by Holly Jaymes
“Allison!” my mother called sharply.
“Let him go,” my father said.
I looked at them. “He’s not wrong.”
My mother bristled while my father let out a resigned breath and sank into his chair.
“What do you mean?” my mother asked.
“I mean, we’re shallow and self-centered.”
“I beg your pardon,” my mother jerked. “We do lots of good in the community. There are many ways to contribute, besides running into burning homes.”
“But you don’t do it out of the goodness of your heart. You do it so people will think you’re great or for a plaque.” I felt like my world was crumbling around me.
“You don’t think he gets something out of fighting fire. He gets a paycheck, doesn’t he?” my mother said in her snippy tone.
“He risks his life. There are easier ways to get a paycheck,” I argued.
“Not with an AA degree there isn’t—”
“Mother!” I shook my head. “You just proved my point. You’re judging him because of his degree, and not on what’s really important.”
She had the sense to look chagrined. “He might be a fine person, but he’s not for you, Allison.”
No. I made sure of that by not stepping up to support him as my parents demeaned his education and job.
“Your mother is right. He doesn’t like or respect us,” my father said.
I laughed. “You two are something. Why would he like you? You’ve insulted his job, his family, his grandmother’s beautiful ring—” I looked down, realizing he didn’t take it with him. “He’s right, you don’t buy respect, you earn it, and you didn’t earn his.”
“Allison, you’re rude,” my mother said.
“I’m telling the truth. If an apocalypse happened, our family and families like it would never survive.”
My father frowned. “We’d do just fine.”
“Would we? Money wouldn’t matter. Survival would. What do we know about how to survive besides talking behind people’s backs? We’d be kicked out of any groups because we have no skill to offer, and we’re annoying and mean.”
“Bravo, Allison,” Victoria clapped from where she stood in the doorway.
“Victoria, don’t encourage her.” My mother pressed a hand to her temple as if we were giving her a headache.
“The problem is your final stand is too little too late. I couldn’t stop him from leaving,” Victoria said to me.
“Good. Now this family can go back to normal. We have a brunch to attend. Oh!” My mother thought for a moment. “I’ll call the restaurant and have them switch the seating. Maxwell should be there—”
“Is it that you don’t listen or don’t care?” I asked her, completely stunned that she was back on Maxwell again.
“What?” my mother’s expression suggested she really didn’t know what I was talking about.
“Allison has been clear that she’s not interested in Maxwell,” my father explained. At least he listens.
“You don’t know him, Allison—”
I jammed my fists on my hips and glared at her. “I know that he hires prostitutes. Is that what you want for me, mother? A husband that pays for sex?”
My mother blanched. “That can’t be true.”
“I think he uses a high-class escort service, but it's just as bad, right?” Victoria said.
“I’m not going. I’m going to pack and go home.” I turned to leave.
“Don’t you walk out, Allison,” my mother said in a tone I hadn’t heard since I was a kid.
Victoria put her arm out and stopped me. “Stay. We’ll hang and talk like real sisters are supposed to.”
I felt like I needed to go after Josh. It was not just a longing, but like my very future happiness depended on it. For so long, I’d felt out of sync with my family and life. I’d gone to Eden Lake to find my own rhythm. I didn’t realize until too late that it was with him that I’d felt normal in my own skin.
“He needs time,” she added.
Reluctantly, I nodded.
“Allison and I are going to go have some sister time. Ta.” Victoria hooked her arm in mine and led me upstairs.
“Let ‘em go,” I heard my father tell my mother.
We went to Josh’s room. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to be closer to him or to punish myself. He’d left his bag and all the clothes I’d had him get for the trip.
“He really wanted out. He didn’t even take his toothbrush,” Victoria said as she looked in the bag.
I didn’t want her there witnessing my misery, but I didn’t have the strength to send her away.
I sank onto my bed. “I just want to hide.”
Victoria went to the sliding door and opened it, letting the ocean breeze waft in. Then she looked at the bedside table. She walked over to look closer and picked up the waste can.
“Hmm. Three times, huh?”
I looked at her, only then noting the condom wrappers. I was sure she was looking at the condoms in the trash.
“I’ll flush these and get rid of the evidence. Unless you want mom and dad to know you and Josh had sex under their roof. Personally, I’d like to see that.”
I flopped back on the bed. “This isn’t funny.”
She sighed. “No. It’s not.” She sat next to me. “What happened to being your own person?”
“I know. I brought a fake fiancé. I lied to appease them.”
“First, there’s nothing fake between you and Josh. Maybe you’re not engaged, but there’s something there.”
“No, there isn’t.” If there had been, it was surely gone now.
“Allison, women go their entire lives wishing someone would look at them the way Josh looks at you.”
I looked up at her, wanting to believe what she was suggesting was true that Josh loved me. The fact that he was so hurt earlier indicated he felt something, and my heart ached as I realized that perhaps my feelings weren’t one-sided. Perhaps he cared for me too, and that meant I’d lost even more than I even had realized.
At the same time, whether I stood up to my parents or not wouldn’t have mattered. The fact remained that my parents didn’t like him. They’d never accept him. I wanted to live my own life, but I didn’t want to live it without my parents or with constant tension.
“It’s probably for the best,” I said, resigned that Josh and I weren’t meant to be.
“What is?” she asked.
“That everything ended with Josh.”
“You don’t mean that.”
“I do. Our lives are different. He’s not really a settle-down type of guy. Back at Eden Lake, he has a reputation as a ladies’ man.”
She pursed her lips at me. “Don’t be putting this on him. You’re the one that failed him.”
I draped my arm over my eyes, wanting to close off the world. “I’m the worst.”
“What does your true self tell you?” Victoria said, laying back next to me.
“To let him go.”
“Ugh. Wrong answer.”
“No, really. I don’t want all this drama and angst. It would just be more of this if I choose to be with him. Mom and dad would never accept him. And Josh isn’t going to put up with their condescension.”
“I can’t believe you, Allison. You’re saying he’s not worth fighting for. You’re an idiot.”
She wasn’t wrong.
She stood. “I can’t decide if you’re a coward or just not as different from the parental unit as you claim you are. He deserves a woman who’ll fight for him.”
“He didn’t fight for me.”
She rolled her eyes. “You really are spoiled. He stood up to mom and dad and begged you to tell him he meant something. If that’s not fighting for you, I don’t know what is.” She gave me a disappointed look and left the room, taking the trash can with the evidence of the night I spent with Josh in it.
I rolled over and started to cry as I realized she was right. He reached out to me, and I did nothin
g. But I still couldn’t get past the reality that if I asked him for a chance, our lives would be more of the same. I would continuously be pulled between him and my parents.
I cried all the tears I had stored at the moment. Then I got cleaned up and went downstairs. My parents were in the living area, my father with the newspaper and my mother giving her maid some directions.
“Oh, dear Allison. You need some eye drops,” my mother said, going over to the table that held her purse. She pulled out eye drops and handed them to me. “I hope you’ve got him out of your system.”
“I don’t, but you don’t have to worry, he won’t be in my life. It would be cruel of me to ask him to put up with this family.”
My mother’s eyes narrowed.
“And he wouldn’t take me back anyway. I let him down.”
“You seem to be under the impression that we don’t like Mr. Dalton because of his background,” my father said.
I quirked a brow. “I wonder why? Let’s see, you dismissed his degree, his career, his grandmother’s ring. I don’t know why I’d think you objected to him based on his background.”
“Allison, I want you to be happy,” my father said, standing. “I’m more bothered by the fact that you felt like you had to lie to us and bring a fake fiancé.” He looked over at my mother. “Although I suppose I could see why that would happen.”
“What? You’re going to blame me for all this?” my mother snapped. “This is the world we live in.”
“Not me. Not anymore,” I said. “I’m tired of trying to live up to your standards, especially when they go against my nature.”
“I thought you said he was out of your system,” my mother said.
“You have a good life mother if the worst thing in your life is worry about whether or not I’ll be with someone who saves lives for a living.” I was so disappointed in my mother but more than that, in myself.
“I’m tired of you judging me, Allison.”
I laughed. My father’s eyes widened in surprise, and my mother’s narrowed.
“You’re such a hypocrite. It’s okay for you to judge, but heaven forbid someone judges you.”
“Allison,” my father started, but I cut him off.
“From now on, I’m living my own life. If you try to set me up with Maxwell or anyone, I won’t come to family events anymore. If you judge my life or my friends, I won’t talk to you. I’m done trying to fit into your mold. You can meet me halfway, or you can let me go. It’s your choice.” I turned to head out to the driveway.
Victoria had a smirk as I passed her. “You go, girl.”
I somehow made it through the brunch. Afterward, when we got home, I headed out to the beach to have some alone time. Josh would be home by now. How did he even get home?
“Allison.”
I turned to find my father standing beside me.
“If you’re going to ask me to apologize, I’m not. Well, I’m sorry for lying about Josh. But that’s it.”
“I have a problem with you thinking that we don’t want you to be happy. Or that you feel we’re trying to dictate your life.”
“You want me to be happy living your life. But I don’t want that life, and you think any other life isn’t worth living.”
“You’re being unfairly critical.”
I gaped at him. He gave me a small smile. “Your mother has a few other ideas around that, but she loves you, Allison. Don’t ever question that.”
I looked back over the water. “I know.”
“How serious is this thing with Mr. Dalton?”
“It’s not.” It could have been, I realized.
“He seemed to think differently.”
“Yeah, well, I’m sure he knows the score now.” Guilt burned my gut at how much I hurt him.
“He’d be a fool to let you go because of your parents.”
I looked up at my father, confused by his words. Did he want me to be with Josh? “He didn’t let me go because of that. He let me go because I let him down.”
My father put his arm around me. “Love is a strange thing. Between you and me, my parents didn’t much like your mother. At least not at first.”
“What?”
He shrugged and gave me a smile, then he turned and headed back to the house.
Aftermath
Josh
Wyatt was the best big brother ever. Since we were kids, he’d taken his role as older brother seriously. He’d protected me from bullies on the playground, taught me how to play soccer and football, and when Coreen Binder broke my heart in ninth grade, he helped me through it.
What I felt after Coreen dumped me for Eric Smithers, was nothing compared to how I felt now. It was like Allie had reached inside my chest and ripped my heart out. Wyatt, being a good big brother, seemed to know when to push me and when to let me wallow in my pain.
As we entered Eden Lake city limits, he said, “It’s Sunday, so it's family dinner night. You’re not expected since you’re supposed to be with Allie, so if you want me to cover for you, I can.”
“Yeah, thanks. I don’t think I can face anyone.” I did a facepalm as a thought came to me.
“What?”
“She still has grandma’s ring.”
“I’m sure she’ll give it back.” Wyatt stopped at a red light. “Do you want me to get it, so you don’t have to see her?”
I shook my head. I was twenty-five years old. It was time for me to pull up my big-boy boxers and be a man. “Nah. I’ll deal with it.”
Wyatt pulled into the parking lot of my condo building. I expected him to drop me off there, but he parked and started to walk to my unit with me.
“You don’t have to babysit me,” I said, not wanting to be rude, but I needed time alone to figure out what to do about all these messy feelings.
“I want a beer.”
“I don’t know that I have any,” I said as I unlocked my door.
He smirked. “You always have beer.” He wasn’t wrong about that.
I let him in and went to the bathroom to splash cold water on my face. I felt like I was walking in a fog, and I hoped that would snap me out of it. When I got back to the living room, Wyatt was on the balcony overlooking the lake.
He handed me a beer and clinked his bottle against mine.
“What are we toasting to?” I asked.
“As fucked up as life gets, you still have the family and me, and this fantastic view.”
I let out a small laugh, which was strange as I never thought I’d laugh again. “To fantastic views.”
We took a seat in the resin chairs and sat quietly, taking in the view and drinking beer. I wondered how many beers it would take to numb the pain in my chest.
“They think I’m low class.” I don’t know why I said that. Maybe I needed Wyatt to reassure me that I wasn’t the loser Allie’s parents seemed to think I was.
“They’re fucking snobs, Josh. You run into burning buildings for a living. What do they do? Shop?”
I smiled as I realized this was what I needed. I needed him to commiserate with me.
“I told them I saved a kid up the hill from them during last year’s fire in Malibu. I asked them what they’d done because I didn’t see them risking their lives for their neighbors.”
“Good one.” He held up his hand, and I high fived it. “I bet it’s hard to grow up with that sort of attitude.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, it sounds like they’re the classic definition of a snob, but I never got that vibe from Allie. She always seemed nice.” He sipped his beer.
“She says she wants to find her own way, be her own person, but when she had the chance, she fell in line with her parents.”
“It can be hard to go up against parents, especially the high and mighty ones.”
I glared at him, not liking where he was going with this conversation. “You’re siding with her?”
“Nah. I have your back, Josh, you know that. I’m just saying that maybe she w
as caught between a rock and a hard place.”
“She chose the rock.” I took a long gulp of my beer.
“It’s probably hard to feel like she has to choose between her family and you.”
I gritted my teeth, wanting to lash out at him for sympathizing with her. “First, I don’t know that she felt like she had to choose. It’s not like we declared our feelings. In fact, we were fake engaged. It was just an act for her.”
“Did you sleep with her?”
“What the fuck, Wyatt?”
He shrugged. “In my opinion, she wouldn’t sleep with you simply because she was fake engaged.”
I stared out over the lake wishing he’d leave.
“Did you?” he prodded.
“Did I what?” I snapped.
“Sleep with her?”
“What’s your interest in my sex life?”
He smirked. “I’m going to take that as a yes, which means she must feel something for you.”
“I encouraged her to be herself. I supported her desire to find her own way.” I wasn’t the bad guy in this scenario.
“While helping her hide behind a lie.”
“Jesus.” I stood, feeling a little betrayed. “My point is, she didn’t have to choose, at least not on my side.”
“She may have felt she had to choose. What could she have done differently when being grilled by her parents?”
“She didn’t have to say I didn’t mean anything.” I finished my beer, wishing I had something stronger.
“Just because she said it, doesn’t mean she meant it. We’ve all told the parents things that weren’t true to get them off our backs.”
I turned to face Wyatt, leaning back against the railing. “I don’t want to be with a woman that is going to lie to her parents about me.”
“So, you do think she was lying to them when she said you didn’t mean anything to her.”
Jesus fucking Christ. “I don’t know if she was lying or not. The point is, I have enough pride to want my woman to be honest to her parents about how she feels about me.”
“So, she did have to choose?”
God. “You like kicking me while I’m down, don’t you?”
He set his beer down and came to stand with me. “I’m not kicking you. I want you to think this thing through. Don’t give up on a chance of love if it can be saved. I get that you’re hurt, but sometimes that doesn’t let us see the full picture.” He put his hand on my shoulder and squeezed. “But I agree, I would want my woman to be proud to be with me.”
