Chapter 82: Open The Door

Chapter 82: Open The Door

Andy

I treasured that letter.

That was the complete, honest truth.

Ivy had been sixteen when she wrote it. Maddie and I hadn’t started dating yet. The cookies she baked still sat on my desk for two days before I could bring myself to eat them, and the letter itself—I read it until the creases threatened to split the paper.

She had written that she fantasized about my mouth. That she wanted to recreate the moment I pulled her out of the water over and over again.

That she was old enough now to dream about things that, if acted on, would have put me in serious legal danger.

Most of all, she had written that she wanted to give her virginity. She wanted me to be her first.

I had been flattered. More than flattered. Part of me had been drawn to the intensity of it, to the way she always looked at me like I was something solid in a world that kept shifting under her feet.

Like I was some sort of god she worshipped.

But the age gap sat between us like a locked door. Sixteen and twenty. That wasn’t a gray area. That was a line I refused to cross, no matter how many times I opened the letter again in the dark.

So I kept my distance and kept the letter. And somehow it still ended up in her father’s hands.

Now she was standing in front of me in a guest room that wasn’t even mine, eyes wet and furious, accusing me of the one thing I had never done.

“You could have told me to my face that you didn’t feel the same way,” she said. “You could have written back—”

“I did.” The words came out harder than I intended. “I wrote a letter back. I just couldn’t give it to you. It was wrong, Ivy.”

“Wrong? Making me look like an idiot was the better option?”

“I was twenty.” I needed her to hear the number the way I had heard it every time I looked at that paper. “You had just turned sixteen. I had no business sending you a sexy note describing how much I wanted to touch you intimately. That would have been fucked up.”

Her hand flew to her mouth. “No…”

Words weren’t going to be enough. I could see it in the way she was already shaking her head, already rebuilding the old story she had lived with for years.

I had packed the unsent reply when I left the house earlier. Some part of me must have known this confrontation was coming.

I crossed to the open suitcase, dug past the folded clothes, and pulled out the envelope. The paper had yellowed slightly at the edges.

“See for yourself.” I held it out. “I wrote you back. I just never sent it.”

She took it slowly, like it might burn her. The room stayed quiet except for the soft sound of paper unfolding.

I watched her eyes move line by line. I knew exactly what she was reading—the careful, too-honest paragraphs where twenty-year-old me had admitted I thought about her more than I should, that I wanted to take her out, that I wanted to touch her, that the only thing stopping me was the fact that she was still sixteen.

When she finished, she held the letter up between us.

“What do you think this changes? It changes nothing! All I know is that you were the one who made me leave Weeping Willow.”

“That was never my intention. I was shocked when your dad received that letter.” My voice dropped. “Maddie told me you wanted to transfer. I didn’t push for it. It wasn’t my fault.”

She kept shaking her head, doubt still written across every feature. “It’s a lie. You showed that letter to them. Poppy said so.”

“She lied.” I kept my voice even. “That was the story she was told to feed you so you’d hate me enough to kill the crush you had on me. Someone wanted the whole thing buried.”

Ivy stepped forward, anger flaring again. “This is irrelevant now. It’s all in the past. And how am I supposed to believe you didn’t just forge this to manipulate me?”

I met her eyes. “You know I didn’t.”

“I’m with Leo now.” She wiped the remaining tears from her cheek with the back of her hand. “He loves me. Please open the door. I want to leave.”

“Do you love him?”

The question stopped her.

I watched the flicker of something—panic, uncertainty, I couldn’t tell—cross her face before she locked it down.

“He knows how I feel about him.” She said,

That was not an answer.

I took a step closer. She stayed where she was, fingers curling into fists at her sides. Another step. Still rooted. A third, and only then did she retreat half a pace.

“You still love me.”

“I don’t.” The denial came out sharp, eyes flashing.

“You don’t?” A short, humorless laugh escaped me. “Then why are you in such a hurry to run? You don’t trust yourself around me? Scared you’ll fall back into old habits if I push a little harder?”

“No.” Her voice was cold. “I’m scared you can’t control yourself around me, Andy.”

That wiped the expression off my face. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Figure it out yourself.” She moved to step around me. “I’m leaving.”

I caught her wrist before she could reach the door. Not hard enough to bruise—never that—but firm enough to stop her.

“The one you should be worried about is Leo.” The words came out low. “Do you even know who you’re sleeping with?”

“I don’t care what kind of bitter story you’re trying to sell.” She tried to pull free. “Get your hands off me.”

“You think I’m inventing things just to make him look bad?” I held her gaze. “Wake up, Ivy. There’s a reason his own mother isn’t comfortable with this relationship.”

“Shut up!”

“Your boyfriend has been in and out of rehab since he was twelve.”

She went still. The anger on her face cracked into something closer to shock. “What?”

“I’m not lying. Leo has been through more programs than most people know about because of his violent tendencies.” I kept the first layer light on purpose. “He’s bad news, Ivy.”

For a second I thought I had finally reached her.

Then she laughed. “So what? He went and got help. You think that makes you the better option? You think I’m supposed to fall into your arms because Leo has a history of anger management?”

I stared at her, genuinely thrown by how quickly she moved to defend him.

“He didn’t commit a crime,” she continued, voice rising again. “He couldn’t control his temper. Whoever he hurt probably gave him a reason.”

“Are you serious right now?”

“Open the door, Andy.” She pointed past me. “If Leo comes back and finds us like this, you won’t walk out of it in one piece. He'll kill you.”

“I’m not done.” I stepped closer, lowering my voice. “You said he didn’t commit a crime.”

“Yes.”

I held her stare and let the next words leave my mouth carefully, deliberately.

“So… murder isn’t a crime?”

The silence that followed was absolute.

Ivy’s face drained of color so quickly I thought she might sway. Her lips parted, but no sound came out. The letter she was still holding crumpled slightly in her fist.

I didn’t elaborate. I didn’t need to. I could see the moment my words connected to everything else she had been told.

“You’re lying,” she whispered.

“I wish I was.”

Her breathing had gone shallow. She looked at me like she was seeing a different version of the room, one where the walls had shifted and nothing was solid anymore.

“Get away from me.”