What kind of man does that make me? If I can’t prevent myself from falling for another girl, do I even deserve Maggie? I refuse to answer that, because I know that if I don’t deserve Maggie, I also don’t deserve Sydney. The thought of losing either of them, much less both of them, is something I can’t bring myself to entertain. I lift my hand and trace the edge of Sydney’s face with my fingertips, running them across her hairline, down her jaw, and up her chin, until my fingers reach her lips. I slowly trace the shape of her mouth, feeling the warm waves of breath pass her lips each time I circle around them. She opens her eyes, and the familiar pool of pain floats behind them.

She lifts a hand to my fingers. She pulls them firmly to her mouth and kisses them, then pulls our hands away, bringing them to rest on her stomach.

I’m looking at our hands now. She opens a flat palm, and I do the same, and we press them together.

I don’t know a lot about the human body, but I would be willing to bet there’s a nerve that runs directly from the palm of the hand, straight to the heart.

Our fingers are outstretched until she laces them together, squeezing gently when our hands connect completely, weaving together.

It’s the first time I’ve ever held her hand.

We stare at our hands for what feels like an eternity. Every feeling and every nerve are centered in our palms, in our fingers, in our thumbs, occasionally brushing back and forth over one another.

Our hands mold together perfectly, just like the two of us.

Sydney and me.

I’m convinced that people come across others in life whose souls are completely compatible with their own. Some refer to them as soul mates. Some refer to it as true love. Some people believe their souls are compatible with more than one person, and I’m beginning to understand how true that might be. I’ve known since the moment I met Maggie years ago that our souls were compatible, and they are. That’s not even a question.

However, I also know that my soul is compatible with Sydney’s, but it’s also so much more than that. Our souls aren’t just compatible—they’re perfectly attuned. I feel everything she feels. I understand things she never even has to say. I know that what she needs is exactly what I could give her, and what she’s wishing she could give me is something I never even knew I needed.

She understands me. She respects me. She astounds me. She predicts me. She’s never once, since the second I met her, made me feel as if my inability to hear is even an inability at all.

I can also tell just by looking at her that she’s falling in love with me. It serves as further proof that I need to do what should have been done a long time ago.

I very reluctantly lean forward, reach over to her nightstand, and grab a pen. I pull my fingers from hers and open her palm to write on it: I need you to move out.

I close her fingers over her palm so she doesn’t read it while I’m watching her, and I walk away, leaving behind an entire half of my heart as I go.

17.

Sydney

I watch as he closes the door behind him. I’m clutching my hand to my chest, terrified to read what he wrote.

I saw the look in his eyes.

I saw the heartache, the regret, the fear . . . the love.

I keep my hand clutched tightly to my chest without reading it. I refuse to accept that whatever words are written on my palm will obliterate what little hope I had for our maybe someday.

• • •

My body flinches, and my eyes flick open.

I don’t know what just woke me up, but I was in the middle of a dead sleep. It’s dark. I sit up on the bed and press my hand to my forehead, wincing from the pain. I don’t feel nauseated anymore, but I’ve never in my life been this thirsty. I need water.

I stand up and stretch my arms above my head, then glance down to the alarm clock: 2:45 A.M.

Thank God. I could still use about three more days of sleep to recover from this hangover.

I’m walking toward Ridge’s bathroom when an unfamiliar feeling washes over me. I pause before reaching the door. I’m not sure why I pause, but I suddenly feel out of place.

It feels strange, walking toward this bathroom right now. It doesn’t feel as if I’m walking toward my bathroom. It doesn’t feel as if it belongs to me at all, unlike how my bathroom felt in my last apartment. That bathroom felt like my bathroom. As if it belonged partly to me. That apartment felt like my apartment. All the furniture in it felt like my furniture.

Nothing about this place feels like me. Other than the belongings that were contained in the two suitcases I brought with me that first night, nothing else here feels even remotely like mine.

The dresser? Borrowed.

The bed? Borrowed.

Thursday-night TV? Borrowed.

The kitchen, the living room, my entire bedroom. They all belong to other people. I feel as if I’m just borrowing this life until I find a better one of my own. I’ve felt as if I’ve been borrowing everything since the day I moved in here.

Hell, I’m even borrowing boyfriends. Ridge isn’t mine. He’ll never be mine. As much as that hurts to accept, I’m so sick of this constant, ongoing battle with my heart. I can’t take this anymore. I don’t deserve this kind of self-torture.

In fact, I think I need to move out.

I do.

Moving out is the only thing that can start the healing, because I can’t be around Ridge anymore. Not with what his presence does to me.

You hear that, heart? We’re even now.

I smile at the realization that I’m finally about to experience life on my own. I’m consumed with a sense of accomplishment. I open the bathroom door and flip on the light . . . then immediately fall to my knees.

Oh, God.

Oh, no.

No, no, no, no, no!

I grab her by the shoulders and turn her over, but her whole body is limp. Her eyes are rolled back in her head, and her face is pale.

Oh, my God! “Ridge!” I crawl over her and reach for the door to his bedroom. I’m screaming his name so loudly my throat feels as if it’s ripping apart. I attempt to turn the doorknob several times, but my hand keeps slipping.

She begins to convulse, so I lunge over her and lift her head, then drop my ear to her mouth to make sure she’s breathing. I’m sobbing, screaming his name over and over. I know he can’t hear me, but I’m scared to let go of her head.

“Maggie!” I cry.

What am I doing? I don’t know what to do.

Do something, Sydney.

I lower her head carefully back to the floor and spin around. I grip the doorknob more firmly and pull myself to my feet. I swing his bedroom door open and rush toward the bed, then jump on it and climb over to where he’s lying.

“Ridge!” I scream, shaking his shoulder. He lifts an elbow in defense as he rolls over, then lowers it when he sees me hovering over him.

“Maggie!” I yell hysterically, pointing to the bathroom. His eyes flash to the empty spot on his bed, and his focus shoots up to the open bathroom door. He’s off the bed and on the bathroom floor on his knees in seconds. Before I even make it back to the bathroom, he’s got her head cradled in his arms, and he’s pulling her onto his lap.

He turns his head to look at me and signs something. I shake my head as the tears continue to flow down my cheeks. I have no idea what he’s trying to say to me. He signs again and points toward his bed. I look at the bed, then look back at him helplessly. His expression is growing more frustrated by the second.

“Ridge, I don’t know what you’re asking me!”

He slams his fist against the bathroom cabinet out of frustration, then holds his hand up to his ear as if he’s holding a phone.

He needs his phone.

I rush to the bed and search for it, my hands flying frantically over the bed, the covers, the nightstand. I finally find it under his pillow and run it back to him. He enters his password to unlock it, then hands it back to me. I dial 911, put the phone to my ear, and wait for it to ring while I drop to my knees next to them.

His eyes are full of fear as he continues to hold her head against his chest. He’s watching me, nervously waiting for the call to connect. He intermittently presses his lips into her hair as he continues to try to get her to open her eyes.

As soon as the operator answers, I’m bombarded with a list of questions that I don’t know the answers to. I give her the address, because it’s the only thing I know, and she begins firing more questions I don’t know how to communicate to him.

“Is she allergic to anything?” I say to Ridge, repeating what the operator is asking.

He shrugs and shakes his head, not understanding me.

“Does she have any preexisting conditions?”

He shakes his head again to tell me he has no idea what I’m asking him.

“Is she diabetic?”

I ask Ridge the questions over and over, but he can’t understand me. The operator is firing questions at me, and I’m firing them at Ridge, and we’re both too frantic for him even to read my lips. I’m crying. We’re both terrified. We’re both frustrated with the fact that we can’t communicate.

“Is she wearing a medical bracelet?” the operator asks.

I lift both of her wrists. “No, she doesn’t have anything on her.”

I look up to the ceiling and close my eyes, knowing that I’m not helping a damn bit.

“Warren!” I yell.

I’m off my feet and out of the bathroom, making my way to Warren’s bedroom. I swing open his door. “Warren!” I run to his bed and shake him while I hold the phone in my hand. “Warren! We need your help! It’s Maggie!”

His eyes open wide, and he throws off his covers, springing into action. I push the phone toward him. “It’s 911, and I can’t understand anything Ridge is trying to tell me!”

He grabs the phone and puts it to his ear. “She has CFRD,” he yells hastily into the phone. “Stage two CF.”

CFRD?

I follow him to the bathroom and watch as he signs to Ridge while holding the phone in the palm of his hand, away from his ear. Ridge signs something back, and Warren runs into the kitchen. He opens the refrigerator, reaches toward the back of the second shelf, and pulls out a bag. He runs with it to the bathroom and drops to his knees next to Ridge. He lets the phone fall to the floor and shoves it aside with his knee.

“Warren, she has questions!” I yell, confused about why he tossed the phone aside.

“We know what to do until they get here, Syd,” he says. He pulls a syringe from the bag and hands it to Ridge. Ridge pulls the lid off of it, then and injects Maggie in the stomach.

“Is she diabetic?” I ask, watching helplessly as Warren and Ridge silently converse. I’m ignored, but I don’t expect anything different. They’re in what looks like familiar territory for both of them, and I’m too confused to keep watching. I turn around and lean against the wall, then squeeze my eyes shut in an attempt to calm myself. A few silent moments pass, and then there’s banging at the door.

Warren is running toward the door before I can even react. He lets the paramedics inside, and I step out of the way, watching as everyone in the room around me seems to know what the hell is going on.