Brave (Contours of the Heart Book 4)

by Tammara Webber

  “What does that have to do with Isaac?”

  Joshua stuck his chin out and opened his hand as though it was obvious what protests and riots in another state had to do with my supervisor.

  Responses stuck in my throat, none of them exactly right. I’d never in my life called out racism except to challenge the idiotic things Leo sometimes said. But torching Leo was easy—he was a walking, talking monument to insensitivity, not a coworker.

  Isaac walked in then, cup in hand, and the entire conversation felt like something I’d enabled or even contributed to, because it consisted of words said in front of me, to me, that I hadn’t yet confronted or rejected. The unspoken responses unstuck and fled, and in their place came defenses to an accusation Isaac had not made. His mere presence made it for him.

  Joshua’s insolent smirk and glib, “Lunch later, Erin?” showed that he felt that same accusation. But he wasn’t shamed by it.

  “I don’t think so, no.”

  He frowned, then flinched when the loudspeaker above our heads crackled to life and emitted Cynthia Pike’s displeased voice. “Joshua Swearingen, please report to the weekly sales meeting in my office. We’re waiting for you.”

  He left, mumbling, “I’m coming. Jesus.” The clock on the wall—which he’d been facing the whole time he’d been talking to me—indicated that he was seven minutes late.

  “You okay?” Isaac said, drawing his eyes away long enough to fill his cup.

  “Yes. Fine.”

  Somehow he knew I wasn’t fine and I was lying about being so. His face went blank, and he left the room without another word.

  chapter

  Fifteen

  Jacqueline: A couple of weeks ago, I told Lucas I thought you were avoiding me.

  Me: Why would you think that?

  I’d received her text three hours earlier but waited until it was midnight in Ohio, where she lived now, to respond. Jacqueline wasn’t a night owl. During the two years we’d roomed together, she was often asleep before I came in, and she’d signed up for eight a.m. classes almost every freaking semester. Whenever we’d partied together, she would start looking bleary-eyed just as the club or party got going. She’d tolerated the requisite teasing like a champ.

  After sending my reply, I plugged my phone into its charger, laid it on my nightstand, and opened a novel with only twenty or so pages still unread. I expected to hear back from her tomorrow, so when my phoned chimed with her texted response, I just stared at the locked screen, which read: MESSAGE: JACQUELINE. It chimed with a second text a moment later.

  Jacqueline: Maybe because we haven’t talked in so long that I can’t remember when we last talked? Every time I call you, I get your VM. I text and you answer hours later. And you’ve called me when (I think) you knew I wouldn’t be able to answer? I’m trying not to be paranoid. I know it’s been two years since I moved away, but I thought that even if we were hundreds of miles apart, we’d stay close.

  Jacqueline: I’ve been wrapped up in school and Lucas, and I’m sorry it took me so long to realize we had drifted apart. I have things to tell you, but I don’t even care about that because I can’t shake the feeling that something is wrong and you’re not telling me. (In case you were wondering, the not being paranoid thing isn’t going so well.)

  This was not the result I’d intended. Jacqueline had always been a diligent student, and I would have never resented her putting academics first, especially at her dream school. And her perfect relationship with Lucas, her perfect boyfriend… only a coldhearted bitch would have begrudged her that. She deserved every bit of her happiness. That’s why I hadn’t wanted to unload my emotional wreckage on her. I hadn’t wanted to tell her about my nightmares or the guilt I couldn’t leave behind.

  She’d been staunchly supportive when I’d called to tell her about Chaz’s proposal, my rejection of it, and our subsequent breakup. “You did the right thing,” she said. “If there was no possibility of your changing your mind, you had no choice.” When he died six months later, she’d asked if I needed her to come home for the funeral. “I’ll come if you need me, Erin,” she’d said, despite her grueling senior-year schedule of compositions and performances at Oberlin. “I can be on a plane tonight.”

  “There’s no need for you to upend your week,” I’d told her, certain I would survive it, as much as I dreaded that day. “Almost everyone I know will be there. I won’t be alone.”

  Burying my ex had been as awful as I’d feared it would be and then some. I stood surrounded by almost the entire shocked and grieving Greek community. Everyone was crying, including the guys, standing in their ties and blazers, dozens of likenesses of the boy we had lost. Aisles ahead of me, Chaz’s family sat—his parents, his older brother, his little sister—leaning against each other, their sobs anguished.

  Twenty-one-year-old boys aren’t supposed to die. They’re supposed to build lives for themselves, start families, grow old, look after and bury their parents. Sixty or seventy years ahead of schedule, Chaz was gone, and it made sense to no one sitting in that church.

  The funeral service—standard consoling words from the pastor, reminiscences from three of his close friends, a tearful eulogy from his father—had been agonizing. But the lowering into the ground of the casket containing the remains of a boy I’d cared for, deeply—that was the worst. That was the moment it became real. There was no waking up from it. Not for Chaz. Not for any of us.

  Minutes later, his grief-stricken mother confronted me and dropped her bomb on my distraught heart, and my guilt mushroomed. I couldn’t escape its explosions, still. I was beginning to think I never would. Some damage is irreversible, it seems, and all the remorse in the world won’t make up for it.

  Me: J, you haven’t done anything at all. I’m just trying to find my feet with this job, and I screwed up in the most massive, embarrassing way recently. It’s fine now, but I was preoccupied for a while.

  The phone rang just as I hit Send. She was calling. And this time she knew I had my phone in my hand. I took a deep breath and answered.

  “Well, that was sneaky. I taught you well, young padawan.”

  “I did learn from the master. Are you gonna tell me what’s really up?”

  I started to go with Nothing, really, I swear, but I couldn’t do it. I waded in, hoping to stay in the shallow end.

  “I’ve just had a rough time lately. Leo seems to believe I’m trespassing on his territory or something, and I think he purposefully fucked something up with one of my clients to make me look bad.”

  “That dick! Your dad couldn’t have been happy about that?”

  “No.” My laugh was more rueful than amused. “But ultimately the fuckup was my fault. And my boss had to fix it.”

  “So it’s okay now?”

  “Getting there.”

  “But Erin…” In her typical Jacqueline manner, she weighed and rearranged her words before uttering them. A slight pucker would have formed between her brows, and she would be chewing her lip. Turning the dilemma this way and that. Trying to sense her way through the bullshit to the heart of the matter. “I feel like this emotional slide started before your job. Before graduation. You needed me that day, last fall. Jesus, it’s been almost a year. I should have insisted on coming instead of letting you talk me out of it. You were there for me during the lowest points of my life, and I wasn’t there for you.”

  I wanted to absolve her, if only so she’d stop prying. I knew she was doing it out of love, and that meant I had to protect her from believing she’d failed me in some way. So I told her the truth. “The only thing that might have changed if you’d been there was my hearing something I deserved to hear.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “If you’d been with me, his mom might not have come up to me after the graveside service. She might not have told me that Chaz had never returned that solitaire. That he’d never quit planning ways to win me back. That during all those months, he hadn’t given up.”

&n
bsp; “Oh, Erin.” Her voice wavered. “You can’t shoulder the responsibility for what he chose to do or believe. I’m so sorry her grief made her say those unkind things to you, but his response to your ending the relationship was not your fault, and you do not deserve to feel guilty for it. That’s what you’re doing, isn’t it?”

  “I hurt him, J.”

  She dug in her heels. “What if you had accepted that ring, knowing you didn’t want to marry him? What if that accident had never happened and you were engaged or even married now—just so you wouldn’t hurt his feelings? You know that doesn’t make sense. You wouldn’t have done it.”

  “I know, but—the accident did happen. And he spent the last six months of his life”—I swallowed, fighting tears—“miserable and in love with someone who didn’t—didn’t—”

  “You told him the truth. The fact that he wouldn’t or couldn’t accept it is regrettable and tragic, yes, but it’s not your fault. Is this why I haven’t heard you say a word about grad school for almost a year, though being a therapist is all you’ve ever wanted to do? Why you’re working for your dad and living at home?”

  My silence answered for me.

  “We can’t live our lives in fear. You showed me that, once upon a time.”

  It had been so much easier to be wise and encouraging when it was someone else’s sadness. When I didn’t really know how this sort of despair felt from inside my own skin.

  “After you told me about your breakup,” she said, “I had an epiphany about what Kennedy had done—breaking up with me after I’d followed him to his first-choice university instead of applying to my own. It hurt. It unmoored me. But he had realized we weren’t on the same page anymore, even if I didn’t. And he was being honest with me in ending my delusions of what we were. In setting himself free, he set me free, just like you were releasing Chaz to find someone right for him.

  “I don’t know how Kennedy feels now about me being with Lucas, and I don’t actually care. But I know if Chaz had moved on and found someone else, you would have been happy for him. Because you’re a good person, Erin.”

  Her audible tears brought mine to the surface. We sniffled wordlessly for a minute or so.

  “Well, now I feel really dumb for not calling you sooner.”

  “I called you,” she said.

  “Girl, throw me a bone here.”

  “You answered. Finally.”

  I appreciated what she’d done, allowing me to unload this thing I’d shared with no one but a couple of therapists I would never see again. But I couldn’t tell her about the nightmares. It would only increase her concern, and I’d worried her enough. Besides, maybe they would stop now that I’d shared the principal basis for them with my best friend.

  “What was your news?” I asked, redirecting the conversation. “I want to hear it.”

  “Oh—I’m earning my master’s in musical education from Oberlin. It’s a fifteen-month program. I started in June, and I’ll be certified to teach any grade from pre-K through high school when I’m done.”

  “I thought you didn’t want to teach?” I was more grateful than she knew to discuss her life and not mine.

  “I’m still going to pursue other options too—joining a jazz orchestra or a band. Doing one doesn’t have to exclude me from the other. If anything, they’ll be mutually reinforcing. But it turns out I like working with kids, especially middle-grade kids, which is apparently really odd.” We both laughed. “But they’re so musically malleable at that age! And a teaching gig will keep me from being a starving musician.”

  “That’s great.” In sharp contrast to my parents, Jacqueline’s were so supportive of her academic ambitions that they’d been upset with her for sidelining them by following her high school boyfriend to college. I stomped on my senseless envy before it could crawl from its gloomy well of self-pity.

  “So when are you going to get those applications in, woman?” she said then, as if she’d heard my bellyaching. “Unless construction work has become your new catnip. I’m visualizing you in a hard hat and tool belt right now. They don’t make a lot of sense with your customary sky-high heels and pencil skirts, but you do look pretty hot.”

  I snorted. “Yeah, they do not allow the office suits near the tools, and hard hats are heavy and smell like feet for some unfathomable reason.” I sighed. “J, my grades senior year were shit. I barely pulled off an adequate enough GPA to graduate. Grad schools would take one look at my transcript and laugh their asses off.” Just as my parents had assumed.

  “So you’ll need superior GRE scores to compensate for the not-so-glorious GPA, and maybe take a few leveling courses to prove to them and yourself that you’ve got this. Sign up for a GRE prep course. The warrior redhead I know and love will crush that surmountable obstacle to her dreams.”

  When had my pragmatic best friend turned into the chirpy optimist in this relationship? That had been my MO once upon a time. She was the pensive musician—cautious and sometimes in need of a positive bump in the right direction. I was the enthusiastic cheerleader—seer of bright sides, believer in silver linings, and giver of inspirational speeches. Those had been our roles.

  “I’ll think about it.”

  “Erin, what you did for me sophomore year, and for Mindi—that wasn’t just you being nice. That was you doing what you were meant to do—being an unfaltering advocate and an empathetic guide. You believed us both when we needed it most. I’m sure you’re doing a great job there and your dad would love to keep you forever, but please think long and hard before you give up your aspirations. Your gifts are needed in the world.”

  “Thank you for that,” I said, loving her unfaltering faith in me and keeping my But what if I’ve already given up? to myself. I made myself smile and repeat, “I’ll think about it.” I tried my best to sound sincere, to be sincere. But the thought of prep courses and admission exams, letters of recommendations and personal statements, transcripts and applications… All of it was overwhelming.

  I hadn’t known, until that moment, how far I had wandered from myself. I’d thought being home would help me remember how to be brave, but I was only hiding from the woman I’d fought to become and sliding back into the coddled girl I’d been. I had never felt less courageous.

  “You’re seeing a therapist there, right? This isn’t just your best friend advising you from hundreds of miles away, with no training to actually help you—unless you need to know an obscure musical term or learn how to play a scale.”

  This was the reason I’d avoided conversation with J. She was not a clueless family member or caring-but-easily-diverted-by-little-white-lies friend. In college, she’d seen through my smoke screen of faux positivity when others hadn’t. I’d been raised to be this way. She hadn’t. This was one of the odd truths we came to—the fact that her mother, cranky and anxious as she often was, allowed for cranky and anxious in her daughter, whereas I was expected to plaster on a smile no matter my inner turmoil or unhappiness. From the time I could walk, faking happy was second nature.

  I swallowed. “Of course.”

  “Okay. Good.” Her intuition was no match for a blatant lie over the phone, even if something deep inside me wanted it to be. “My parents are coming here for Thanksgiving, and Lucas and I are going to the coast for Christmas to stay with his dad and stepmom, and with this intense program I’m doing, we may not be back in DFW for over a year. I know Cleveland isn’t your first choice for vacay, Miss Skiing in Aspen or Beachcombing in the South of France, but you’re welcome to come stay with me anytime for a long weekend and some BFF bonding.”

  “That sounds perfect.” I bit my lip to stop its useless quiver. I wanted to be the Erin she remembered. Fierce and confident, ready to take on the world. Was that girl still inside me somewhere? Had she ever existed, or was she a figment of my imagination, as much illusion as my Friday-night cheer smile?

  chapter

  Sixteen

  Isaac stood in my doorway in his deep violet shirt and
tie—my preferred combo of everything I’d seen him wear. The competition was ongoing; any day could bring a new challenger to the field. But this one had been defending its title without much effort for the past month. Yum.

  The distraction over his wardrobe choice for the day had sidetracked me from the puzzling words he’d just spoken. I replayed them in my mind: “You might want to consider costume choices before today’s meeting. Departments coordinate.”

  “I should do what now?”

  “Halloween costumes. Mandatory.”

  “You have got to be joking.” I hadn’t been around the past several Halloweens, but I couldn’t remember Daddy going out the door in a costume. “How long has this been going on?”

  “Since before I started.” He shifted one shoulder up, unconcerned. “But if you have a complaint, you know where to go with it.”

  I scowled at him from behind my monitor. “Low blow, Maat.”

  “If the shoe fits…” His eyes flicked beneath my desk to my crossed legs and my black patent Mary Jane kitten heels. My pleated highland plaid skirt and white blouse completed my retro private school vibe for the first Monday of fall.

  I recrossed my legs, loving and hating the brisk tingles I felt everywhere when his eyes tracked the movement for a split second before he tore them away. My heart rate sped up, for fuck’s sake. His responses shouldn’t affect me as though I was some virginal adolescent. I was a woman with plenty of sexual experience, dammit.

  And whyyy was I thinking about that in capacity or connection with my boss?

  Focus, McIntyre. Halloween. “Hank goes for this? And Cynthia?”

  “Are you kidding me? Sales wins almost every year. Last year they did The Wizard of Oz.”

  “Wins?”

  “The costume contest, held during the party. The winning department, chosen by your father, gets lunch ordered in from any local restaurant they choose. Best costume, which the whole office votes on, wins a Costco gift card for a hundred bucks.”