Drowning Erin

by Elizabeth O'Roark

  Drowning Erin

  Elizabeth O’Roark

  Copyright © 2017 by Elizabeth O’Roark

  Editing by

  Jessica Royer Ocken

  Cover Design by

  Kari March Designs

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This is a work of fiction. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  ISBN: 978-0-9898135-6-3

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Chapter 66

  Chapter 67

  Chapter 68

  Chapter 69

  Chapter 70

  Chapter 71

  Chapter 72

  Chapter 73

  Chapter 74

  Chapter 75

  Chapter 76

  Chapter 77

  Chapter 78

  About the Author

  Also by Elizabeth O’Roark

  Acknowledgments

  1

  Erin

  Present

  When things are going poorly, I dream about tidal waves. I’m told it’s a sign of feeling powerless, those walls of water surging toward the sky. I wake gasping, too upset to fall back asleep.

  I hate that dream, but there’s one I hate even more—the one I have when things are going well.

  In it, I’m back at my best friend’s wedding. The air is balmy but not hot, the sun dropping low over Grace Bay in the distance while a cellist plays Pachelbel’s Canon in D.

  The wedding coordinator taps my shoulder. I give Olivia a quick hug, careful not to crush her veil, and walk into view. Every head turns toward me. I don’t love being the center of attention, but that has nothing to do with the tight knot in my stomach right now.

  Don’t look at him.

  How many times have I pled with myself in this way? Ignore him, forget him. I don’t know why I bother—it’s never worked once. Even now, with my boyfriend sitting somewhere in the crowd, I can’t seem to stop myself. I’m not five feet down the aisle before my gaze goes straight to the one person it shouldn’t go to: the best man.

  He stands to his brother’s right, watching me the way he’s done often over the past few months—as if he’d eat me alive if I’d allow it. His eyes, as blue as the sea behind him, meet mine, and my heart doesn’t seem to beat but bounce inside my chest. There’s one long bounce where five or six beats should have occurred. Inside my head I begin pleading with him: It’s not too late. You can still fix this. Please, please fix this.

  I hate waking from that dream. I hate the way I wake hungering for the sight of him, someone who never deserved a moment of my time in the first place.

  I open my eyes this morning with my ears still straining to hear the cellist, surprised for a moment to find only normal sounds—running water, the whir of an electric razor. My heart is still bouncing in my chest as I roll toward the nightstand and slip on my engagement ring. I can’t believe I’m still having that dream after so many years have passed.

  I know what a shrink would say, because I’ve already seen one. Cold feet, she assured me. It happens to everyone. God I hope she was right.

  Rob emerges from the bathroom clad only in a towel. “Sorry,” he says, frowning. “I was trying to be quiet.”

  He got stuck at a client thing and didn’t get in until after midnight, yet here it is barely 5 AM, and he’s already leaving for the day. This has been his life for months now, thanks to a merger he’s overseeing. I wound up scraping last night’s dinner into the trash. I don’t blame him for it, and the merger itself is nearly done, but I sometimes wonder if the frantic pace will ever end. Rob seems to enjoy it a little more than he should.

  “There’s no reason both of us should be running on fumes today,” he says. “Go back to sleep.”

  He grabs boxers and drops the towel, revealing a perfect body, honed by long hours in the gym and a commitment to healthy eating I wish I shared. It’s a pleasure to watch him dress, even this early in the day.

  “You know,” I say, attempting to sound seductive, “if we’re both awake and in the same place at the same time, I can think of something I’d rather do than sleep.”

  I’m not sure if I’m motivated by desire or guilt—I really hate that I had that dream again. Thank God he can’t see inside my head.

  He flinches. “They’re eight hours ahead in Amsterdam, hon. I’ve really got to get going. But I’ll be home early.”

  “Don’t remind me,” I groan.

  Brendan, Rob’s best friend, has just returned to Colorado after several years overseas, and he’s coming over tonight. This is only happy news for one of us.

  Rob arches a brow. “You promised you’d be nice.”

  “Just to be clear, I only promised to be civil. Which is more than I’ll get from him in return, I’m sure.”

  He sighs, pulling on his jacket.“I don’t understand why you hate him so much.”

  It’s nothing I’ve ever been able to explain. Hatred for Brendan is like some underground water source—you think you’ve got it all out in the open, but it just keeps coming.

  Except when I’m dreaming about him. I don’t seem to hate him much then.

  2

  Erin

  Present

  I am stewing. I’ve stared at my computer for so long without action that it’s gone into sleep mode twice.

  I know that Olivia—the only member of our college track team who was able to make running a career—is out training right now in the mountains north of Seattle. I’m tempted to call anyway, as if asking questions of her will somehow lessen my anxiety: Why is Brendan here when his entire family has moved away? Why can’t he move to Seattle instead?

  I’m not going to call, of course. Brendan is her brother-in-law, and she’s his biggest fan. She finds my belligerence toward him mystify
ing, the same way Rob does. Everyone in the freaking world seems to think he’s impossible to dislike. I know better.

  A file floats gently through the air, landing in front of me. I glance up to the top of my shared cubicle wall to find my officemate, Harper, staring down at me. “I just added something new to your Pinterest board,” she says. “The bouquet is calla lilies, tied with this orange ribbon that matches the sash on the bridesmaids’ dresses.”

  Harper’s obsession with my future wedding never fails to amuse me, given her own disdain for commitment. “The sash on what bridesmaids’ dresses?” I ask. “We haven’t even set a date yet.”

  She jumps down and comes around to my desk, moving several files to the floor before she sits on it. “Rob proposed over a year ago.”

  I shrug. “He’s been busy, and I’ve got the faculty catalogue coming out. There just hasn’t been time.”

  This all sounds so reasonable to me, but Harper groans loudly and bangs the back of her head against the carpeted cubicle wall.

  “The faculty catalogue? Do you hear yourself? This isn’t Doctors Without Borders, Erin. You work in a college PR department at a job you hate.”

  “I don’t hate my job.”

  “Of course you do,” she says, rolling her eyes at our boss’s closed office door. “We all hate our jobs.”

  She’s right, of course. Working for Timothy could ruin any job. He’s the worst combination of arrogance and stupidity, substituting marketing buzzwords for any actual knowledge. East Colorado University isn’t merely my employer—it’s also my alma mater, and the years I ran here with Olivia are some of my best memories, so putting out the right image of the university matters to me. What matters to Timothy, however, is Timothy. He can listen to himself talk for hours about nothing that will make us better at our jobs.

  “I’ll look at the Pinterest board later,” I promise, rocking back in my chair and closing my eyes. Thinking about the wedding makes me feel overwhelmed, and I feel overwhelmed enough right now as it is. “I’m just a little stressed out today.”

  “What’s up?”

  I hesitate, reluctant to even admit it aloud. “Brendan’s coming over for dinner tonight.” I guess I still feel guilty. The guilt lasts for days when I have one of those dreams.

  “Brendan? Insanely hot Brendan? I thought he lived in Europe or something.”

  “He did,” I sigh. “Italy, then Spain, then somewhere else. And now I guess he’s home.”

  Brendan moved away right after his brother and Olivia’s wedding, and it was a relief. Since then my life has been normal, devoid of all the highs and lows and drama. All I want, in the entire world, is for it to stay that way.

  “Let me see his picture,” she says. Her eyes take on that distant look they get whenever she’s thinking about sex. Which is like 90 percent of the day.

  I scowl. “Why would I have a picture of Brendan?”

  “Come on. You must have a picture somewhere online. On Facebook? Look at Olivia’s page. I bet there are pics on there from the wedding.”

  I’m guessing there are not. Olivia wasn’t even sure she wanted to get married in the first place. And posting photos of herself for the world to see is definitely not her style.

  Reluctantly I open my computer, but I don’t go to Olivia’s page, I go to Dorothy’s. She—mother of the groom, and also mother of Brendan—is one of my favorite people. No one was happier to see Will and Olivia get married than she was, and I guarantee she’s posted every picture taken at that wedding somewhere.

  I find them, buried under one million photos of her two grandchildren, and click on a picture of the four of us: Will and Olivia, me and Brendan. Harper makes this little groaning noise when she sees him, and even I swallow a little. Brendan has an impossibly perfect face: square jaw, straight nose, full lips, the palest blue eyes. I may hate him now, but I really can’t fault myself for the depth of the crush I once had.

  “Holy shit,” she breathes. “If he’s home, you’ve definitely got to set me up.”

  “Harper, I love you too much to expose you to that many STDs. Do you have any idea how many women he’s slept with?”

  “What I hear you telling me is that he’s hot and experienced. Which isn’t a con in my book.” She peers more closely at the screen, looking at an old picture of me and Olivia during our college track days. “Look at you back then! I’d barely recognize you now.”

  By the time I got to the wedding, I’d already broken my cheeseburger habit and started going to Pilates, but under Harper’s guidance, I’ve reluctantly undertaken all the other girl shit, like getting highlights and wearing makeup. “All the credit is yours.”

  “And that,” she says, tapping Brendan’s form on my screen, “is how you can say thanks.”

  I don’t see Brendan’s car out front, but the moment I walk in the house after work, I know he’s here. It’s confirmed when I hear his laugh, a sound I’d know anywhere—deeper than Rob’s, a husky, low chuckle that resides somewhere toward the bottom of his chest. I’m pretty sure he could get laid on the basis of that laugh alone, sight unseen.

  My stomach swims, the way it would preceding any unpleasant event, as I step out into the backyard. I realize the two of us should be able to act like adults by now. I also realize neither of us is likely to.

  Our eyes lock, and my heart stutters despite all its good intentions. I don’t know how it’s possible, but he’s actually gotten better looking. His skin is still golden, and his mouth still makes me think bad thoughts, but the boyish side of him is gone. He’s no longer lanky but ripped, and his hair is now shaved close, highlighting the angles of his face. That he somehow managed to improve sort of pisses me off.

  He sits in a chair across from Rob beside the fireplace, looking more relaxed on my fucking porch than I ever have, but that’s just vintage Brendan. He’s always been too self-assured and attractive for his own good.

  He stands, and we exchange a brief and impersonal hug. Even that feels like too much. Rob is hardly a small guy, but I feel dwarfed by Brendan, as if he could crush me by accident were he not careful enough. Given the look on his face when I walked outside, I would not be at all surprised to learn that he’s imagining crushing me as we hug. I’ve lost count of the number of times he’s tried to convince Rob to dump me, to not move in with me, not propose.

  Yes, I kissed another guy very early in my relationship with Rob. But how big a hypocrite must you be to hold that against someone when you’re the one she did it with?

  “I guess congratulations are in order,” Brendan says, returning to his seat as Rob pulls me into his lap. “When’s the big day?”

  “We haven’t gotten that far,” Rob says, “because one of us won’t set a date.” He tries to sound as if he’s joking, but I hear displeasure there too.

  Brendan eases back in his chair. There’s something effortlessly masculine about everything he does, including this. He sits back in the chair like a guy who’s about to get his third blow job of the day. Knowing him, it might not be that far from the truth.

  “You know, in Europe it’s pretty common to just get engaged and leave it at that,” he says.

  “Exactly!” I cry, turning to Rob. I should probably be more chagrined than I am to discover Brendan and I are arguing on the same side of anything. “Did you hear that, babe? I’m just being European about it.”

  “Except I don’t want a European girl. I want my Irish girl from New Jersey,” Rob says, pushing my hair behind my ear with an affectionate smile. “And I do want a wedding.”

  Brendan watches us with a look I can’t quite name. It’s disdainful, yet distant, as if we’re animals in a cage he’s forced to observe. I guess it makes sense. He’s only had one relationship that I know of—some girl in Italy—and it didn’t last.

  “So what about you?” Rob asks him. “What brings you home?”

  He shrugs. “Just felt like it was time. I’m planning to open my own tour company here in June, but before I do
anything I need to meet my new niece. I’m going up to Seattle this weekend.”

  I light up inside at the very thought of Caroline, Olivia and Will’s newest, who is soon to be my goddaughter—and Brendan’s. She’s the most beautiful baby I’ve ever laid eyes on, with eyes exactly like her uncle’s. He may be a menace to about 50 percent of the population, but no man alive has eyes like Brendan’s—a pale, translucent blue, the color of beach glass.

  I used to love beach glass. Not anymore.

  “Wait,” says Rob. “You’re opening a tour company here, but you’re staying with your mom and Peter out in Boulder?”

  Brendan shrugs. “It’s just until I know where the office will be. Then I’ll get a place closer in.”

  “You can’t make that drive every day,” Rob says. “Just stay with us. We’ve got the whole pool house sitting empty.”

  Somehow I manage not to let my jaw drop entirely, but there’s no doubt I look mutinous. Brendan is the last person I want staying in this state, much less my home, a fact that Rob is well aware of.