Chapter Twenty-Eight: For the First Time-

                                    

                                          
A/N: Song recommendation on the side from CountingLockets!
                          
    I hadn't left the beach, still sitting in the sand, watching the waves crash down in the distance. I'd tucked my knees up against my chest now, but left my jacket laying by my side. Goosebumps surfaced on my skin as I shivered against the cold, but I didn't make any effort to warm myself up. I didn't want to be warm. Being cold was a good distraction. 
                          
    I never tore my gaze away from staring at the grey picture in front of me. Grey clouds, grey sky, grey everything. It was like the world was reflecting back to me how I was feeling. The crashing sea was my inner turmoil, the harsh wind was my anger, and the colour of it all...grey - that was my emotions. That was my future. It all just looked bleak. 
                          
    In a way, it made me wish that back when we first met in the classroom, I had just walked away and not given him enough time to ask for my number. But I knew that I didn't really want that. Logan has possibly been one of the best things that could have happened to me. The thought of losing him was tearing up my mind. I couldn't stand the thought. 
                          
    I knew it wasn't going to be like the movies. There wasn't going to be some miraculous recovery or miracle that would mean he was going to be okay. Logan would leave, and there was nothing that I could do about it. I couldn't help him in any way. At all. I felt so goddamn useless. 
                          
    I twirled my phone around, from where I held it loosely in my palm. I don't know how long it'd been since I ran off to the beach, but Logan had been ringing pretty much every five minutes since. I couldn't work up the courage to answer it, I was afraid that I'd forget how to speak. But in the end I did answer, and Logan mumbled something about wanting to speak to me. 
                          
    But even just hearing his voice...I couldn't. I just couldn't talk to him right now, I didn't even know what there was to say. I couldn't find the will to stand up and move, either. So I stayed where I was, accepting the cold with a fine line to my lips. I kept my gaze fixated on the line between the sky and the sea, letting my mind wander off into thoughts about the edge of the world. 
                          
    But my mind soon rotated it's focus back onto Logan. I wish I could shake the thought of him leaving and just concentrate on the fact that, right now, he was still here. He hadn't left yet, and I should be spending every minute that I have free, with him. I shouldn't be sat in the sand, staring out at the ocean and just torturing myself about it. 
                          
    It must have been about five or ten minutes later that I saw a shadow to my left, just before a figure was sitting down beside me. I didn't need to look at his face to know who it was. I felt somewhat relieved that he was here. Like somewhere in the back of my mind, I wanted him to come and find me. 
                          
    "How'd you know where I was?" I muttered, reaching a hand out to pick up some sand, letting it drift through my fingers and get carried off in the wind. 
                          
    "Heard the sea in the background when I called," I could see him looking at me from the corner of my eye. I didn't meet his gaze. Found that I couldn't pull my eyes from the edge of the world, even when I tried.
                          
    "What're you doing out here?"
                          
    "Thinking," I said, sounding distant and empty. I saw the movement as Logan nodded his head gently, turning to look out at the sea. He kept glancing my way, seemingly contemplating whether to do something or not. He stayed still, and silent, for a few more minutes. Then he shuffled closer to me, reaching around to grab my jacket and shaking the sand from it. 
                          
    "You should put this on," he offered it to me, but I only shook my head in reply. He sighed. I imagined him rolling his eyes in that way he always did, whenever I did something stupid. The sort of eye roll that showed his affection, even when he was trying to come across as annoyed.