21. Lorraine

Chapter Twenty-One

Lorraine

S itting next to Ash, I thought about my visit home. When I’d been with Cat, talking about Ash, I’d told her I didn’t know if I wanted to stay in his realm or not. The truth was, I wanted to stay. I wanted to be with Ash, away from a world that held nothing but pain.

Aside from Cat, who was the only point of light my world still held, the life that waited for me was dark and dreary, and doing it all without Ash made me feel sick to my stomach. The alternative, coming here, was terrifying. How could I give it all up and come live here? I’d told Ash I would be giving up an identity and not know what to do, but surely I could figure something out? Philippa could help me. Maybe living here would mean I had some kind of magic, something I needed to do the way Ash looked after the trees, or something. Or maybe it would be the way it was now, with me living in the cabin and going through every magical day like I was floating on clouds. With Ash in my life, and having him confess that he was in love with me, I could easily imagine that I would be floating on clouds for the rest of my life. The thing was, what if I couldn’t come here? If someone else had done it, then it stood to reason that I could do it, too, but that didn’t mean that it was so simple. Or that it had happened at all—what if it was just a story? My mind ran in circles, and I struggled to think straight. “Hey,” Ash said, cupping my cheek and tilting my head up to look at him. “Whatever it is, we’ll figure it out. Whatever the answer may be.”

I nodded. Ash could tell when I got myself stuck in a corner overthinking everything. “What about you coming to Earth?” I asked. Ash stiffened against me. It wasn’t very obvious, but the atmosphere had shifted slightly, and he had a tick in his jaw that hadn’t been there a moment ago. “I know I mentioned maybe looking for a job and all that, but is going there even something you would be able to do?”

“I think so,” Ash said. “I’d have to give up my immortality, though.”

“What does that mean?”

“No more magic,” I said. “No more eternal life doing what I’d been created to do.”

“You would just be… human?” I asked. I couldn’t imagine Ash without his magic, without the power that oozed out of him whenever we had sex, and the way he was so serious about the trees. Everyone around here had magic, and that had become normal. Thinking about Ash without it was weird. “Yeah,” Ash said. “Human, with the same lifespan, the same lack of power, the same kind of life.”

“Oh,” I said, surprised. I didn’t know why I’d thought it would be any different. Then again, I hadn’t really thought much about it at all. “Is that something you would want to do?”

“It’s a big ask,” Ash said. “Bigger than me giving up my life on Earth?” I asked. I didn’t want to sound like I was challenging him, but wasn’t it a big ask either way? “I’ll be losing a lot more by going to Earth,” Ash said. “And I won’t lose a lot when I come here?” I asked, incredulous that he even had it in him to say something like that. Didn’t he understand that either way, it would be a huge sacrifice? “Well, life here would count in your favor; you’d gain a life with me, and all that entails.”

“And life on Earth wouldn’t count in your favor?” I asked, my voice getting snappier. “You know, you’d be getting me, too. And all that entails.” My voice had a hint of sarcasm to it when I added that last bit. Ash narrowed his eyes at me. “It’s not that simple. I’d be trading immortality for mortality, giving up the rest of eternity for a few years on Earth. If you come here, it will be the opposite, creating immortality when you would have expired.”

“And that’s what makes it so much better, huh?” I asked. I was getting angry now.

Did he think that living on Earth was beneath him? Did Ash really think that going back there was a step down from the life he lived here? He slept in a tree, for fuck’s sake! This cabin had been archaic until he’d decided to fix it up for me. None of that sounded like a remotely fair trade. “You’re getting pissed off,” Ash said tightly. “Yeah, I am. You’re telling me my life is worth less than yours.”

“That’s not what I’m saying,” Ash said. “But it is, though, isn’t it?” I argued, my head starting to ache when my blood pressure rose as I got angrier and angrier. “You’re the one with magic, running around, saving my ass all the time while I just lie on the couch, drink coffee, and have picnics with Philippa. Philotes. Whatever you call her.”

“It’s not what I mean at all,” Ash said. “I don’t know why you suddenly think you’re superior to me,” I carried on, struggling to stop now that the floodgate had opened. It was frustration after being cooped up here for so long—I knew that. It had to be cabin fever. Ha. After I’d seen Cat today, visiting the life I’d left behind, I felt great. A part of me still felt like I’d been ripped apart, trapped here. Even though I was happier than ever, I still felt like I was stuck. That was only adding fuel to the fire. I was getting pissed off with Ash for what he was saying because I was still homesick—maybe even more so now than before—and the idea of giving that all up when Ash thought it wasn’t a big deal made me so angry I saw red. I shook my head and got off the couch, putting distance between me and Ash. “I’m grateful for your help, and that you reached out and tripped me that night, or whatever, but that doesn’t mean we’re not equals. If this is ever going to work, you and I have to be on the same footing.”

“I never said you’re not my equal,” Ash said, his voice hard and the tick in his jaw growing faster and faster. “Not until now, you didn’t,” I said. “But it’s all been in the way things are set up, isn’t it? I stay here, you go out and protect the forest. Protect me, because for some reason they can find me but I can’t fight back to save my life. You had to do that for me.”

Ash shook his head. He was getting more and more pissed off, too. “Do you think I haven’t thought about it?” Ash asked. “I’ve thought about going back to Earth with you a million times. It’s just not that simple.”

“What’s complicated about it?!” I cried out. “Please, tell me what it is that makes you not want to make the same sacrifices for me that you’re expecting me to make for you.”

“On Earth, we just have each other for a short while before the ride is over,” Ash said, his voice rising. “If you come here, it’s an eternity together. Don’t you get it?”

I stared at him, blinking. His reasoning made sense, and it melted me to think that he wasn’t condescending; he just wanted me for as long as he could have me. For an eternity. I sighed and walked back to the couch. When I came closer, Ash held his hand out to me. “I don’t know what to think or what to do,” I said when I took his hand and he pulled me onto his lap. I curled against his chest and listened to his heart beating against my ear. His heat radiated through his clothes, and it enveloped me. I could sit here drinking him in forever. “I don’t know either,” Ash admitted. “We’ll see what we can find. The only thing I do know is how I feel about you, and that won’t change, no matter which way we turn.”

I reached up and kissed him.

How could he be so shitty with words one moment and then so sweet and romantic the next? Ash was so different from any other man I’d had in my life. He was different from Oscar in ways I couldn’t even begin to decipher. That was the point, though, wasn’t it? I wanted to find someone who was nothing like the hell I’d had in my life before. It brought me back to the idea that my life back on Earth, aside from my sister, had been pretty shit since my parents had died, and leaving all that behind wasn’t the worst thing that could happen. I just didn’t know if it was possible, and getting excited about something when it might not happen was stupid. “How I feel about you won’t change either,” I said to Ash. “No matter what the next step is to figuring out what to do.”

Ash wrapped his arms around me and tucked me tightly against him, holding me close. I loved it when he held onto me, when we were so tightly melded together it was like we were one. “Will you stay tonight?” I asked. “Yeah,” Ash said. I smiled, even though I knew he couldn’t see my face where it was tucked against his chest. I loved it when Ash stayed over. I wanted to wake up to him every morning for the foreseeable future, and then for however long we had after that. If I could leave behind my life on Earth and stay here with Ash the way he hoped we could, I would do it. I didn’t tell him that yet—I still had time to think about it, but I already knew that if it came down to deciding right now…

I knew what my answer would be.