Page 60 of Lifeline

He thought about that for a minute before grunting. “Pretty pissed, actually. It was hard enough to know it had happened while I was benefiting from it, so okay, bad example. I just⁠—”

I looked him over. “Is this about me or Reno?”

“Yes,” he answered grumpily, and I laughed. “It’s not funny.”

“It kind of is. Talk to me,” I said soothingly.

“I don’t know if that’s a good plan.”

“Try me.”

“I just…I hate not knowing what’s going on with him. And to get more evidence that he is upset and something is going on with Jake, but he’s…he’s not telling me anything. He’s keeping things from me,” he said with a frown. “Like you did.”

I swallowed the first thing that came to mind, mostly because…wasn’t I keeping something from him right now? As much as I tried to tell myself my reports were barely official and didn’t contain any secrets or damning information, it still felt wrong. It had felt wrong before I’d even shown up, but desperation for a proper job and a new start had made me swallow my misgivings and follow through because, hell, I needed to do something.

Except it was worse. These weren’t hypothetical men I felt guilty spying on; these were men and a woman, I knew personally. I worked beside them, hell, even literally fought beside them, and yet I was still keeping tabs on them. I was still sending in my reports, and I was still doing it without anyone knowing.

Now I had the one that got away looking me in the eye and reminding me of the secrets I would keep from him, the lies I would tell. Not that I was lying about the reports, the…spying, but I might as well have been. Had I learned anything of importance if I was going to sit here and let this secret continue?

It was time I told him, even if the timing wasn’t the greatest after we had finally gained a measure of trust and understanding between us.

I opened my mouth, and Mika gave a pained noise, hanging his head. “I’m sorry.”

My mouth closed, and I hesitated. “For what?”

“I’ve never apologized for how I ended things back then,” he said, looking up at me with a sorrowful expression. “And before you say it, I know I technically said it when we first tried to make nice with each other, but…it’s not the same as meaning it.”

I froze. “You…didn’t mean it?”

He blinked rapidly. “I…wait, hold on, let me try that again. I meant it when I said it, but it also feels like I was saying it because it was the right thing to say. I knew what I’d done was wrong, but it was like⁠—”

My admission died in my throat as I stayed there, letting him find the words he needed to say. He had let me say my piece last night, and despite feeling like I needed to come clean, it wasn’t my place to interrupt him.

“It was like I wanted to move on from the past, like I didn’t want to be stuck in that…who I was back then, and how it was affecting us now. That’s not the same as being sorry for what I did,” he said with a heavy sigh. “I keep making the same mistake repeatedly, no matter how much I think I’ve moved on, no matter how much I think I’ve grown. Just like I all but turned Reno away years ago because I was so desperate to escape my childhood, so I gave you the words I was supposed to say without meaning them because I didn’t want to be the person I was when you and I were together.”

I understood. “Sometimes…sometimes the past isn’t that easy to escape. We can’t be blamed just because we found our way back to familiar paths, Mika.”

He rolled his eyes. “It’s one thing to trip over an old habit; it’s another thing to keep doing it. I keep…trying to escape these old versions of myself, but instead of doing it right, it’s as if I believe I can leave them behind like old toys at the side of the road.”

I didn’t know what to say, so I kept my silence and let him work through things, the urgency of my words dwindling until it was nothing but dust. I could see he was frustrated, unhappy, that he was disgusted with himself. I also knew I couldn’t and shouldn’t stop him, because he needed to speak.

“And I can’t keep doing that,” he said, bowing his head. “I’m sorry…I’m sorry I left like that. And I wish I had some great, amazing, or even terrible thing I could tell you that drove me away, but…I don’t. I knew our relationship was going nowhere, but I lacked the courage to say it to your face. I told myself it was because you wouldn’t handle it well, that your temper would get the better of you, and that I didn’t want to get guilted because my needs and wants weren’t being fulfilled, but…I didn’t. I ran away.”

I sucked in a breath and nodded. “Okay.”

“No, I did,” he said quickly, reaching for me and stopping. “I couldn’t face you; I couldn’t tell you the truth, the same damn thing I had accused you of doing, and I was doing it myself. I knew your schedule and your habits, and I knew you probably wouldn’t stay too long and would move on if I avoided you. And what’s worse, right before I think you left…I saw you.”

That was news to me. “You did?”

Mika nodded, looking miserable. “You were hanging out with someone, the two of you were just sitting outside and drinking coffee, talking. You looked so…happy, like you didn’t have a care in the world, and I was ready to convince myself you were happy not to have me. Like me leaving you was the best thing in the world. Then, before I could convince myself and leave, she got up and went inside. You took out your phone and I remember my phone going off and then you just…stared at the screen. You looked so lost and so heartbroken and⁠—”

“Mika,” I said softly as he stopped, taking a deep breath and shaking his head.

“And then you heard her come back, and it was like…you were happy and bright and all was right with the world,” he said miserably. “I knew then I had been lying to myself. Worse, that act was the best one I had ever seen, and I realized I had either taught you how to hide your feelings perfectly or…or brought back an old habit of yours. And I still left, and I never saw you again until weeks ago. And God, you were so angry, so furious, trying so hard to make a good impression and yet struggling not to strangle me on the spot. And I realized…you were still hurt.”

“I was,” I said, sensing we were coming to the end and letting him finish.

“And then I avoided you because I was the one feeling shitty, I was the one feeling guilty and ashamed. And once again, I thought I could leave an old version of myself behind and just move on. Give you the words I know you needed to hear, the ones needed for us to move on. So I could be the person I thought I was, not the person I knew I had been,” he said, hanging his head again. “I’m sorry, Aidan. You deserved better. Even if that moment hadn’t brought us to this point, I should have done better by you. I should have…I’m sorry.”