Total pages in book: 89
Estimated words: 87766 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 439(@200wpm)___ 351(@250wpm)___ 293(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 87766 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 439(@200wpm)___ 351(@250wpm)___ 293(@300wpm)
That’s it! I’m going to kill my sister.
“It’s okay,” he shakes his head. “She’s right in that I don’t, and I only hope that one day you can forgive me,” he sighs. “Just know that I didn’t mean for things to play out the way they did.”
“Did you put her up to asking me to come into school yesterday?”
“No!” He jumps. “That was pure fate,” he sighs, his mouth turning up into a small smile. “Wonderful, wonderful chance.”
“So you’ve spent all this time fishing Gracie for information and not contacting me?” I clarify.
“Would you have even talked to me?” He points out, and I sit back in my chair to think.
Yes.
No.
Yes.
“I dunno,” I shrug quietly.
“You always said that you were the one so obsessed with me, but you had it all wrong,” he implores. “It was me, who was always so consumed by you.”
I feel my eyes tearing, so full of hurt and anger, and yet still so full of need for things to just go back to the way they were. I look down at the ugly, stark white tablecloth. “And if we didn’t run into each other yesterday?”
“I was planning on calling you,” he admits. “I finally just got your number from Gracie only the other day.”
I give him a look. I am so going to murder her. Or thank her. Or thank her, and then kill her.
“I…” he hesitates. “I requested for her to be in my class this year. I guess we sort of became friends.”
I give him another look.
“Not like we were friends!” He shouts his clarification. “Gross, Luci, she’s your little sister.”
“Well, what am I suppose to think?” I shake my head, knowing full well it’s not what I think at all. “You had a wife the whole time, yet still...”
“Luci,” he sighs. “I wasn’t lying when I told you I never touched Holly while you and I were together. Shit, I wasn’t even living with her! I was staying at my sister’s! Even after she told me about the pregnancy!”
“But you failed to mention the fact that you even had a wife, or that she was pregnant!” I point out.
“Can you stop referring to her as my wife?” He pleads. “And I only found out about the pregnancy after things got serious between us.”
I give him a look of disbelief. He still found out about it, yet continued with me anyway, leaving me blindsided.
“I know how bad it looked-”
“It didn’t look bad!” I practically shout. “It was bad!”
“It’s the worst, most self-serving thing I have ever done,” he agrees. “Believe me when I say I didn’t want to give you up.”
“But you did,” I spit. “You chose the path that didn’t involve me.” I stop talking, regretting my words immediately. Of course he’s going to choose his wife and kid over some fling with a high school girl. Still, it hurt being second best.
“I was trying to do what was right for everyone involved,” he places both hands on the table, and I look down, not meeting his eye.
I can’t continue this fight. I’m over it. I’ve moved on. I take a long, deep breath.
“You said we were friends,” I spit, “but you and I? We were never friends.”
“No,” he smiles sadly.
“You and Gracie had no right.”
“Don’t be mad at her,” he persuades. “It was me. All me.”
“No, I’m upset and mad at her,” I whisper. “But you? I hate you.”
“I know,” he admits, flinching at my words, and we both fall quiet.
“But the problem is,” he sighs, and when I look up his sad eyes are eclipsed with a devilish gleam. “I still have feeling for you. Very strong feelings.”
“How?” I exclaim, utterly shocked. “It’s not poss-”
“If I’ve learned anything,” he laughs quietly. “And I have, please believe that I have… It’s that from here on out, I’m going to be nothing but up front and honest with you.”
“But you can’t still have strong feelings for me!” I accuse. “Not after waiting all these years, and from here on out? This,” I point between us. “This is a one time thing-”
“You were just coming out of high school! What did you want me to do, Luci? Fly to Italy and beg you to come home? Can you see how selfish that would have been? Or did you want me to wait until that winter, when you moved to Boston? When would it have been right for me to beg you? And then what? You would leave everything for me - your entire life and future, after what I did to you? That’s not fair to you.”
I don’t answer, because yes to all of the above. That’s what I would have wanted. That’s what would’ve made me the happiest. I don’t care about a single place I’ve been. I could’ve done without it all if it meant him.