He Belongs With Me

by Sarah Darlington

  I decided in an instant that it didn't upset me at all. Anita wasn't a witch like Monica Harvey. And even if she was, I’d learned after that debacle that nothing could ruin my relationship with Dad. He loved me unconditionally, and it didn't really matter who he dated or married or divorced. Just like Leo dating Clara didn't really have to affect me that much either, I realized.

  “I approve,” I told her. “One hundred percent. Just don't count on me to call you Mom.”

  She burst out laughing. “Oh honey, I will strangle you if you ever call me that. And don't you dare tell your daddy anything. I'd be real embarrassed if he knew we had this conversation. I’m sure he only asked me over to go over next week's schedule or something else work related like that.”

  “No way. Dad only grills for people he cares about.”

  “Really?” she asked, sounding surprised and hopeful.

  Dad came back into the house another second later. “Hey, Maggie May. I saw you two laughing from outside. What's so funny?”

  “Nothing,” I answered, my eyes flickering briefly to Anita. Her cheeks had turned a cute shade of pink. I quickly glanced back at Dad and before he could inquire further, I said, “But I have some news. Valerie is not your child. She's Dean's.”

  Dad's jaw dropped and so did the plate of sausages onto the counter. “Maggie,” he scolded.

  “What? I thought you'd be relieved.”

  “I guess I am, but we all agreed last night that we would wait.” Dad's sharp eyes took in my day-old clothes. “Didn't you go to Blacksburg last night?”

  “No, I went to Dean's.”

  The lines on his face crinkled. “And you're calling him Dean now too.”

  “Daddy,” I whined. “I didn't stay the night at his place. Look at my arms.” I jetted my arms forward to show off all the bug bites. “I parked by Blue Creek and slept in my car. I didn't feel like coming home or driving to my apartment. I needed a night alone to think. But would it really have been so bad if I had stayed with him?” Ever since Clara and I started college, Dad had relaxed considerably on how late we stayed out with boys. Why was he suddenly becoming protective now? I thought he liked Dean. He called him a “good man” yesterday. Plus, shouldn't I be the one making these kinds of decisions for myself? Not him...or Leo, for that matter. Speaking of… “Where's Clara? Did she stay with Leo?”

  Dad sighed. “You and Clara are both old enough to make your own decisions. As long as you stay safe and tell me where you're going, then my only choice is to trust you both. But don't forget, if you decide to get involved with Dean, then he comes with the whole package. As for your sister, I'm relieved she's with Leo. He's fiercely protective and will always look out for her. Maybe that means I can finally have a little piece of mind. Your sister can be very stressful, you know. The only reason I let the whole New York thing slide so easily was because she was with Leo.” He kissed my forehead and moved toward the waffle maker. “I guess I'm glad you confronted Dean and figured that out for the rest of us. Anyway, are you hungry?”

  “Starving.”

  I heard the side entrance door open and immediately thought Clara’s ears must have been burning. Except it wasn't Clara…it was Leo. “Morning,” he said as he passed through the kitchen. He headed straight for the living room, not really looking at any of us, and I noticed that I wasn’t the only one still sporting yesterday's clothes. “I'm going to go lie on your couch for a while. So, yeah, ignore me.” He disappeared just as quickly as he had appeared, and I heard the TV click on in the living room.

  “So much for your relief.” I gave Dad a look and then followed after Leo. He was stretched out on the couch, his arms crossed behind his head, eyes glued to morning cartoons. “That had to have been your most dramatic entrance ever. What are you doing on my couch?”

  “Wallowing.”

  “Oh.” Wallowing? Leo basically invented the word, but this seemed different then all those times he got drunk and moody. Somehow this seemed...real. “What happened?”

  He swallowed and appeared to focus harder on the TV, but I knew better. “Nothing I want to talk about.”

  My stomach flipped. I couldn’t remember the last time Leo didn’t want to tell me what was bothering him. “You're scaring me a little.”

  “I'm peaches.”

  I came around the couch and sat on the floor, blocking his view of the TV. He had no choice but to look at me. His eyes were bloodshot, looking as if maybe he hadn't slept or that he'd been...crying? No. Leo would never cry, right? Now my stomach did a full-on belly flop.

  When it became painfully obvious that he didn't want to talk about it, I decided that I could try and distract him with how humiliating my life had become. “Okay, fine. I’ll talk first. There's something I need to tell you anyway. The last couple days, I thought I was in love with—”

  “Jesus H. Christ,” Dad huffed, marching into the room. He had the house phone clutched tightly in his hand. Anita came into the room behind him, her face rather pale.

  “I just got off the phone with Mary Ann at the Pro Shop,” Dad said, shaking his head. “Clara never showed up for her lessons. She did call, however, telling Mary Ann she was sorry she had to cancel all of them.”

  Dad's words permeated the air. Any idiot could see that Leo's dramatic entrance and his self-proclaimed 'wallowing' had everything to do with Clara. And Clara calling out of work surely had everything to with Leo.

  “I'm trying to decide if I should be angry or worried,” Dad said, his attention shifting to Leo. “Which is it, son?”

  Leo sat up, running one shaky hand through his hair, while the tension in the room grew so thick I could barely breathe. “Worried,” he muttered. Then he stood and dashed out of the room.

  I chased after him. “Leo! Wait!”

  “Not now, Mags!”

  He was already halfway in his car before I caught up with him. “Yes, now!” I screamed, wrapping both of my hands around one of his arms, pulling uselessly against his strength. “You are NOT going to run off to get drunk or high or whatever it is you do when think you can't handle your problems! I won't let you this time! I just won't!”

  “I'm fine.”

  “No, you aren't! Don't think I never notice all of your attempts to self-medicate because I do—constantly! And do any of them ever work for you? No! So, please...don't go.”

  He took a deep breath. Then he stopped fighting me and closed his car door. The next thing I knew he was hugging me, holding onto me tight, letting way too much of his weight rest on me. How many times had I used him as my shoulder to cry on when my relationships went up in flames? Too many to count, that’s for sure. And now our roles were suddenly reversed.

  Several minutes passed before we broke apart. I looked up tentatively at Leo's face to find that his eyes were now stone cold. Even robots showed more emotion.

  “What happened?” I whispered.

  “When we were in New York, Clara asked me to prove to her I wasn't an ass. She wanted to let me in and I think maybe she did. And the first chance she gave me to prove myself, I ruined everything—story of my fucking life. Why is it that I can't control my temper around her?”

  “Because you love her. We all do stupid things when we're in love.”

  “Then I must be the biggest moron there ever was.”

  Probably horrible timing, but I couldn't help it when I burst out laughing. “You and me both. Dean shows back up, confusing the heck out of me, and the last couple days I somehow convinced myself I was in love with you! Omigosh!” I kept laughing, bending over my knees. “I was even going to kiss you to try to figure out who I liked more, you or him. If that's not moronic, then I don't know what is.” My laughter came to a screeching halt. That's why Dean said 'I can't.’ He still thinks I have feelings for Leo. Oh God, why didn’t I think of that before?

  “So, you don't love me?” Leo asked, his eyebrows lifted.

  “No. Sorry, not like that.”

  He let out a huge sigh of relief.
“Thank the fucking Lord.”

  I smacked him. “Hey, you don't have to be mean about it.”

  The corners of his mouth twitched upward ever so slightly.

  “So,” I said, “this older, wiser, very sexy guy told me a couple of days ago that I had to fight for what I wanted—”

  “Me?”

  “No, Dean.” I rolled my eyes. “You're two months younger than me, silly. Anyway, he told me that I shouldn't let the moment pass without fighting for what I wanted. How many times in your life did you say something nasty to Clara, instead of grabbing and kissing her or telling her how much you really cared about her? I'm guessing a lot. Same goes for me. I stuck with Andrew for four years—four years!—and now I can't even remember why. So, let's do this. We have to fight for the people we love or else you're gonna end up like your father—a cold bastard who has more money than God but nothing to really show for it—and I'll end up a trophy wife in a loveless marriage with someone like Andrew.”

  One of his perfect smiles came out. “Did you just say bastard?”

  “Shut up!” I walked around to the other side of his car. “C'mon. Let's go find Clara. We both have some groveling to do. I haven't been exactly nice to her over the years either.”

  He nodded and we climbed in the car.

  TWENTY-FOUR HOURS LATER, Clara had yet to turn up and we were all now officially worried. Leo hadn't eaten, slept, showered, or spoken much. We'd driven around all of Blue Creek looking for her the day before and found nothing. No one had seen her or had any clue where she might be, and she wasn't answering her phone. Leo even tried emailing her. Why he had her email in the first place, who knows? But it didn't matter because that had proved useless too. Clara had disappeared into thin air and part of me, though I wouldn't voice it out loud, feared it might be for good.

  ANOTHER TWENTY-FOUR HOURS later and Leo and I were sitting on a plane, halfway to New York City. Thank goodness he’d showered today. After two days of wallowing, something in Leo had snapped this morning and suddenly he was different. Confident. Eager. Maybe even...excited? I wasn't really sure what to make of his change in attitude, but we were going to the city and that was that.

  “I have an errand to run and then we're going to Brooklyn.”

  “That's fine.”

  We'd been forced to fly commercial since Leo's dad currently had the family jet. Leo couldn't even get us first-class tickets and we'd been oh-so-lucky to get two seats in the same row with a screaming toddler. But the most noteworthy part of the day so far was the fact that, despite everything, Leo hadn't complained once. No snarky comments. No f-bombs. And that, more anything, told me he genuinely loved my sister.

  The plane reached JFK and we hurried through the airport. We hadn't brought bags and our return tickets were booked for a flight home in six hours. So whatever Leo needed to do, we didn't have much time to do it and traffic always sucked in New York.

  Outside the airport, Leo claimed a yellow taxi from the long line that waited by the curb. I knew how much he preferred having his own driver, but I guess there hadn't been time to call him. The second the taxi door slammed shut, Leo pulled out way, way, way too much money and handed it over to our driver.

  “I'm going to need your services for the whole day. Well, roughly five or six hours.”

  The driver stared wide-eyed at the wad of cash in his hands.

  “Is that gonna be cool?” Leo demanded.

  Finally, the man nodded. “Whatever, man.”

  “Good. Now head to Harry Winston. Fifth Avenue. And, please, drive as fast as you can.”

  “Are you kidding me?” I shouted at Leo, choking on my own tongue and gasping for a decent breath. “Harry Winston! As in the jeweler, HARRY WINSTON?”

  “Relax and buckle your seat belt.”

  The taxi driver zipped the car into traffic, causing my body to lurch into the door. Oh God, we were going to die. I hurried to buckle my seat belt and then returned to scolding Leo. “You're nuts! You can't be serious about this.”

  There was only one reason a guy would go to Harry Winston.

  “I said relax. I know what I'm doing.”

  There wasn't much time to continue yelling because I spent the entire car ride to the Upper East Side silently praying to Jesus. Please, let us make it there alive! Please, let Leo come to his senses! Our cabbie must have had a death wish because my knuckles were white when we reached Fifth Avenue in record time. Leo's assistant, Regina, stood at the curb, obviously waiting for us. “I won't be long,” he told me and the driver. “I'm dropping something off and then we can head to Brooklyn.”

  “No.” I grabbed hold of Leo's arm before he could leave the car. “I don't trust Regina.”

  “What? You've never mentioned this before.”

  “I know. She's probably a great assistant and I have no clue what you need her to do for you at Harry Winston, but I don't trust her.”

  “Okay then,” Leo said simply and got out of the car. He said something to Regina and I watched as she turned in a huff and hurried away. Leo looked back at me and shrugged. Then he disappeared into the store. Soon after, the car horns started blaring and our cab driver was forced to start circling the block.

  An hour later, Leo came out of the store empty-handed.

  “Did you get what you needed?” I demanded.

  “Yes.”

  “Can I see?”

  “It's not ready, but I called Great-Grandma Bunny, since you don't trust Regina. She said she'd be able to pick everything up and meet us back at the airport.”

  I laughed. “She's ninety!”

  “She's fine.” Leo leaned forward and told the driver, “The Alligator Lounge in Brooklyn.”

  Alligator Lounge? Oh, Lordy!

  CHAPTER 24

  CLARA

  There are beautiful people all over the world, yet somehow it always seemed to surprise me when I came across one. Take Sloane Richards, for example. Nicest lady ever, especially given her occupation. Used car salesman…or saleswoman, to be exact. We'd met on the phone a couple of months earlier. She was a long-lost friend of Leah Longerburger's dad and she'd agreed to help me when the time came. And the time had definitely come.

  “...and here they are.” Sloane handed over the keys to my new used car, dangling on a shiny metal ring. I stared at them, unable to look away. Those keys represented more than just a car. “Are you sure there isn't anything else I can do for you?”

  “No, thank you. Really, you've done too much already.”

  She'd sold me a car—my very own car!—for dirt cheap. It wasn't some crap-junker either. It was a four-door, blue Honda Civic. Sure, I had a beautiful Porsche, a clone of Maggie's Baby, sitting back home in Dad's garage, but this new car already had so much more sentimental value than my other car ever had. Sloane had also picked me up from the airport and driven me around town when I first arrived in Arizona. I'd been skeptical of her at first, but she'd turned out to be genuinely nice and helpful.

  “Are you still staying at that fancy hotel? That worries me. Whoever you ran away from... I'm scared that they could find you because of that hefty hotel bill. I'm sure they don't take cash.”

  No, the Maddox Hotel I was staying at certainly didn't rent rooms by the hour. “I'm using a friend's credit card and it's only gonna be for a couple more days. Now that I have a car, I'm sure I'll find an apartment and a job soon.”

  She nodded. “Call me if you need anything else.”

  “I will,” I told her, but knew I probably wouldn't. I left the used car lot and headed for the nearest supermarket. There were essentials I'd desperately needed since I got here—like food. I couldn't afford to eat another meal at the hotel’s upscale restaurant, so I loaded up on junk food before going back to my empty room.

  Phoenix was everything I'd ever dreamed it to be. I'd kind of braced myself for disappointment but hadn’t felt let down yet. The humidity-free heat, the sunshine, the casual atmosphere, and the cactus—I about died from excitement w
hen I saw my first one—had all lived up to my fantasies. I was here and halfway to my goal of freedom. And I couldn't have done any of it without Leah Longerburger.

  Two days ago, I left Leo's house wearing his white shirt, running as fast as I could across Dad's golf course. I called Leah from my cell phone and when I arrived, she was waiting for me at the back of her moderate-sized house. Her blonde hair had knots in it like I'd woken her up, and her blue eyes grew fierce with rage as she took in my appearance.

  “You slept with Andrew, didn't you? And he took off in the morning, like a dick. Like he always used to do with me. Like he was better than me. I knew your stupid plan to get even with him was just that...stupid!”

  “Not Andrew,” I whimpered. “Leo.”

  “What?”

  “It doesn't matter. It's time for Arizona.”

  Leah and I had never been super-duper besties like Steph and I were, but we were still fairly close and she'd always been surprisingly loyal to me. I'd been upset after finding out that she'd been sleeping with Andrew while he was still my sister's boyfriend, but he'd hurt her too so I'd gotten over it fast. And after the way she'd come through for me over the last couple of days, swapping her cell phone with mine, lending me her credit card in exchange for the blank checks I'd written her, helping me book my plane ticket, driving me all the way to Dulles Airport to fly out here, I knew now that she was one very good, super-duper bestie. I kind of wish I would have known that sooner.

  I sent her a quick text.

  Me: Your dad's friend Sloane was totally freaking awesome. I've got a car now. I'll find an apartment tomorrow...hopefully...then I can stop using your credit card. If Dad looks into my bank account (can he do that?), he'll find the checks to you. Just so you know.