he Resolution of Callie & Kayden (The Coincidence, #6)(4)

‘You know what?’ I say as we reach the register. ‘I can believe it. I’m not the same girl I used to be.’

He lowers his hand from his mouth and the humor dissolves from his expression. ‘You’re so right. You have changed. You’re so much stronger now.’

Even though it’s our turn to order, we give each other a hug. ‘We’ve both come so far,’ I tell him because Seth has had his own struggles as well and yet here we are – happy, healthy, and enjoying life. Survivors, that’s what we are. I just wish Kayden could see that about himself. Realize just how far he’s come.

Maybe Seth’s right. Maybe it’s time to grab that little space between Kayden and me. After all, I have faced worse than asking my boyfriend to move in with me.

Way, way worse.





Chapter 2


#107 Have a Winter Wonderland Magical Moment.



Kayden


I’ve been in a downer of a mood lately. It’s nowhere near the same as it used to be when I’d get so down I’d lock myself in the bathroom and cut out the pain by slicing my own skin open and letting myself bleed. I won’t go back to that place no matter what happens to me. I refuse to live in that dark hole ever again. I want things to remain light. I just wish I could fully grab onto it like Callie grabs life, but there’s some things – fears – holding me back. An abundance of things bothering me when I really start to analyze it. Like the fact that Thanksgiving is in less than a month, making it almost a year since my father stabbed me then bailed with my mother before he could pay the consequences. It was the year when my already crumbling life fell apart. The year when I just about gave up and ended it all.

But I didn’t. I survived and I should be grateful – which I am – but it still bothers me that my father and mother are who-knows-where, doing who-knows-what, maybe without a care in the world.

Then there’s the fact that my oldest brother, Dylan, invited me to his house for Thanksgiving to a family dinner. I’m not sure what to do with that one, how to react to the word family. I can’t even picture the concept of sitting around the table with my brother and his wife and all of her family, laughing and chatting while we stuff our stomachs with food. Dylan said he would have invited Tyler, too, but neither of us has seen him in quite a while, and we worry that he’s addicted to drugs, living on the streets somewhere like he’s done in the past. Or worse, maybe he’s not alive at all.

I feel like I’m stuck in the past, and I want to move forward. My therapist tells me I need to all the time. But it’s more complicated than it seems and depressing to take in sometimes – the lack of family I have and the fact that I’ll never truly have a group of people there for me.

There is one person who always gets me through my despair, though.

Callie Lawrence.

She’s the best thing that’s ever happened to me. My ray of sunshine through the rain, the clouds, the storm that’s hovered over my head. She can make me smile when I’m down, laugh when I’m unhappy. She’s the one person who has ever loved me, and who I completely and wholly love back in a way I can barely understand sometimes.

I honestly thought I could never love anyone the way I love her. That I’d never know how to love since I never really learned how to. However, Callie showed me how to open my heart – at least, when it comes to loving her. She makes it so easy and sometimes it confuses me because why couldn’t my family just do it – love each other instead of being so full of ugly hatred?

‘Kayden, get your head in the practice!’ my coach hollers as he waves at me to get my ass on the field. I’ve been standing on the sidelines, staring at the end field for who knows how long, lost in my thoughts.

Getting my head back into practice mode, I jog into the center of the field, hooking the chin strap as I join my other teammates in the huddle. We’re in our practice uniforms, the field icy from last night’s intense temperature drop, and it’s still f*cking cold. But it’s good to be outdoors, distracting myself from the thoughts that haunt me whenever I’m in my room alone. Playing clears my head more than anything else, except for maybe talking to Callie, who I get to see when practice is over.

Still, even when I’m playing, I can hear his faint voice telling me what to do. It’s always there whenever I’m doing anything athletic and sometimes when I’m asleep. I hate that I hear it, but after years of it being drilled in my mind, I can’t get rid of the sound.

Run.

Do better.

Go faster.

Play harder.

Keep going until you break.

It’s only when I’m dripping with sweat and completely in the game that I can barely hear my father’s voice in my head, my heart thudding too loud to hear anything but the overworked beat of it. It makes me love/hate football – love it for me, but hate it because of him.

Still, I focus on what I need to do for practice, putting my heart into playing well, running the drills, throwing, catching, playing as good as I always do. By the time we’re finished and I’m heading to the locker room, the sweat has soaked through my uniform and my brain is too exhausted to think so I’m feeling pretty good. Coach pulls me aside before I go inside and tells me how good I’m doing, but then gives me some things to work on. He usually does this, but he’s been on my case a lot this year since we’ve been playing so well. There’s been a lot of talk about my future in football, even though I’m still a sophomore and still have a ways to go before the draft comes into my sights. I’m grateful for the time, too, because I’m not even sure what I want to do anyway.