Hate You Still by Lyssa Lemire

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

EMMA

I wake up in my bed.

For a moment, my mind still groggy and unfocused in its early consciousness, I hope against hope that I realize the last three days have been just a dream.

I fervently, desperately wish, trying to will my hope into reality, that as I wake up and my brain starts piecing facts together, I’ll realize that my breakup with Knox was just a dream, and that the reality of the last three days has been something entirely different.

But it’s no use. In fact, I realize that my sleep from the night before was a blank. No dreams. Just oblivion.

The truth of the last three days, I realize, is inescapable. Knox’s breaking up with me was no dream. The heartbreak I’ve been suffering was no nightmare.

Not only was it real, it’s still real.

Like a raw wound that hasn’t even had time to heal, a sharp pain rends my heart. Hot tears flood my eyes. I roll onto my side and press my face against my soft pillow, drowning my sobs in the cold, unfeeling fabric.

It’s just the way it has to be.

The words reverberate in my memory.

Out of the blue, three days ago, he knocked on my door. When I answered, I reached up to wrap my arms around him and plant a kiss on his lips, like I always do, but he stopped me.

He said we needed to break up. It was so unexpected that I didn’t even feel anything at first. But then I heard the seriousness in his voice, I saw the steely resolution in his face.

He told me it was for the best. He told me he wasn’t right for me. He told me we could never work out long-term.

He wouldn’t tell me why. I couldn’t crack his façade and find out the truth that lurked behind his excuses. All he would do, when I pleaded with him to explain himself – when I demanded an explanation as my right – was to shake his head and repeat, It’s just the way it has to be.

I was left thunderstruck in the doorjamb as he turned his back and walked away without looking back.

Since that day I’ve tried to see him. I’ve knocked on his door, but each time there has been either no answer, or Gavin answering and apologetically explaining that Knox refuses to see me or to talk to me.

I saw him on campus once. I tried to approach him, at that moment more angry than sad, longing for at least the dignity of an explanation. He sped up his pace when he saw me walking to him, and I was too far across campus to have any hope of catching up to him.

It’s still a mystery to me. What could have made his feelings turn so sharply in such a short period of time?

Katie knocks gently on my door. I pull my head up from my pillow and see that the pillowcase is so soaked with tears that it looks like a spilled a glass of water on it. Oh, well.

“Come in,” I say through sniffling.

Katie peeks through the door. “Morning,” she says in a light voice. “Skipping classes today?”

I check the time. Shit. I’ve been up lying in bed like this for an hour and a half, having totally lost track of time. “I guess I am now,” I groan.

Luckily, student teaching is over now. But all the student teachers have a class for the last couple weeks of the semester as a wrap-up to the experience where we reflect, write reports of our experience, share our experiences with each other, that kind of thing.

Missing a day of student teaching would have been a big no-no. But missing a normal class is no big deal.

Katie sits on the edge of my mattress. “You know, my offer to burn his house down still stands,” she jokes.

I’m still in too bad a mood to laugh, but at least the edges of my mouth curl up just barely. “But then what would happen to Gavin?”

“Darn, you’re right,” she pouts.

“Then you’d have to let him stay in your room, since you’d be the one responsible for leaving him homeless.”

“Moving in together? No, I don’t think we’re at that stage yet. Darn, I guess I rescind my offer of burning Knox’s house down.”

“It’s okay,” I reply, the shadow of a giggle escaping my throat.

Katie gasps over-excitedly. “Was that a laugh? Maybe, at least, half a laugh?”

“Maybe a quarter of a laugh,” I concede.

“I’ll take it.”

I sit up in my bed. I glace at my pillow again, wet from my tears. I feel a jolt of anger. It’s not fair how many tears of pain and sorrow I’m spilling over a man who won’t even give me a real explanation for why he’s left me. I grab hold of my pillow and fling it across the room. I cross my arms defiantly over my chest.

But the anger does nothing to dull the pain, the sadness, the loss. I can tell myself I shouldn’t care about Knox over and over again, but I can’t erase the feelings I’ve built up for him. I can’t stop missing spending time with him, I can’t stop missing how he made me feel.

And I can’t stop wracking my brain over why he’s done what he’s done. I can’t stop overanalyzing all our interactions in the days before he broke up with me. I can’t stop thinking if maybe I’d done something wrong.

“I’ll try to get Gavin to talk to Knox,” Katie offers.

I shake my head. “No, I don’t want things between you and Gavin to get weird because of Knox and me.”

Katie sighs. Another thing I feel bad about: I’m sure it’s awkward for her and Gavin, what’s going on.

“How about some ice cream?” Katie asks.

I know she’s suggesting that to try and cheer me up. What girl doesn’t like to binge shamelessly on ice cream when she’s suffering from heartbreak? But the suggestion again threatens to send streams of tears down my cheeks.

Because when I think of ice cream, it’s impossible not to think of Knox. It’s impossible not to think of that night we shared together, that night he picked me up when I was at my very lowest and turned it into a night of memories that was among my most treasured.

“No thanks,” I say.

Katie squeezes my hand. “Well, how about I make pancakes then? With chocolate chips?”

I smile and nod. I’m really not hungry, but I can see how badly Katie wants to do something to make me feel better, so I accept.

Katie leaves my room for the kitchen. My eyes linger on the pillow I tossed across the room. A sudden surge of resolution hits me, like a clap of thunder booming out of nowhere on a clear blue day.

I shake my head resolutely. Knox isn’t allowed to do this. He already did this once. He isn’t allowed to do it again.

I fling the covers off from over me. With a sense of righteousness and self-confidence that I’ve never possessed before, I start to get dressed. I don’t care about my bedhead, I don’t care about my eyes red from crying. I pull on a pair of jeans and a sweater and stomp out of my room, my destination fixed in mind.

“Emma?” Katie questions from the kitchen, her surprised face peeking around the corner. “Where are you going?”

“I’m going to talk to Knox,” I say, gripping the doorknob with determination. “And this time, I’m not taking no for an answer.”