smacked my shoulder as he walked past me, but it was enough to get me to move.
I turned around and headed back toward the parking lot, only stopping to hand over the flowers to the first girl I passed. As soon as I was in my car, I sat there for what felt like hours playing with the ring I’d had in my pocket before finally putting it back in the box it had come in, and started the drive back to Seattle.
I’d known it was crazy, and probably a long shot, but I’d gone to Harlow’s dad a week before she’d left for college to ask if I could marry her. It had been a long talk that had ultimately ended in me promising that we wouldn’t get married until she graduated, among some other conditions, but he’d given me his blessing to ask her after she turned eighteen, and I’d gone to buy a ring that night.
Because I’d known that nothing would come between us. And now, all I wanted to do was blame her dad. The conversation I’d had with him months ago flashed through my mind, and I bit back a curse because I knew this was his fault . . . all of it was his fault.
“I can’t believe I’m about to say this,” Mr. Evans said after long minutes of staring blankly at the floor. “Knox, you may ask her to marry you, but there are conditions.”
I straightened in the chair and tried to contain my smile. “Anything.”
“She needs to graduate before you get married.”
I wanted to remind him that that was another four years away, but still didn’t care as long as it meant she was mine. “Done.”
“And this one might be harder for you . . .”
“Harder than waiting another four years?” I teased, but Mr. Evans didn’t seem to find it funny.
“When she leaves for school in a week, I want her to try to enjoy it.”
“Of course,” I immediately agreed.
Mr. Evans shook his head. “Knox, the wife and I like you. Not many young men would treat our daughter with the respect you have, and that quickly earned our respect. However, we’re worried that her mind is so focused on you that she will miss out on life, which is why we pushed her to go away to school instead of staying in Seattle. If all she thinks about is making it to her eighteenth birthday, then she won’t try to enjoy her time when she is away from you—do you understand?”
“I’m not sure,” I said slowly, but I was worried I did.
“You’ve always given her space, but not the kind of space I think she should have when she leaves. You’ve let her be her own person, but she needs to decide who she is now, and she can’t do that with you always there beside her. She sees her future as Harlow and Knox; I need her to see what it could be as just Harlow. Like I said, the wife and I like you, and I would be glad to have Harlow marry you . . . but I want her to be sure this is what she wants once she finally gets to be on her own and makes her own decisions. I don’t want my daughter to ever look back on her life and regret it. You look confused,” he grumbled, and searched for the words to explain himself.