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She could’ve done anything, demanded I put the world at her feet, or taught me a lesson for playing with her, but she did none of that.

Instead, she told me she loved me.

In the little time that I have known her, I’ve shared more with her than I have with anyone else. I wouldn’t call what I had with her just friendship. It was more than that. But was it love?

What was love to me?

Was it what my mother showed with a healthy dose of blind affection, or was it the stone-cold attitude my father showed me, or was it the trust my siblings had in me?

I didn’t know the answer to that because I didn’t know what love was.

No one cared about me enough to show me what love really was, so I simply returned what they expected of me. That was the only love I knew.

And I knew it wasn’t the kind of love Bella spoke about. The real kind, the true kind, the kind that she was adamant still existed in this fucked-up world even though most would disagree.

Yes, I found every inch of her gorgeous. She was beautiful, and it was hard not to appreciate everything about her. But that was attraction, not love. Was it?

But it wasn’t just how she looked—that faded after I got to know her more and more—it was the way her presence made me feel, the way her eyes would shine when she looked at me, the way I wanted nothing more than to hang on to every word she spoke, the way I wanted to keep her in my arms and not let the world touch her, the way I wanted to care for her and protect her. That simply wasn’t because I was attracted to her, but it wasn’t love either, right?

My mind flashed back to the pain in her eyes when she found out the truth. It was one image that kept haunting me when it shouldn’t. And something in my chest crumbled at the moment when her eyes filled with tears. It was a feeling I didn’t recognize. It was a feeling I’d never felt before. She didn’t even cry when she had a fucking steel bar poking out of her foot, but she cried for a selfish bastard like me.

I didn’t know if I liked what I did to her. In a way, I used her. I did use her. And the reason I did it—for my family—was how I justified all my actions, but when it came to Bella, that reason didn’t feel right at all.

She was the only person who came into my life wanting nothing back.

And I fucked that up.

Regret held my chest in a tight grip. Regret that I lied to her and regret that I used her, but the thing I regretted the most was when I told her I wanted nothing from her but the codes. And the way her eyes glimmered with hurt when I said that was something I won’t forget for the rest of my life. My mind replayed that scene over and over again, and all I wanted to do was go back and say what I really wanted to say.

Her.

I wanted her more.

Only days of knowing her, my life felt worthwhile to live with Bella by my side. And now, just three days without her, it felt like I had lost my arms.

And I didn’t know what to do.

I didn’t know how to go back to before her.

I didn’t know if I was even living before her.

But I could never give Bella what she wanted. Love. I was incapable of that. But I also couldn’t function without her.

What the fuck do I do?

I didn’t understand these feelings, and I didn’t like how my mind was only thinking of her.

By the time I pulled out of my thoughts, everyone had already left the room. The empty four walls stared at me, almost as if they were accusing me of being the fucked-up motherfucker I was.

Maybe I was.

I knew I was.

Fuck it.

Without another thought, I grabbed my jacket and stormed out of the room. In minutes, I found myself walking through the familiar hallways of the Twins Codex, almost as if she had tied a string around me and was pulling me with her dainty fingers.

Her section at the library remained quiet and desolate as always. It looked like no one was really interested in astrophysics these days. It was almost as if she picked this section for that reason, but I knew it was because of her father.