Total pages in book: 166
Estimated words: 160042 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 800(@200wpm)___ 640(@250wpm)___ 533(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 160042 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 800(@200wpm)___ 640(@250wpm)___ 533(@300wpm)
His jaw clenches and his nostrils flare with a tough breath. “I’ve got nothin’ to give you, only a bloody past and a prison record. I don’t even know how to function in the outside world. I can’t breathe with too many people around. I can’t sleep without holdin’ you in my arms. I’m barely a man so it terrifies me to be standin’ here and tellin’ you this but you deserve to know. You deserve to know that I love you. I’m in love with you. You’re the only woman I’ve ever loved.”
He shakes his head, his eyes molten. “I don’t know anything about it, about this feeling. I don’t know how to handle it. I don’t know how to cope with it except when I think about my life, I think about you. I think about makin’ you smile, makin’ you laugh. Keepin’ you safe, protectin’ you, watchin’ over you. I think about giving you your every wish, makin’ you happy. Standin’ outside of your window to make sure you got to sleep okay. Followin’ you wherever you go and standin’ guard so nothin’ bad ever touches you. When I think about my life, I think about how you saved it. And how the only way I can ever repay you is by living it. Is by being alive, by keeping Rosie alive. So I moved to Bozeman because I wanted to live and the only place I want to live is where you are.”
IT’S BEEN A week, and he’s still living his life.
If following me around is what you call life, and apparently, he does. He stands outside my window every night and doesn’t leave until I turn out my lights. Every morning as I leave for work, I once again find him standing under my favorite tree, waiting for me. And then he walks me all the way to the abused-women’s shelter where I’m volunteering for the summer. He disappears after that to God knows where and then comes back around when it’s lunchtime. So he can follow me to a café nearby—not the one where we first met; I steer clear of that one on purpose—and watch me order my tea and my strawberry crumb muffin. I realize it’s not really lunch, but that’s all the appetite I have these days. Anyway, once I have my lunch, he walks me back—from a distance—to the shelter and comes back to do the same when the day’s over and I need to go back.
Not once during this whole one-week period has he approached me or tried to talk to me. Well, except for the first day when he left a note at my door. I saw it when I came back from work. It said: You need to eat lunch. Because he must have seen me ordering my muffin and didn’t like it. I’m not going to lie, it pissed me off a little bit. So much so that I took off the note taped to my door, unlocked it, and went to the window. As always, he was there under the tree, waiting for my lights to come on so he’d know I was home safe. As if some danger could befall me while climbing up two flights of stairs from the front door of the building to my apartment on the third floor.
I stared at him through the space, made a big show of holding the note up, and then crushed it in my hand and threw it into the trash can I held in my other hand. I will admit that my anger lasted for only about fifteen minutes. At which point I went back to the can, fished his note out, and stored it in the desk drawer with all his other letters and notes. And then wrote him a note and went outside to attach it to the tree.
I am eating lunch. PS: You need to stop following me.—R
To which he responded with:
Strawberry crumb muffin is not lunch. PS: I can’t.—A
It is, if I want it to be. PS: Yes, you can.—R
If you don’t start eating properly, I’m going to have to tell Haven. And she’s already worried about you. PS: No.—A
Are you threatening to tell on me? PS: People at my work think you’re a creep.—R
Yes, I am because again, you need to eat. PS: I don’t care about other people.—A
You’re an asshole. I’ll eat what I want. PS: What if someone calls the cops? You’re still on parole.—R
I called Haven today. She said she’s going to send food with Ax. You can freeze it until you’re ready to eat. PS: Again, I don’t care about other people.—A
He did call Haven, and she called me the next day, worried. I told her I was fine and that I missed her. She said I should come visit soon. I agreed because I didn’t want to seem rude, but we both knew I was lying. And then I cried for hours—I seem to do that every night, actually—because I can’t believe he told on me and that my freezer is now overflowing with Haven’s delicious cooking. I can’t believe that for the past week, we’ve been passing notes like we’re in grade school and he still won’t leave.