“What?” I ask, confused.

“Acceptance. You’ve reached acceptance, Addie. That’s what you’re feeling right now.”

I test the word out for myself, “Acceptance.”

After gathering my purse, I turn and give Liv a hug. I don’t say anything. She has helped me so much. I don’t know where I would be without her. Yes I do, I would still be pretending, most likely. Living without actually breathing.

I walk out without another word. I spot my brother in his usual seat waiting for me. He stands as I approach him. I wrap my arms around him. My rock.

“Thank you for always being here for me even when I try to push you away. I’m sorry that I shut down and lost myself. You didn’t deserve that. You lost them too and had to deal with losing me even though I was still here. I love you Logan,” I say into his chest.

Logan is speechless. I can see that he is trying to rein in his emotions.

“I know how much you want to be here for me. But right now I need to be alone. I just have to get my head on straight. I promise I will see you before you leave tomorrow. Just . . . I . . .”

“You got it, baby girl.” He kisses me on top of my head. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

I smile at him before I leave. I walk around for what feels like hours, but I have no sense of time. I wander the streets of New York without a destination. I keep replaying the word “acceptance” in my head. Is it really this easy? Am I just pretending or am I really better? I know I can’t be that girl I was before the accident. I’m still me, though. Just a different version of myself.

I’m going to continue getting better for the four lives that were lost that night; my dad, my mom, my little sister, and me. I died that night. They were able to bring me back, but I lost something that I can never regain. That piece of my soul, that has forever changed the person that I am, died that night.

A laugh that I will know anywhere snaps me back to reality. Please, please be wrong. I know without a doubt that I’m not. I see a man’s back against a brick wall while a leggy blonde sucks on his neck. I can’t see the man’s face, but I don’t need to see it. I can tell from his unruly hair, the muscles showing through his custom suit, who he is. It’s Jax.

Glancing around, I realize where I am. I’m standing a block away from Jax’s apartment building. Of course I am. Where else would my legs carry me?

I stand still, unable to move or look away. I hear him tell me how much he loves me in my mind while some blonde whispers in his ear, causing him to laugh and shake his head. I want to scream at her to get her slutty hands off him, but I don’t. I freeze, mouth open, while the man that I love lets some tramp have her way with him in the middle of the sidewalk.

I thought the pain of Jax’s rejection was the worst thing that he could do to me. Now I’m not so sure. Seeing him with her floods the pain of losing him back to the surface again. Instead of the heart-shattering pain from before, I’m fucking furious. Especially when I see who the slutty blonde is.

She’s the troll from the bathroom who was considering dyeing her hair based on Jax’s preferences. As if they can feel my staring at them, they both turn their heads my way. The troll looks amused while Jax pales. Good.

Not needing to witness what happens next, I turn around and run away. Jax shouts my name so I run faster. I’m thankful that I wore flats instead of the wedges I pulled out of my closet. The would have made my escape impossible.

I’m about to reach the corner when I’m jerked to a stop. All my anger from not being enough from Jax rises to the surface, and seeing him with the blonde troll pushes me one step closer to losing it. All the pent up anger from not being able to change what happened six years ago makes me lose it. I take all of it out on Jax in the form of a slap.

He releases his tight hold on my wrist as he stumbles back. I’m barely able to keep myself from falling into him. My right hand burns from the force of the blow. I’ve hit him before, but that was child’s play compared to the slap he just received.

There’s an entire imprint of my hand on his left cheek. Good.

“Don’t you EVER fucking touch me again!” I shout.

“Wait, Ads!” he yells after me.

I jump into a cab and scream out my address at the poor driver. I apologize and pretend like I’m not the crazy person he just saw smack some guy on the street. I sigh in relief when the driver veers away right when Jax tries to open the door. I don’t look back even though every part of me begs me to turn around and ask the driver to stop.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

I unlock my front door, hurl my purse on the ground, and slam the door. I continue visualizing the scene over and over again with the stupid melody of him telling me I’m not enough. A sick torture that I can’t escape. I need help. I need a friend right now. Without any thought, I drop to the floor and dig through my purse for my phone. I ignore all the missed messages and call the only person I can. She answers on the first ring.

“Hello love!” Harper sings into the phone.

Throat tight, I weakly choke out, “Hi.”

“I’m on my way. Keep the door unlocked,” Harper says before hanging up.

She doesn’t ask if I want company. She knows I need her. I had a tiny second of doubt that I shouldn’t have called her, that I should be strong enough on my own, but I made the right choice. Needing someone else every once in a while isn’t a bad thing. It doesn’t make me weak.

I desperately want to change into something comfortable, but I can’t find the strength to move. Today had been one hell of a day. I feel as if someone took a metal bat to my head then realized that wasn’t doing enough damage so they grabbed the biggest knife they could find and stabbed me repeatedly in the chest.

Somehow I manage to stumble my way to my balcony. I gulp in the cool night air. I should run back inside for a sweater or a blanket, but I can’t. Instead I collapse in one of my lounge chairs and wait for Harper.

It’s not long when I hear her calling my name. I’m too tired to raise my voice. Even though I’m emotionally drained to the point I feel like my head will explode any second, my mind won’t shut off.

I see the blonde troll making Jax laugh while he tells me I’m not enough. I relive the way his eyes sparkled as he confessed his love for me. Then as if that’s not enough, I see Hadley extending her headphones while the sound of my dad’s head smashing into the window as I soundtrack that plays over and over again. The images blur together until I can’t decipher what I’m seeing.

“What happened, Adalynn? Can you hear me?” Harper talks too fast, panicked.

All I can do is nod. Well, I think I nod. My whole body quakes. Is it from the cold outside or from the coldness inside of me? I’m vaguely aware that Harper keeps talking, asking me more questions that I can’t answer. All I hear is Hadley painfully saying my name one last time. Her last word was my name.

She was the only one besides Jax to call me Ads. I’ve never let anyone else call me that, even before she died. She thought it was Jax picking on me when we were younger, that’s why she started calling me Ads. To her horror, it was only a nickname, a nickname that only Jax could use, as he patiently told her. Too bad Hadley has always gotten her way even with Jax. He couldn’t get her to stop calling me Ads. It became their name for me.

When I heard Jax call me Ads the first time in the hospital, I couldn’t breathe through the pain. I would never hear my little sister call me that again, it would only be Jax. As much as it hurt in the beginning, I couldn’t tell him to stop. I think on some level he knew how much I needed it even though I dreaded it. I needed a daily reminder of her that wasn’t tainted from that night.