"I'm sorry," I said, tears rolling uncontrollably down my face. "I never meant to hurt you. I just—"

He shook his head. "No, I get it. I know you didn't do it to hurt me. If I were in your shoes, I'm not sure I'd have handled it better. But that's the problem. Maybe there isn't a way to handle it. Maybe that just means we can't handle it."

I knew in my gut what he was implying, but I couldn't accept it.

"What are you saying—"

"You asked me not to do anything without you. I've been wanting to test something."

He stood up and came a little closer, grasping the corner of his black curtain.

Alarmed, I grabbed his wrist.

"No. Don't."

"You haven't even seen for yourself," he said in a monotone voice, "what happens when I get exposed to sunlight. You just took my word for it. What if I've been lying all this time?"

"The bat was proof enough. And I trust you. I don't need to see this to know I don't want any harm to come to you."

"I'm doing this whether you're here or not. I just didn't want you to think I was hiding it from you. You don't have to watch if you don't want to."

Nolan waved towards his door.

"The door's there, if you want to leave."

Nolan didn't have to say it aloud. He was offering me an out. I knew that if I stepped out of that door, I'd miss out on being here for him. The idea of missing that I would be missing out on an important part of Nolan's life kept my feet firmly planted to the floor.

"I'm not leaving!"

"Fine."

He paused, then rolled up his right hoodie sleeve to expose his forearm. My breath caught in my throat as he shifted the curtain aside with his left hand, allowing a thin ray of sunlight to spill into the room.

He moved his hand, palm up, out from the shade.

The instant the sunlight met his hand, the surface of his skin grew red and began bubbling. A horrible sizzle filled the air.

My stomach churned. I had to bite down on my lower lip to keep from retching.

The numerous blisters grew larger at a rapid rate until the first one popped, all within the next few seconds. I expected blood to spurt out, but it didn't. Instead, the skin burst open and a black smoky substance rose from the opening, almost as if there was an unseen fire inside and the smoke was rising up from it. The black smoky substance swiftly dissipated into the air, leaving behind what appeared as a reverse blister, the ragged edges of the broken skin caving into the emptiness under it.

I covered my mouth with my hand, unable to scrub the horrified expression I was sure had taken over my face.

Rather than the bloody mess I'd been expecting to witness, this was more like some kind of essence from inside him was being torn out of his body and vaporized. The same happened to the rest of the blisters forming on his hand, which was beginning to take on the texture of an air ripple mattress, albeit a red and overly bloated one.

Nolan let out a hiss. My gaze flew up to his face.

I hadn't thought it possible, but he looked even paler than usual as he stared down at his hand. Copious droplets of sweat trickled down his forehead, over his eyebrows, past his cheek and dripped down his chin. It was the first time I had seen him so strained. He always appeared so invincible in the face of physical danger or challenges.

Sucking in a sharp breath through his teeth, he jerked his whole body backwards and dropped the curtain back in place. He gripped his right wrist with his other hand, as if to steady his trembling.

"Nolan ..."

I took a hesitant step closer to him. He abruptly slumped to the floor, his back against the wall, still holding onto his wrist. He drew his legs closer to himself, with his knees bent and facing upwards. His whole form shaking, he gasped repeatedly for air, scrunching his eyes shut.

I fell to my knees beside him and put my arms around his shoulders and knees, tucking my face into the crook of his neck. A fresh wave of heat rose at the back of my eyes, tipping over some of the new tears that were welling up. The guy I loved was in so much pain, and I couldn't do anything to help.

"I'm here for you," I murmured. "I'm here. You're not alone ..."

A quick downward glance informed me that his hand, looking like it'd been viciously torn open from the inside, was quickly mending itself. With each passing second, the inflamed skin rapidly cooled to its regular color and pulled itself over the open wounds. An invisible suture pulled them together, repairing the broken skin and multiple holes until his hand returned to its original unblemished state.

"How painful is it?" I ventured.

"Like someone's gouging out my flesh ..."

A tiny sob choked out of him, and then he drew another harsh breath.

I pulled back slightly to look up at him. Watery green eyes met mine. The corner of his lips tugged upwards, but the smile looked bleaker than ever. My heart shattered into a thousand shards at the sight of his tears. Looking at him like that, all I wanted to do was hold him forever until he was okay.

"This is who you're dating," he said, his voice breaking in every other word. "Who am I kidding? Someone like me can't be with anyone. I can't even blame you if you want to leave."

"How can I bear to leave you?" I whispered, fighting to speak through the enormous lump in my throat. "I love you."

"For how long?" His voice was toneless. "How long can you love me until it all becomes too much? We were overestimating ourselves right from the start."

I held him tighter, so much so that my arms were starting to strain from the amount of strength I was using.

"Don't say that." It was my turn to cry. "I'm so, so sorry. I never wanted to hurt you. I was so scared of—of everything. I should never have let anyone get to me like that. You're the most important person in my life. I just ... I just couldn't ... I couldn't bear to see all those people look at me funny—"

He broke out of my embrace. My hands fell back down to my side.

"It's not just this. It's not just this, don't you get it?" Frustration seeped into his voice as he looked down at his hand. "I can't go out with you in the day, and if I stay awake even a little longer than I should, I can't stop myself turning into a bat. And then I can't even talk or hold you and be there for you like any other normal person can. We can't spend a whole day out together like normal couples. We can't explore the world together in the daylight. I can't eat with you, and your parents are getting suspicious about it—and don't tell me otherwise; you know I'm right."

"But I don't care," I said desperately. "I don't care that you can't be out in the day. I know you love me and that I'm important to you. That's all that matters."

"You deserve better than being with a guy who turns into a bat and can't even present himself as your boyfriend when that happens. In that form, I can't do anything for you."

"What about what you deserve?"

Sure, maybe I would've been happier if he didn't have all these restrictions limiting the way he lived. But it wasn't fair to Nolan. He hadn't asked for this. It was all suddenly forced on him one day, and he'd had no say in any of it. For all my selfish fears, I could at least recognize that.

"I can't be happy like this, Chelsea. I can't ..."

He lowered his head, but not before I could catch sight of the tear that rolled down his face.

I hugged him again. This time, he put his arms around me and sniffled into my shoulder. Hearing Nolan cry made my heart ache in ways it'd never experienced before. My own tears started to form a wet spot on his T-shirt.

"I'm sorry," I sobbed over and over. "It's my fault ..."

"It's not," he muttered back, burying his face in my shoulder.

After my tears ran dry and my arms grew tired and became slack around him, Nolan pulled away.

"This is the first time I've gone this far," he said hoarsely. "The only other times I got exposed to the sunlight, it was for barely a second and only because I got careless. I've never stayed long enough to see the blisters pop."

"Do you really think you'll still live after going out into the sunlight?"

I watched him flex his hand, which was perfectly restored now. Nobody could possibly tell it had been just been fried to an almost unrecognizable state minutes earlier. He clenched it into a fist.

"I don't have a choice. I have to give it a try. I'll find some time to do it, maybe head home on a weekend."

"No—don't," I pleaded, putting my hand on his arm. "Don't do it, please. We don't know what's actually going to happen. Your hand was practically disfigured in the one minute it was out in the sun! I can't lose you, Nolan, I can't—"

"Tell me I'm not already losing you!" he hurled the words at me, and the agony in his voice was like a slap in my face. "Tell me that it's not already over anyway while we're trying to pretend it isn't."

Reeling, I could only stare at him, slack-jawed.

"Even if you don't leave me—don't look at me like that, you can't tell me it's not eventually going to happen—I'll still have to bear with the stares in public. How long can we be together? How are we going to get married? Do you want a groom who still looks like he's fourteen at the altar? And all our guests to stare at us and whisper and wonder about us? Or are we going to elope? Have the minister stare at us? Can you handle it? You can't even take a bit of handholding in public now—what makes you think we can even make it past this semester?"

Every question of his stabbed right into me like a freshly sharpened blade.

He was right. If we were dating casually, it wouldn't be a big deal. At the end of the day, we wouldn't be in each other's lives long enough for any of this to be a serious issue. The problem was that I wanted to be with him for as long as I could.

I wanted so desperately for what Sylvan said to be true. But I wasn't convinced of it after watching his hand collapse on itself in the sunlight. Imagining that happening to his whole body sent another crashing wave of despair through me. I couldn't lose Nolan. I couldn't imagine him not being able to talk to him, not being able to hear his laughter, not being able to explore new places together, not being able to see his smile again.

"Think about it. If I die, we're over. And if I don't try this, we will be over anyway. If I do this and I become human again, I can start aging before the gap between us gets too obvious. And this isn't just about us. I can't live like this anymore. I have to try it."

He was set on doing it, even if that meant leaving me behind. I wouldn't be able to change his mind.

I inhaled a deep, shaky breath in a weak attempt to pull myself together.

"I understand," I said. "Could you tell me when you plan to try it? I want to be kept in the loop. I don't want—I don't want any surprises."

"Yeah," he said. "You know I will."

We looked into each other's eyes, his somber expression a perfect reflection of mine. The sheer fragility of our present relationship was clearer than it had ever been.

I hadn't wanted to think about it, or talk about it, but he was right.

This was our best shot at saving our dying relationship, and him getting to live a real life.

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AN: thanks to all who commented and voted on the previous chapters! i love you guys! as usual, if you enjoyed this chapter please remember to leave me a vote and comment! it means a lot to me. ♡ thank you for reading, hope you're having a great day! 

(ﾉ'ヮ')ﾉ*: ･ﾟ

also: because this is late, i'll be updating again later in 7 hours as a sort of double update! so sorry, please forgive me! ♡＼(￣▽￣)／♡