Page 50 of Meet Me in the Valley (Oakwood Valley #2)

Chapter Thirty-Two

LOGAN

My hands tingle. My knee bobs. My pulse skyrockets to staggering heights. I’ve never had a peanut allergy, but the tightness in my chest and the way my throat’s closing up feels pretty damn close.

I’m waiting for the blonde woman with kind eyes to show up. When I saw her picture online, I thought she looked respectable. Demure. There was something about the way she sat up tall in her picture that oozed confidence.

She had hair that didn’t go past her chin, cut into a sleek bob that somehow made her seem more mature. It gave me a weird sense of comfort, like she’d know what she was doing—experienced.

I know looks aren’t everything, but trust starts with a feeling. If I don’t see it in their face, how could I give them any part of me?

And that’s what this was about, right? Trust? Well, I’m shit with trust. I’ve seen trust vanish right before my eyes. Hell, I’ve been the one to make trust vanish. But it’s just as bad to be on the receiving end, too. I’ve been in both roles. Both fucking suck.

I haven’t been waiting too long. Five minutes tops. But it feels like a lifetime. Every second ticking is a Herculean effort to not pass out from the nerves. I’ve never done this before. I didn’t think I’d ever do this.

But I have to do this.

Then she’s here, the woman I’ve been waiting for, greeting me with a friendly smile that somehow disarms me quicker than I had expected. I was right about her eyes being kind. Big and glacier blue. Ironically full of warmth, despite the cool tones in her irises.

“Hi, Logan. I’m Charlotte. It’s really great to meet you.” Her voice is bright, but not annoyingly chirpy. It’s soothing, and I can imagine she might have a good singing voice. Her smile isn’t overbearing. Far from condescending. It’s genuine, and that puts me at ease.

“Hi, Charlotte. It’s great to meet you, too. Is it okay? If I just call you Charlotte?” My throat works down a swallow, and my clammy palms feel weird as I rub them up and down on my jean-clad thighs.

“Of course. No need for formalities. I want you to feel comfortable.” I nod at that, absentmindedly cracking my knuckles. Charlotte grins politely, sensing my nerves.

“Yeah, okay.” I clear my throat. “I’m sorry. I’ve never done this before, and I’m pretty nervous. It’s weird because I’m usually really confident. I never get nervous, not really. I don’t think. Uh,” I ramble, scrubbing a restless hand over my face as I work a way to get my mind to slow down.

I try breathing slow, deep breaths, but that only seems to shorten them somehow. I try rolling my shoulders away from my ears to release the tension there, but it snaps back like a rubber band.

Charlotte’s calm demeanor keeps me suspended. Her warm smile coaxes me slowly out of my head. It’s amazing, really. No words. Just energy.

“It’s okay, Logan. You can set the pace here. We don’t have to rush into anything.” Her voice flows steadily, like a river.

I set the pace.

The tips of my ears flame as a quick rush of embarrassment flushes my skin. I’m so out of my goddamn element here, but I refuse to punish myself further.

“Okay. I’m ready now.”

The fan above me spins in hypnotizing circles. The cool brush of air pricks against my damp, bare chest, but I ignore the discomfort the chill brings me.

I reflect on my time with Charlotte. The hour went by in a blink. It was so easy, yet the hardest thing I’ve ever done all at once.

But it was a start. It was a step in the right direction for me. As I watch the fan blades blur, spinning around and around in an endless loop, I can’t help but compare the way they turn in circles to my time with Charlotte.

Maybe that’s how the first time feels—an endless loop of uncertainty.

I’m definitely going to see her again because this time with her was just a small scratch on the surface.

She wouldn’t unlock the deepest parts of me yet because as I watch the blades chase each other in circles, I’m terrified of what will come out when I stop moving.

When I stop running.

I learned I thrive on the need to control my intimate relationships.

I need to get ahead of the curve before I’m the one left behind.

I learned I don’t like to be left behind.

Honestly, it’s shit I already know. No mind-bending epiphanies.

No life- altering self discoveries. Just Logan stuck in that endless loop of bullshit.

But Charlotte will get me there. She’s consistent like that. Disarming and smart. I knew that from just one hour with her. Until next week when I see her again, I have work to do. So much more work to do.

I’m completely spent—mind and body. There are aches in every point of my body that hold tension. Bringing my hand to my chest, I rub the space there.

This ache. This one is the worst of them all.

I thought about Tia the entire hour. Fuck, I’ve been thinking about Tia every second of every day since she became mine.

Still mine, even if I’m not hers.

We’ve gone no contact, but not in malice. The way we left things that night left us both suspended in the air. Her words spin in an endless loop, exactly like the whirring fan over me.

“We have to let each other go.”

That sinking feeling in my stomach is there again, dragging me down like an undertow I can’t fight.

Tia wouldn’t want this for me. She doesn’t want me to fall deeper. To fall in on myself. After being with Charlotte today, it was proof not only to Tia, but to me—that I don’t want that for me.

I can hear Charlotte’s praising voice ringing in my head, helping me cut the weights off my ankles and bring me back to the surface.

“That’s good, Logan. Really good.”

I was doing good, even when I felt like a failure. Especially when I felt like everything coming up for me was worthless, or unimportant, or stupid.

Charlotte reassured me, telling me the first time can often feel awkward. It wasn’t her at all. I was hyper-aware it was all me. But I loosened up as we got into the swing of things, and we fell into an easy rhythm.

I let out a harsh breath and push off the bed, peeling the towel from around my hips.

At the dresser, I yank open a drawer and step into a pair of briefs.

My phone buzzes. Still drying my hair with one hand, I reach for it with the other and check the handful of notifications lighting up the screen.

Valerie

Want some company later? You seem off at work. Maybe I can help?

Hot Bartender on 6th

Hey Logan, it’s Kylie from Green Light Social. Remember me? I’m off tonight. Come to my place.

Four more look just like that, and it makes me sick. Not one name in my notifications gets my heart racing. Not one message makes my smile come out from hiding. Sure, I smiled at Charlotte earlier. But it’s polite. A little broken.

My unguarded smile is waiting for her to resurrect it. That ache is back with a vengeance, permeating through my chest like a sickness, claiming my entire body in total weakness.

The hour spent with Charlotte feels empty now. I thought it was supposed to bring me some form of relief. A release I know I’ve been needing. But this fucking ache. It won’t go away. Not yet. Not right now. I delete all the messages and block their numbers.

Pulling a t-shirt and jeans from my dresser, I shut the drawers with force.

I don’t mean to, but this ache has me slowly spinning out of control.

I throw on a hoodie, tug it over my head, and snatch the keys to my bike from the hook.

I’m out the door before I can think twice.

The moment my fingers clutch around the handlebars, I’m gone.

Escape is there. I’m running away again.

But I have to right now. I thought today was a step in the right direction, but this shit is harder than I thought.

Thoughts of Tia flood my brain and ruin me when her smile, her laugh, her smell all but invade me when I’m flying down the highway with the wind on my back.

“Black Balloon” by The Goo Goo Dolls floats in my ears as I push the speed faster and faster, as if trying to outrun the rapid thump behind my ribs.

Outrun the ache. I chase the sunset, eyes trained on the horizon in front of me as I pass the blur of headlights.

The colors are so vivid even from behind my visor, vibrant orange and hot pink streaks.

It’s a California sunset if I’ve ever seen one.

The beauty of it has my chest faltering. It’s a sudden swell, overwhelmed by its brilliance. It’s Tia there in the sky, wrapped within the setting sun.

Then something in my mind shifts, clicking in place as satisfying as fitting a puzzle piece.

What I’m doing now isn’t an escape. It’s a release in the highest form. And I’m running toward peace for the first time in my life, changing gears and seeing my life through a new lens.

I’m done running away. Now, I ride fast toward what I want.

Self acceptance. It’s there in the distance, ready for me to claim. I’ll get there. Maybe not tonight, but I’ll get there. I know it.

I might be on the edge of a breakdown, but the sight of an airplane flying overhead has me choking on a laugh. It rests perfectly against what I now call Tia’s sky. Perfectly her. Undeniably beautiful. Tears well in my eyes at the imagery of it.

I fly on my bike in tandem with the plane. I know where they’re going, and my unguarded smile breaks free for a fleeting moment as I lean heavier on the throttle. I won’t have to wonder who they are. I imagine it’s us. And I won’t have to know if they’re happy.

Because I already know they are.