As if he’d read my mind, he pulled into the parking lot of the chain burger joint where we’d had our first actual date. The first time it had been just the two of us, not counting the myriad times I’d tagged along with him and Matthew. The meaning of his selection was more valuable than a choice table at the trendy new place.
“I’m assuming when you said somewhere that you really meant here,” he smiled. He shut off the engine and pulled the keys out of the ignition, pausing briefly to confirm his suspicions. Pleased with whatever it was that he saw in my eyes, he climbed out of the car and walked around to my side.
I stayed put, letting him play the part of the consummate gentleman. He swung open my door, reaching his hand out to help me up. Our fingers touched, sending an immediate chill down my spine. Goose bumps appeared over my bare arms.
“Cold?” he asked as he pulled me to a standing position. Given the fact that the late summer sunset smoldered overhead, it was obvious that I wasn’t. He didn’t wait for my answer, not expecting one anyway. With a chuckle, he wrapped his arm around my waist and led me inside.
To say we were the most overdressed couple in the place was the understatement of the year. The dining room was inhabited by a large crowd of teenage guys, clad in shorts and t-shirts. Several of them witnessed our arrival with great interest, looking me over from head to toe like I’d just stepped out of their wet dream. Instinctively, Chris tugged me closer, his possessiveness back in spades. Instead of being annoyed by him staking his claim, I surprised myself by relishing in his action.
We placed our order, helped ourselves to drinks from the soda machine at the condiment island in the middle of the restaurant, and selected the most private table we could find. This entailed walking past the crowd of guys again, heading to the corner booth. I felt their eyes on me once more, ogling. Chris held the tray containing our dinner so he couldn’t escort me the same way he had up to the counter. He opted for following behind me more closely than normal, lest they focus too much on the way those killer heels made my hips move when I walked.
I slid into the side of the booth that was pushed up against the wall, choosing to have full view of the dining room. Instead of sitting down across from me, Chris set the tray down in the middle of the table and joined me.
“Must you?” he asked as he scooted into the seat. His leg brushed mine, perhaps intentionally. Whatever the case, he left it where it was and I didn’t move an inch, either.
“Must I what?” I cocked an eyebrow and reached for a french fry, popping it into my mouth. His eyes focused on my lips, stained the lightest red courtesy of my cosmetics bag. Clearly they rendered him speechless.
“Look like that,” he said finally.
“And who would you rather I look like?” I joked playfully.
“No one.”
“That’s what I thought.”
He grabbed his sandwich, unwrapping it and creasing the paper around it as he surveyed my admirers. “I don’t remember it being like this everywhere we went before.”
“Then you’re remembering it wrong. Though I rarely dressed up to get a value meal, when I made myself up to go to parties, I always turned heads.”
Really, I wasn’t trying to be conceited. Beauty was the Snyder blessing or curse, depending upon your viewpoint at the particular time. I’d seen it enough times where Matthew was concerned to recognize it when it happened to me. How a certain look could get you almost anything you wanted. A smile, a laugh, and people were reduced to putty in your hands. I’d not used the tricks in my arsenal as frequently as my brother had, at least not until Chris and I had broken up. Once I’d journeyed along my path of self-destruction, they’d come in handy on a number of occasions. More than I was willing to admit to.
“Don’t worry,” I said, running my fingers down his arm. “I’m obviously here with the hottest guy in the place.”
“True,” he contemplated, his eyes sparkling.
We continued our banter as we ate, laughing and enjoying each other’s company. It was like the years between us had washed away, erasing the awkwardness of our last weeks as a couple and the animosity of the very recent past. I wanted to kick myself for wasting so much time, for being so afraid. Of deciding to bottle all of the bad, holding it inside of me, fearful of the consequences of it coming out. Had the payoff of keeping my secret been worth it? Had I really spared him any grief by doing so? Or had I simply caused more?
Without thinking, I snuggled up against him, leaning my head upon his shoulder. He tensed for just a split second at the unexpected touch, then relaxed. I played it off like I didn’t notice his hesitancy.
“I’m so full,” I murmured, stretching my long legs under the table. One of my heels banged against the chair on the other side, making me laugh. “And I guess I’m not as coordinated as I used to be.”
“I seriously doubt that. If I remember correctly, you could do the splits like it was nothing.”
I shrugged. “I haven’t had a reason to try that out lately. Not like there’s much need for cheerleading prowess in interior design.”
He dipped a french fry into the pile of ketchup he had squirted onto the wrapper on our tray. I watched as he twirled it thoughtfully in the condiment. “Isn’t it like riding a bike? Something that you never forget? And you might possibly get more business if you advertised that fact.”
I jabbed him in the ribs. “Most of my private clientele is female, you idiot. And I doubt that the corporate accounts would be swayed by a nice pair of legs. Or maybe they would, and then I’d have to decline the job because I’d be sick to my stomach. Anyways, I don’t think I’m hurting for business; I’m booked solid for the next few months.”
“Nice to know you have standards,” he mused.
I took that at face value for the jab that it was. However truthful, the fact of the matter was that it still stung. I’d hurt him on some level by my actions when we’d been apart, and this was his way of telling me. Nearly a year of self-imposed abstinence on my part hadn’t done much to ease his mind that I’d gone and carelessly given myself to many others since him. I wondered if he’d been with anyone since me.
“I kissed Eric,” I blurted out, “so maybe I don’t.”
His body went rigid against mine. I winced, preparing for the brunt of his anger.
“Lauren’s Eric?” he clarified.
“Yes. I mean, no. She’d broken up with him way before. It was at her wedding.”
“Eric didn’t come to the wedding.”
“No, but he was staying at the hotel that night. It was the strangest coincidence. I ran into him by the elevators and I panicked. I heard someone coming, and I was afraid it was Matthew and Lauren. So I pushed him up against the wall and kissed him, thinking that maybe I could hide him.”
“That you could hide him?” Chris smirked. His rage had clearly dissipated.
“My hair was really big. And the damn elevator doors wouldn’t open, so I couldn’t think of anything else. I didn’t factor in that he would like it. Or that I would have to slap him when he got a little too grabby.”
“I’m sure he deserved it anyway. For a number of transgressions.”
“Then it turns out it was just Will and Gracie. Gracie applauded. And Will just looked horrified.”
“My reaction would have been somewhere in between.”
“If I recall, your reaction at that time would have been to get as far away from me as possible. We spent most of the evening avoiding each other at all costs.”
“Old habits die hard. But as long as you were doing it for Lauren and Matthew, I suppose your heart was in the right place.”
“I certainly wasn’t doing it out of my own curiosity.” I shivered dramatically, causing him to laugh. “He’s not very good. But you’re right - I’d do anything for those two.”
He caught the sigh that emanated from my very core. “Including?”
“Lauren asked me to be there when she gives birth. Not just in the waiting room, but
in the delivery room, holding her hand. Or keeping my brother from passing out; either way.”
“And you don’t want to?” he pressed.
“I told her I would. But I’m scared, Chris.”
I didn’t need to explain why. Understanding flashed in those eyes that stared back at me; a reaction that wouldn’t have been there mere weeks ago.
“Let’s get out of here,” he suggested.
He didn’t wait for a response. He wadded up his sandwich wrapper, tossing it onto the tray. He rose from our booth and deposited the remnants of our meal in the trash bin by the door, lacing his fingers through mine once he was done. Then he led me out to the car.
He drove us to one of the city’s many parks, neither one of us saying a word. Only once we had pulled into a space in the gravel lot and he’d shut off the engine did I feel like I could breathe normally again, let alone talk. Even then, I stared out the windshield, watching the sunset paint orange and purple streaks across the sky as I composed my thoughts.
“Lauren wants me to take the place of her mother,” I started out shakily. “I feel like I don’t deserve to be there, sharing that moment with her. What gives me that right, when secretly I’m insanely jealous of her?”
“You’re one of the best friends she has,” Chris started slowly, “not to mention Matthew’s one woman support system.”
“I get that, but what help will I be if I’m a blubbering mess? I about had a breakdown in the middle of the bridal store; I can’t imagine what I’ll be like in a hospital.”
“In the bridal store?” Chris asked, turning away to face the driver’s side window. His inability to look me in the eye while I explained bolstered my confidence.
“I was helping her pick out dresses. She was doing a terrible job on her own, looking only at the sale rack.”
He snorted, but still didn’t move to face me.
“I found the one she ended up wearing, along with another one that I would have wanted for myself. Only I didn’t realize it until I’d brought it into the dressing room and was about to hand it off to her. I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror with the dress held up in front of me and I almost lost it. That was my dress and I was supposed to be marrying you.”
The last words came out in a painful rush. It was obvious that he heard me; his hands clenched into fists upon his lap. That was my cue to turn away, grasping at the first object to catch my attention from my perch in the passenger seat of his car. Unfortunately for me, that was nothing more spectacular than a trash bin on the sidewalk, stuffed full of empty soda cups and grease stained paper bags.
We sat in silence for a moment, or at least as silent as I could be. My breath was coming in ragged spurts; the tears not far behind. I scrunched my eyes closed in a futile attempt to stop them. Knowing that I couldn’t fight the onslaught, I gave up and continued looking out the window.
“We were supposed to have a baby together, Chris. Us. We were supposed to be in love forever. You were supposed to ask me to marry you. I was supposed to have her life.”
My eyes were still glued to the trash can, so I jumped when I felt his hand on my shoulder. His touch was light, hesitant, as though he needed to ask permission. He pulled back at my violent reaction, but I gripped his wrist quickly with my left hand and placed it back where it had come from.
“I’m a horrible person, Chris,” I told him.
“No, Blake,” he whispered, “you’re just human.”
“At the very least, a bad date.”
“No,” he repeated.
He plucked my fingers away from his wrist and moved his hand to my face. His thumb brushed away moisture that I didn’t even recall shedding. Through blurry eyes I stared at him.
“You are going to be there for Matthew and Lauren,” he said gently, “because that’s who you are. You’re the first person who ever stood up for him and you aren’t going to stop now. He needs you. And Lauren is pretending to be stoic, but she’s scared to death, too. You care way too much about her to let her down. You really are like sisters now. And the baby - you already love it and you two haven’t even met.”
I sniffled, drinking in his words. “How are you so sure I won’t ruin it?”
“Because as much as you try to play it off like you’re so tough, you have this killer protective instinct. You can be dying inside, but you won’t let anyone else know. You’ll nail the role of proud aunt, because that’s what’s expected of you. You’d do anything to ease their anxiety, to help lessen their pain.”
“I don’t know if I can this time.”
“Of course you can. You’ve done this before - with me. You stood in your brother’s rundown kitchen ten years ago, hunched over in pain, and told me to rot in hell.”
I closed my eyes and attempted to pull away. His hand, still on my face, slid down to my chin and prevented that movement.
“Look at me, Blake,” he commanded.
I obeyed. Instead of the anger that I’d suspected would be written all over his face, I saw only understanding.
“For so many years, I took what you said at face value. You knew what you were doing; you chose exactly the words that would cut the deepest. You wanted me gone and that was the only way you saw to make that happen. And I responded just like you knew I would. I left.”
“I’m sorry, Chris.”
He pressed his index finger to my lips and shook his head.
“I know you are. And if I would have been more perceptive, I would have seen what you were doing. I would have known that you were protecting me in your own misguided way. You didn’t want me to grieve for what we’d lost. You wanted to save me from all the helplessness, all the despair that you knew I would feel. You didn’t want to me to see you weak like that. Especially when you had just declared how independent you were. So you pushed me away, against your better instincts. And I let you.”
“I was so scared.”
“You had every right to be.”
“I wanted our baby, Chris.”
“I know.” He swallowed hard, even though he already knew. It wasn’t the first time I’d told him that, nor did I think it would be the last. Like the apology that just kept cropping up when I opened my mouth, I felt it necessary to voice that truth again and again.
“I was afraid to tell you. Afraid you’d be so mad at me. I thought that maybe if you didn’t know, you wouldn’t have to go through what I did. That if you were just pissed off at me, it would hurt less than if you knew the truth.”
“Just being pissed off at you hurt like hell.”
“I’m sorry.”
“And it may be a delayed reaction, but I’m grieving every day for our child.”
“I still think about it every day, too. Sometimes more than others. The last nine months have been excruciating. Almost like it’s a raw, open sore and the people that I love are standing there unwittingly pouring salt into it.”
“I don’t think it’s something that you can ever truly get over. But maybe you can move past it. Maybe we can move past it.”
Somewhere deep in my chest, a little spark of hope began to bloom. His careful choice of phrasing instilled the possibility that I’d been secretly longing for. He wasn’t closing the door on us. Not yet, at least. It pained me to finally admit that all those years I’d held steadfast to my hatred, I’d been imprinting my self-revulsion onto him. I’d never truly felt contempt for him. And I’d wasted so much time.
“I hope there’s a ‘we’ to salvage,” I found myself saying.
“Blake, I’ve never given up on you. I’ve loved you for every second of every day for the last ten years. And now that I finally know what caused your anger, I understand it. I get everything. And it kills me to think that I was so blind that I could let you go through all of it alone.”
I attempted a smile. “I have a pretty good poker face.”
“That you do. And it will be perfectly intact when you’re in that delivery room with Lauren and Matthew. And I’ll be here to hold y
ou as you cry afterward.”
I wiped at my damp cheeks. “I have no idea why you think I’ll cry about it later.”
He laughed. “I have a lot of consoling to make up for.”
“You don’t owe me anything. Not after what I’ve done to you.”
“I’m not doing it as payback. I’m doing it because that night after the wedding, when I was getting ready to go out to the couch, you said something that broke my heart.”
“‘Please don’t leave me?’”
He nodded. “And that was the moment that every wall you’d built around yourself crumbled into bits. And I saw first hand how vulnerable you were underneath all of that hard exterior. You admitted that you needed me. And you made me fall in love with you all over again.”
“So your immediate reaction was to call in to work and ask to pick up another shift?”
“I didn’t say that the realization didn’t scare the hell out of me.”
It was my turn to laugh. “We’re both pretty sad.”
“But we have each other. We always have, always will. There was just a period of time in which we were both too stubborn to acknowledge it.”
“Never again, okay?”
“Never again,” he confirmed.
With our pact of newfound camaraderie sealed, he turned the key in the ignition and drove me home. The conversation had taken a lot out of both of us; we fell into an easy silence. In fact, nothing more was said until we were at my house. He pulled into my driveway, shut off the engine and dutifully walked me to my front door.
I fumbled with trying to find my keys in my purse, which had magically grown larger during our journey. They’d found their way down to the bottom of my bag. I triumphantly pulled them out and set to work unlocking the deadbolt. Just as I wondered if I should invite him in - was that appropriate protocol after something like this happened? - he broke my train of thought.
“Blake.”
“Hmmm?”
“You forgot something.”
I spun around, confused. I hadn’t brought anything with me besides my handbag and I obviously had that. Before I had a moment to compose a question, his arms were wrapped around me, his lips pressed against mine. My purse fell to the concrete with a gentle thud.
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