by Celeste, B.
I think back to the man Fletcher was at the bar to see the day he’d walked me out. I hadn’t gotten a chance to wonder who he was meeting. I stand by my belief. Fletcher talks about the military like a thing of his past. Not something he’d ever consider being part of again. He wants to be a father to Nicki and be present in his son’s life. Not that he owes me any type of explanation, but I think he’d tell me if he were at least considering the possibility of joining again.
Pushing that aside to deal with when I’m on my own, I look back to Dominic. “I’m sure your dad will tell you whatever you want to know if you ask him when you get home.”
He picks up his shoulders and drops them heavily like he doesn’t quite believe me. I get it. Fletcher told me during our many talks about his past military life that it’d taken a while before his retirement was official. It wasn’t until Dominic was four before he was officially out, even if he was never far from home during that time. He saw Nicki and Traci often. Almost every day, from what I could gather. But if I were in the little boy’s shoes who looks dejected in front of me, I’d probably be scared to lose him again too.
“If you want,” I offer, “we can talk to him about it together.” I’m not sure it’s a smart suggestion, but one that seems to lighten his mood.
His eyes widen as they snap to mine and stay there, full of hope that slightly kills me. “Do you mean it?”
“Of course.”
He nods. “We should do it together because he wouldn’t just be leaving me and my mom this time. We’re used to it. He’d be leaving you too, and you’d be sad.”
My throat tightens at the memories of what it feels like to hug and kiss your loved ones goodbye before they leave. You don’t know when they’ll come back or if they even will, and it’s a horrible feeling. “Yeah,” I murmur. “I would be very sad.”
After walking Nicki to the cafeteria so he can eat, I return with my packed lunch that I grabbed from the teacher’s lounge fridge and stop short when I see a new body in my room.
A tall, lean one, dressed in expensive jeans and a button-down shirt that, for once, isn’t tucked into the belted waistline of his denim. As if he knows I’m standing at the doorway, he turns away from the window and smiles. “Hey.”
I blink, almost tempted to rub my eyes to see if I’m seeing this right. “Hunter?”
He lifts his hands, palms up and facing me with a sheepish look on his face. “I come in peace.”
Slowly, I walk over to my desk and set down the container of food in front of my pushed-out chair, and choose not to say anything until he tells me why he’s standing in the middle of my classroom.
“The secretary told me where to find you,” he says, gesturing toward the door. “Seems like a nice lady. Reminds me of Mrs. Borner. Remember her? She had those hideous glasses and always wore too much—”
I hold up my hand, grab a bottle of Motrin from my top desk drawer, and pop a couple pills in my mouth while my ex watches me. The last thing I plan on telling him is that my body is sore from what his former commanding officer has been doing to it.
“Hunter, please tell me why you’re trying to get me to go down memory lane with you.” I don’t want to be rude, but the last thing I expected was to walk into my room and find my ex-husband in my space again after thinking we’d said our pieces and then our goodbyes. Talking about the woman who had to be at least 100, who drowned herself in perfume every day before coming into our old high school, isn’t high on my list of things to converse with him—or anyone—about. “Didn’t we say everything we needed to before?”
His shoulders lower slightly at my pinched tone. “I already told you that I come in peace. I’m actually about to leave and head back to base. They’re reassigning me, so I wanted to talk to you. Say goodbye.”
I pause, looking at him warily. “Goodbye,” I say slowly, drawing the word out as I grip the back of the chair.
His lips twitch downward like he’s fighting a frown before they go back to neutral. A sigh leaves him. “I deserve that.”
You do, I agree, but I don’t linger on it.
I told him I forgave him, and I meant it. Even though I don’t know what to do with his need to see me before he goes, I still stand by it.
When he realizes I’m not going to say anything else, he rubs his jaw with his palm before nodding. “Look, I shouldn’t have gone to your house. My mom chewed me out when she found out I did. She told me to leave you alone.”
I’m sure she did, I grumble to myself. That woman was always nice to me when I first started seeing Hunter, but it was obvious as our wedding neared that her feelings had changed. I don’t know if it was because I was taking her son away from her, or something else. She made me feel like I wasn’t enough for him more times than I can count, and Hunter never did anything to dispute that when I’d confided in him. I stopped caring about her opinion of me when I signed the paperwork that separated me from him and his entire family.
Hunter was a mama’s boy, and she loved him all the more for it. It meant controlling him.
Like mother, like son, I guess.
“It was just something I needed to do. To let you know that what I did was shitty. The way I served the papers. The way it all happened…” His head shakes slightly as he looks down at the floor, where scuff marks from kids’ shoes dirty the tile and little pieces of scrap paper from notebooks litter the ground around desks. “Truth is, when I heard you were with somebody, I was jealous. I know I shouldn’t have been, so you don’t need to tell me. It was hard hearing you were with anybody when I was so used to having you all to myself.”
Discomfort settles into my stomach. I should shut the door, so nobody walks by and overhears this, but I don’t know if I want to be in a closed room with the man shifting on his feet and moving those eyes up to meet mine. If I did, there’d probably be more speculation as to why I was alone with a random man who nobody had seen before. Not even Sonia, even though she’d asked more than once for pictures. It wasn’t until nearly breaking down into tears when she finally stopped pestering me to see what he looked like.
“I was a shithead, which I’m sure you can’t argue with. I’ve handled things badly for a long time, and it wasn’t until showing up at your house and seeing you that I realized how bad I messed up. I won’t lie, Stevie, I miss you. I still love you, but I can see I have no choice but to get over it. If you’re happy, truly happy, then I will. I won’t show up again.”
This time, I do reply. “I am happy.”
His lips rub together, then his jaw moves back and forth as he nods. “I’m sorry. I know I said that before, but I really do mean it. I didn’t treat you the way I should have, and when you didn’t even want to talk to me, I knew you weren’t the same person I’d known. You weren’t the same Stevie I married.”
I shake my head in agreement. “I grew up, Hunter. We both did. Nobody is the same person they were when they were nineteen. And I’m not going to argue with anything you’ve said because I can’t. I wouldn’t go as far as calling you a shithead, but…”
He chuckles at that. “Definitely wouldn’t blame you if you did. Look, it was obvious when I was at the bar, and you didn’t even look my way that I had no chance.”
I blink. “Bar?”
Those lips curl up but not in any amusement. Instead, there’s almost…sadness in the way they’re carved onto his face. “See, that’s what I’m talking about.” His hand goes up to his hair, raking through the short, buzzed pieces. “You used to always know when I was in a room. It’s like you sensed me. We were both like that. Remember? It used to freak people out. They said we had some sort of radar for each other.”
People had said that, but I’m still confused. “What bar are you even talking about?”
“I went to meet with Fletcher one night. He asked to meet up at the bar, said he didn’t want me at his house. I was having some car problems, so I was late. Pissed him off, not that I’m surprised. If I pulled that on base, he would have
had me run ten miles and then give him two hundred pushups right after with no breaks.”
All I can do is gape at him.
“Anyway, when I showed up, I saw you two together. Had heard from plenty of people that you two seemed close. Didn’t really like witnessing it firsthand. But it was when he walked you out that I knew. Even before I showed up asking you what was going on, I knew. I was standing right there, and you never even looked up at me.”
I…don’t know how to process that. Hunter was the friend Fletcher was meeting? It doesn’t make any sense to me. “Why were you even seeing him to begin with?”
The look he gives me says, do you really have to ask? “Come on, Stevie. You know why I was there. Why we were both there.”
Me. They were meeting because of me.
I draw in a deep breath, letting it fill my chest and flood my lungs. “If you knew that night, then why did you bother showing up at my house? You two must have talked.”
He nods in confirmation. “We talked until the bar closed up. Had a lot to say, shit that doesn’t need to be repeated because it’s said and over with, but I was too stubborn to admit defeat. Not to him. You knew…that I looked up to him. Had a lot of respect for the person he shaped me into. Obviously, it wasn’t somebody good enough knowing what I did. Even after he helped look at my car in the parking lot to make sure it was good, I still went to see you. Out of pettiness, maybe. I guess because I didn’t want to lose to anyone, especially not to someone like him, knowing what kind of man he was. Admirable. Better. Better than me, and better than most guys I know. That’s the truth, even if it sucks to say.”
My eyes widen.
I shouldn’t be surprised that Fletcher would help him even though it’s obvious he isn’t Hunter’s biggest fan. He’s that kind of guy. One who would do anything for anyone no matter the circumstances.
Even knowing what Hunter was to me.
When Hunter’s expression changes into something darker, I can’t help but feel nerves rise up and clench my heart. “I’m glad you’re happy, Stevie. You deserve to be with someone who isn’t a total fuck up like me. What I did to you was horrible, and—”
“Hunter,” I cut him off, sighing. “You fell out of love with me. It sucks, it hurt, but it happened. It happens to a lot of people. It’s what we needed in the end. You don’t have to keep apologizing.”
“You know that’s not what I’m apologizing for.”
I blink, not sure what he means.
“I should have never done it. I know I told you I didn’t, but it was only a couple times with the same woman. It was a mistake that I kept making because I thought it’d make me happier. Like I said, I’m a shithead.”
The nerves clenching my heart tighten so much that I think it stops beating for a second or two as my lips part. When I say his name again, it’s so slow that it almost sounds like I’m trying to remember who he is. “I don’t understand what you’re saying…”
He squeezes his eyes shut before pinching the bridge of his nose. “You don’t need to protect him. I know he’s told you. I would have told you too if I were in his shoes. I swear it was only one woman. I know that doesn’t make up for it happening, make it better, but—”
“Hunter.” My voice breaks, snapping his attention to me before his cheeks pale as he takes in my face.
My face that must look crestfallen.
Confused.
Hurt.
Hurt times ten. A million.
Because the man I spent so many years with is telling me that he did cheat all these years later. He’d cheated more than once. With a woman he thought would make him happier than me. Happier than his own wife.
He cheated, and then he lied.
And the man I was with now, the one I’d asked directly if he’d known what Hunter may have done, had also lied about it.
“Fletcher knows?” I ask, voice tiny.
Hunter’s white face somehow gets paler at my question. “He…he really didn’t tell you?”
Oh my God.
Oh my God.
Can your heart be broken twice by the same man even if you stopped loving him a long time ago? If I had to answer that now, I’d say yes. Because on the floor of the classroom were the shards of my shattered heart all over the tiles.
Right there, where anyone can see.
Hunter cheated on me.
And Fletcher knew.
“Hunter.” My robotic voice is unrecognizable even to me as I look him straight in the eyes and calmly say, “Get out. Leave this room and leave me alone. For good this time.”
“I thought you—”
“Go.” I don’t let myself get so angry that my voice cracks. I don’t get so upset that my eyes glaze with fresh tears, knowing the man I’d let go of has broken my heart more than once.
I trusted him.
Believed his words.
He took that for granted.
He manipulated me. Again.
And the man I was in love with now? The man who I’d compared endlessly to my ex-husband, the one who I decided after countless months was nothing like the man currently leaving the room, was actually no different.
They’re both liars.
And they’d never hurt me again.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
I don’t know how, but I manage to pull through the rest of the day without terrifying the kids with the tears building in the back of my red eyes. I managed to make them believe allergies were the culprit, but even then, I got called to Ms. Clifton’s office after packing my things and buttoning my coat.
That’s when I knew someone who’d seen me either cared enough to be worried or didn’t care at all and wanted to make a scene. I didn’t have enemies here, not even Miles who said hello from time and time and told me all about his fiancée with the hopeless love I’d once been in a long time ago, so I’d like to think the reason I’ve been summoned is because I’m cared for.
Except, the emptiness I feel, the way I hold back my tears when I knock and am told to enter, doesn’t make the impromptu meeting easy. The second I close the door and turn to my boss, she knows as much.
“What’s going on, Stevie?”
There’s a point in everybody’s lives when it all becomes too much. You pretend you’re okay, slap on a fake smile, and give everyone a default “good” when they ask how you are because it’s easier than explaining all the reasons why you’re not. But when that becomes too heavy, and there’s nowhere else to store the bad things piling up, the wall it’s stored in breaks.
Unfortunately, mine breaks in front of my boss. The woman who hired me. The woman who, after realizing I was in no condition to speak, passed me a tissue, led me to a chair, sat me down, and let me cry it out. Snot and angry tears soaked up each Kleenex she passed me as she sat at the edge of her desk and rubbed my back in silence. It isn’t until ten minutes pass, maybe more or maybe less, that she says, “Why don’t you take a day or two off? I know you have the time, and we have the substitutes. Whatever this is, whatever is causing this, should be dealt with.”
It’s a professional way of saying get your life sorted out before coming back. I’m lucky that’s all she says. Some bosses wouldn’t be so kind in their suggestions.
So, I nod, manage to collect myself enough to offer a weak agreement before she murmurs, “I’ll see you on Monday.”
I have four days to pick up the pieces left behind by not one man but two before returning to the life I built after being crushed the first time.
I don’t think before I knock on the door. I’m stepping back when it opens, revealing the man behind it, whose face pinches the second he sees my puffy face.
“Stevie, what’s—”
Knowing Nicki is home, I say, “I need you to come outside so we can talk.” I don’t add a please or let him have any other option but to step outside, close the door behind him and stop in front of me.
When he reaches for my face, I take another step back, cross my arms over my chest, and shake
my head. “Don’t touch me. Not right now. Not…” Not ever again, is what I want to say, but I can’t let the words out. “You lied to me, Fletcher.”
His body instantly straightens. “What are you talking about? What’s wrong, honey? Did something happen at—”
“Yes, something happened. What happened is that you lied to me.” When my voice breaks, I squeeze my fists and bury them under my arms. “Hunter came to see me to say goodbye and decided to tell me about the woman he’d been seeing while we were married. The one you apparently knew about. I didn’t let him explain before kicking him out of my classroom because I knew I wouldn’t be able to handle the details. I didn’t need them.”
His lips part to cut in, but I hold up my hand to stop him. “I asked you. I asked if anything had happened. I needed to know. You told me you didn’t. You looked me in the eyes and lied to my face.”
“Stevie—” His voice is ragged, face pained as I let even more tears escape the sore ducts.
“No. I don’t want to hear it. How can I believe anything you say to me? What else have you been lying to me about?” It all comes out then. Every insecurity. Anything I can throw at him. “Your son came to see me today. He told me that he was afraid you were leaving because Cooper wanted to see you. I told him you wouldn’t do that to him, to us, because that’s what you told me. You said you were done with that life. But maybe you were bullshitting me about that too.”
His hand goes to his face, scrubbing the side as he cusses. “Christ, Stevie. That’s not fair, and you know it. I’d never—”
“Be very careful with your words,” I warn coolly. “You wouldn’t want to say something you don’t mean.”
His jaw ticks. “Would you let me talk? Or are you only here to throw out accusations without giving me the chance to explain?”
“What the hell is there to explain?” I hiss at him, not wanting my voice to raise too loudly, so Dominic doesn’t hear us fighting. My eyes go to the house before shooting back to him. “How can you pass this off like what you did is okay? I told you that if I knew he cheated, it would have been easier. And you hugged me and told me you had nothing to say about it. You could have told me the truth then and there, and we could have avoided this.”
