“Of course. A relationship is based on two people, not just one.”
I wiped at my tears. “I know that, and I know he knew that. He just thought I wanted that, too, because I was never open and honest with him. If I had been, from the beginning, maybe things would have been different. Oh, God.”
My hands covered my face and I started to cry. My mother put her arm around me and led me closer to the giant oak tree that had fallen over years ago.
“Sit down, sweetie.”
Doing as she said, I dropped my hands to my lap.
“What happened after he mentioned kids?”
With a hard swallow, I went on. “I asked him if he would ever want to leave Oak Springs, and of course he said no. Then, I told him I didn’t want to live in Oak Springs. It sort of all came out at once. He replied by saying he thought that was what I had wanted, too, and then he brought up how I never said anything about wanting to live in a big city.”
I looked at her. “I told him I wanted to live in a big downtown city. In like a loft or something, just for a bit. We could travel and see things.”
“What did he say?”
I cried harder.
Pulling me to her side, she rocked us back and forth. “Did he say something hurtful to you and that’s why you made up the relationship about the other boy?”
“No! Just the opposite. He said he would move anywhere I wanted because he loved me. For a few moments I was so over-the-moon happy. He was going to let me live out my dream and I’m ashamed to admit I was greedy enough to want him in my life and I was going to let him.”
“Oh, Harley.”
I reached up and wiped my nose. I hadn’t cried this much in years.
“Then what happened? I’m trying to figure this out in my head.”
Pulling away from her, I stood. Facing her, I took a deep breath.
“Steed broke his arm and we ended up going to the hospital. His momma needed him…that was my first clue that if I took him from his family, not only would Tripp resent me, but Melanie and John would too. I overheard him telling his father he didn’t really want to travel and had doubts about how we would make it.” Tears rolled down my cheeks faster. “But he said he would do it. For me. John told him if he didn’t talk to me about his feelings, he’d end up regretting his decision.”
I dropped back down next to my mother. “I loved him too much to have him give everything up only to have him hate me years later. I made up the other guy because I didn’t have the guts to tell him no. I so desperately wanted him to follow me around the world like a puppy dog, living out my dream while he left his behind, that I couldn’t tell him no. As a matter of fact, I didn’t want to tell him no. At least, not at first.”
My tears started again, and by the look on my mother’s face, I knew she already knew what had happened from that point on.
“So, instead of telling him that you wouldn’t let him give up his dreams, you made up another man.”
“At first I told him we should break up. Take some time apart. I didn’t know what else to say. I panicked and all the emotions running through my head and heart were confusing. Tripp wasn’t about to let that happen. That’s when I knew he would follow me, no matter what. Give up everything for my stupid, silly dream. So, I made up the guy I had met at school. And the hurt in his eyes made me want to throw up. But I couldn’t take it back. It was too late. And I knew, if I told him no, that I would come back to Oak Springs and we would start our life later, he wouldn’t have let me do it. He would have followed me, Mom. He would have left school, moved to College Station and then he would have resented me. I wasn’t going to let that happen, so I came up with the other guy theory.”
My mother stood. “Harley, you broke that boy’s heart! Why didn’t you just tell him you overheard his conversation with his father?”
Massaging my forehead, I groaned. “I don’t know! I panicked and did the only thing I could think at the time. Every single time I came home to visit I tried to track him down to talk to him. Each time I wanted to tell him the truth. That there was never another guy. That I was stupid for walking away from him that day and that I should have just let fate play its role.”
“He won’t talk to you still?”
I shook my head. “No. I’ve called his cell, left messages at work, asked his siblings to have him call me. Nothing. Then, when I came back this last time, and he was dating Mallory, I gave up.”
“A Carbajal does not give up.” She stood with her hands on her hips. “If you want him to at least know the truth, you force his ass to listen. He’s being a stubborn bastard, as well. You two are perfect for each other, both as hard-headed as they come.”
I chuckled. “Why, Maddie Carbajal…listen to you swear!”
Shaking her head, she looked me right in the eye, and with as much determination as I’ve ever seen any one person have, she whispered to me, “Don’t give up.”
The rush of sadness I’d come to know like a best friend swept over me. With a single tear rolling down my cheek, I replied, “I think I’m too late.”
I stood staring at the cat before looking back at Corina.
“Corina, there’s nothing wrong with Milo. I promise you.”
She shook her head. “Are you sure? He was limping earlier.”
“Yeah, maybe you should check his temperature,” Paxton added with a concerned frown.
Smiling, I replied, “I did. It was normal, y’all.”
“Mmm…weird,” Corina said.
A knock on the door of the exam room drew my attention away from the two of them.
Poking her head in, Julie, my very sweet vet tech, said, “Um, Harley? The Parker sisters are here.”
I glanced back to Corina and Paxton before turning back to Julie. She was sharp as a whip when it came to the animals, but she seemed to be lacking common sense today considering two of the Parker sisters were already right here.
“I know, Julie. They’re standing in front of me.”
She shook her head. “No, the actual Parker sisters.”
“Oh.” The last time I had talked to Waylynn she made it clear I wasn’t welcome at their place. It had destroyed me. We were once the best of friends. Her, me, and Paxton. Three peas in a pod.
“Are they here with y’all?” I asked.
The look Corina and Paxton exchanged told me these ladies were up to something. It was time to see exactly what.
“Why don’t you have them come on back to this room,” I told Julie.
“Will do.”
Paxton and Corina avoided my stare.
“Thank God you were here today!” Waylynn busted out as she walked into the room and went straight to Milo who was still sitting on the exam table, taking everything in. The poor thing was just as confused as I was. Even he knew there was nothing wrong with him.
“Well, I did have the day off, but Corina called about an emergency with Milo,” I said. Waylynn and Corina exchanged smiles. “So, ladies, what brings you by?”
“Milo, of course! When Corina said she was bringing him in for an emergency, we knew we had to rush right over. Thank goodness Jonathon was home to watch Liberty.”
I stared at Waylynn. Had she lost her damn mind? My mother had told me about Waylynn’s accident last year. She’d swerved to miss a turtle and lost control of her car. My heart broke in two when I found out she wasn’t able to have kids…but now I was wondering if she might have hit her head also and was now having residual effects from that.
Clearing my throat, I looked up at the four of them. “From what I can tell, he’s perfectly fine.”
“Oh, good!” Waylynn exclaimed while clapping her hands. “I was so worried.”
I gave her a grin. “Is Milo like the Parker family pet?”
Waving her hands all over the place, she laughed. “Oh, hell no. That would be Patches. Chloe’s pet goat.”
“Yes, I’ve had the pleasure of meeting Patches.”
I glanced at Julie, who wore a shit
-eating grin on her face. Yeah, maybe she wasn’t lacking common sense today. More like she was in on this so-called emergency visit. I was going to have to have a long talk with her.
“Well, Julie here can take Milo and give him a little snack.”
“Oh, that would be just perfect and so sweet,” Corina said.
I nodded. “Julie, why don’t you take Milo and get him settled back into his crate.”
She scooped up Milo and grabbed his carrier. “Let’s go, Milo. I’ve got a tuna treat with your name on it.”
Spinning on my heels, I walked over to the sink and started washing my hands.
Paxton cleared her throat. “So, Harley, how do you like being back in Oak Springs?”
When I turned and faced the four of them, I couldn’t help but smile. They were all hanging on my next set of words.
“I’m beyond happy to be home. I’d have come home a lot sooner, but…” I left my sentence dangling in the air. They already knew the reason why I had waited so long.
“But what?” Waylynn asked. “What kept you away?”
I tilted my head and gave them a hard look. They wanted me to say the words that would rip that wound open even more, yet I knew there was some underlying motive for the four of them being here today. “Do you want the truth? Is that why you ladies are here?”
“Yes, always,” Amelia replied.
Expelling an obnoxiously loud sigh, I decided to throw caution to the wind and tell them what they wanted to hear—and what I sort of wanted them to know—with the hopes it would get back to Tripp. If there was one thing I knew about the Parker clan, they were tighter than the ticks I removed off of animals. Anything I said to these ladies would most definitely make its way back to him…
Besides what remained of my dignity, what the hell else did I have to lose?
“Your brother. When he wouldn’t talk to me or let me explain, I couldn’t bear the thought of living in this town and having him ignore me.”
It looked like Waylynn’s eye twitched and her jaw clenched. She was holding back from laying into me.
“Tripp? Why?” Corina asked.
I stared down at the floor and let out a laugh before focusing back on them. “Listen, I don’t know why y’all are here, but if you want to lay into me about leaving your brother, there is nothing you can say that I haven’t already said to myself. You couldn’t possibly make me feel any worse than I did the day I walked away from him.”
At least Amelia and Waylynn’s cold stares melted a bit.
“Tell us why you did it,” Paxton said kindly.
“Why?” I scoffed. “What difference does it make? Your brother has moved on and doesn’t want to speak to me no matter how many times I’ve begged him. I even wrote him a letter, hoping he would read it. I’m positive he never did.”
Paxton and Waylynn exchanged looks.
“Listen, do y’all want to tell me what’s going on here? I know you’re up to something so let’s just get this over with, okay?”
“Harley, we’re not here to lay into you,” Paxton said with a sweet smile. “We wanted to talk. Listen, we all used to be close, and I speak for all of us when I say I want to be friends again.”
“Well, you and I were never friends because I didn’t live here,” Corina said while she rubbed her stomach. When I glanced down, my heart physically ached. I longed for a baby so badly. My eyes lifted to hers and I was positive she could see my pain.
“I’d love to get to know you better, Corina. I have a feeling we’d be great friends.”
Her smile grew bigger, and I knew I was going to fall in love with her. The kindness dripped off of her.
When I peered over to the other three, my heart dropped. Waylynn and I had been the best of friends. Paxton and I had been a bit closer, though. We did nearly everything together when I wasn’t with Tripp.
“I know you all hate me for hurting Tripp. I only did what I thought was right at the time, and I knew the moment after I did it that I’d made the biggest mistake of my life.”
Waylynn walked up to me. “I ran into your mom yesterday. She told me you were having a hard time adjusting, and to be honest, I told her it was your karma coming full circle. When she told me I had no idea what really happened that day and that I should speak to you about it, I started putting two and two together. I know how much you loved my brother, Harley. I also know you both had different dreams and that you never told Tripp yours.”
I swallowed hard and looked at the floor.
“You lied to him, didn’t you? You threw yourself on the sacrificial sword for Tripp’s dreams,” Waylynn asked in a whispered voice. My head snapped up and my mouth fell slightly open.
She stared into my eyes. “There never was another guy, was there?”
“What?” Amelia gasped from behind Waylynn. “Waylynn, what are you talking about?”
Waylynn continued to look into my eyes. A part of me was relieved that someone had figured it out. I had just always hoped it would be Tripp.
“No. There was never another guy.”
The gasps from the women in the room made me turn around and wrap my arms around my body. Damn it all to hell. The flood gates of tears are threatening to spill over.
“What in the hell, Harley! Why would you do that to him?” Amelia cried out.
“Wait, don’t yell at her. Let her explain first,” Paxton added.
They gave me a few moments to gather my wits before I faced them. Leaning against the sink, I took a deep breath.
Here we go again.
“The day I left I found out that Tripp had been offered a job at the law firm here in town during the summer. I had been on my way over to y’all’s house to finally be honest with him about my dreams for after we graduated—to tell him I wanted to travel after graduating from vet school. For years Tripp had dreamed about settling down in Oak Springs, opening up his own law firm, one day running for mayor, and I honestly wanted that for him, and for us, too…just not on the same time schedule as he did. My aunt had filled with my head with stories about the world and being the stupid, naïve girl I was, I longed for those adventures.”
I pressed my lips tightly together and closed my eyes while taking another deep breath in through my nose.
“I know if I had only been honest with him and told him I wanted to travel before we settled down, things would have been different. At the time, he wanted one thing, and I wanted something else. But I loved him so much I told myself that I would want the same things he wanted and before the time came, our paths would align. I asked him that day if he would ever want to live outside of Oak Springs and he said no. That’s when I knew I had to tell him the truth.”
“Oh, Harley,” Waylynn whispered.
I kept going. “That day I was planning on asking him to come to College Station after law school. Once I graduated I wanted to travel around Europe, Asia, lie on beaches in the Caribbean, anything for a few months, before the responsibilities of adulthood weighed on us. I wanted to live in a big city like Dallas for a bit. When I told him this, I could see the disappointment in his eyes and it nearly killed me. That was the reason I kept my mouth shut all those years. I wanted to avoid hurting him.” My eyes stung with the threat of tears. I knew once they started, I wouldn’t be able to stop.
“Then he…he told me he would go with me. Wherever I wanted to go he would be there because he loved me.”
Tears streamed down my face, the reality of what I’d given up like a punch to the gut, and I heard a few sniffles in the room but I couldn’t look at any of them. I was too ashamed of what I was about to say.
“And even though I knew it was wrong and it wasn’t what he wanted, I let myself be happy. I was going to let him give up his dream so that I could follow mine. Then he got a phone call from John. Steed had gotten hurt and broke his arm. John told Tripp he needed him to come to the hospital to be with your mom. We went, and I overheard a conversation Tripp had with John. He told him he didn’t want to travel
and that he worried about how we would afford everything. Your dad mentioned that he’d resent me in the long run.”
I forced a smile and took a few seconds before talking again. I had held this in for so long, waiting to explain it all to Tripp, and here I was spilling it all out again. And not to Tripp.
“It just sort of hit me. I could never live with myself if I took him away from Oak Springs, away from his own dreams and hopes. I panicked and knew if I told him now that he should stay and I would come back to him, he would follow me. He would give up everything to make me happy. So, I did the only thing I could think of. I lied.”
My heavy gaze lifted to see four sets of eyes staring at me. I couldn’t read their expressions.
Would they hate me even more now? Probably.
I looked away, the guilt and shame eating at me like it had for so many years.
“Every time I came back into town, I tried to talk to Tripp. I wanted to tell him there never was a guy. I wanted to come back to Oak Springs and start the life we had always dreamed of. At least, I wanted to try if he would forgive me, if he would understand the why of what I did.”
“But you couldn’t because he always left. The moment he found out you were in town, he would leave,” Amelia said softly.
I nodded. “I can’t tell you how many times I’ve called and left him a message. In the beginning I begged him to let me explain. But I don’t even know if he ever listened to those messages. As the years went on, the messages kept getting shorter. I asked him to talk to me, he ignored it. I wrote him that letter I mentioned, hoping he’d read it, but I doubt he did.”
“All those times you were in town…” Amelia’s voice cracked.
Grinning, I added, “A few times I managed to sneak in without him knowing I was there. I went to his office but he refused to see me. He was always in a meeting or Karen would tell me he was out of town. I never got the chance to try. He never gave me the opportunity to explain that I’d always known I’d come back to Oak Springs.”
Waylynn walked up to me and took my hands in hers. “That’s why you showed up on decorating day. You knew he would be there and you thought he wouldn’t make a scene around the rest of us.”
Blind Love Page 3
