by M Johnson
Maybe it’s a present for Sofie.
She is starting university next year, after all. But something isn’t sitting right with me. I’m unwilling and unable to let it go without at least investigating it first.
After a shower and some breakfast, I’m sober and aware enough to drive safely, so I get in my car and head to the address listed on the paperwork. From the outside, it looks like every other townhouse. There’s nothing special or sinister about it. Hell, it’s walking distance from the university Sofie wants to get into. Maybe it is for her, even if it’s a hell of a graduation present. I think for a moment, then I slide his passport out of my pocket and study it. I still can’t figure this out. Grabbing my phone off the charging mount, I punch in Aaron’s number.
“Hello?”
“Hey.” Fuck. He sounds half-asleep. “I didn’t wake you, did I?”
“Yeah. It’s the middle of the night over here, man.” He chuckles.
I frown and stare at the passport. I’m losing my fucking mind. There’s probably a reasonable explanation to why his passport is here.
Is there a reasonable explanation to why he’s fucking my wife, too?
“Everything okay, Zave?”
“Yeah, sorry, I was just wondering where you keep the spare key because I locked myself out.” I say the first thing that comes to mind, then instantly regret it. What if he calls Sofie?
“Sure, look in the fuse box.”
“Right. Thanks, man. I’ll speak to you later.”
I end the call and toss my phone on the seat next to me, annoyed at myself for getting so carried away. I start the car, and just as I’m about to drive off, I spot Maria. She’s a few cars away, crossing the road in the direction of the townhouse. When she reaches it, and without a single hesitation, she opens the door and disappears inside.
Okay, that is no fucking coincidence.
Paranoia and knowing what’s going on rise up in my skull, making me feel sick and borderline insane. Has Aaron been here all along? The nerve of the fucking guy, asking me to look after his daughter so he can shack up on the other side of town and bang my wife.
My blood boiling, I count to sixty, get out of my car and then stalk across the street to the townhouse. Holding my breath, I twist the handle. It’s unlocked. I let myself inside, keeping as quiet as I can.
I tilt my head, listening. I can hear voices upstairs. Clenching my jaw, I creep up the stairs of the townhouse, my mind flashing with images of Aaron on top of Maria, fucking her.
They have no idea they’re about to get busted, and the thought brings a bitter smile to my face. I pause outside the closed door, my hand lingering on the doorknob when the talking starts again.
“He’s going to figure it out.” Maria’s muffled voice floats through the thick wood. “I think you should tell him—”
“No.” Aaron sounds tired. Probably from all the sex he’s having with my wife. “Now, I’m done talking about this. If you want to leave, fine, but I’m not telling Zave—”
With a growl, I clench my jaw and fling the door open, storming into the room. Fists by my side, I’m ready to narrow in on Aaron and throw a few punches, but I stop when I see them, because they’re not locked in a lover’s embrace. They’re not even near each other. Maria sits at a small round table near the window and Aaron is in bed.
And he looks like absolute shit.
What the fuck is going on?
Chapter 17
Xavier
I stop and stare, a million questions swirling around my head.
Why is Aaron in bed? He looks sickly, pale, his cheeks hollow, dark circles beneath his eyes. Maria jumps to her feet, her eyes wide on me. She glances at Aaron, who nods. I look back and forth between the two of them, trying to figure out what the fuck kind of twilight zone I’ve stumbled into.
“What…?” I swallow, all the fight suddenly draining out of me. “What is going on?”
“Zave,” Aaron says weakly. He’s not smiling, but he doesn’t look angry either. “What are you doing here?”
“I found your passport,” I say. “And the mortgage statement…” I stop and shake my head. “I think the bigger question is, what are you doing here?”
Aaron sighs. “I’m sick, Zave,” he rasps.
A cough hits him then, and Christ, I’ve been around long-term chain smokers in the past, but they never sounded as bad as Aaron does right now.
“What do you mean?” I ask, my heart racing.
“Pancreatic cancer,” he explains. “It’s terminal. Spread to my lungs, my liver… the little fucker is everywhere. I’ve got a couple of weeks left, if I’m lucky.”
I stare at him for so long it feels like time freezes, then I slowly walk over to him and sink down onto the side of the bed next to him. He reaches out with a pale, trembling hand, and puts it over mine. Fuck, he’s colder than ice. I don’t say anything because I can’t find the words. They stick in my throat, choking me, until I force them back down. Maybe if I don’t ask questions, if I don’t acknowledge this, then I can convince myself it’s not really happening.
“I’ve been sick for months,” Aaron continues. “I was getting treatment without anyone knowing until she found out and insisted on being there for me.” He nods at Maria and my jaw clenches.
So… it wasn’t an affair.
She was helping Aaron while he was sick, making this difficult time just a little more bearable. Maybe I should feel gratitude towards her for being there for my friend, but the selfish part of me hates her even more for not telling me what was going on.
She thought letting me believe they were having an affair was a better option.
Aaron didn’t want to tell me—why?
“Don’t tell Sofie.”
Aaron’s voice cuts through my thoughts, the mention of Sofie’s name making me tense up all over again. I stare at him, his words sinking in.
“You have to tell her,” I say.
He winces and violently shakes his head.
“No. I want her to remember me as I was. Not like… this.” His dark eyes search mine. “Look at me, Zave. I’m a goddamn mess. She’s got so many great memories of us together…”
Jesus fucking Christ. I want to honour my friend’s dying wish, but hiding this from his own fucking daughter? Sofie would never forgive me if she found out I knew; if she was robbed of the chance of saying goodbye to her fucking dad.
He can’t expect me to do this.
But why wouldn’t he? As far as he’s concerned, I’m his friend, not Sofie’s.
“You can’t tell her,” Aaron insists, trying to sit up. He’s getting angry now and the more worked up he gets, the harder he struggles to breathe. “She’ll want to fix it, and there’s nothing she can do about it. I don’t want to break her heart.”
Fucking hell.
I swallow harshly. “Okay,” I finally force myself to say. “I won’t tell her.”
Aaron smiles weakly, his hand falling away from me as he sighs, and leans back against his mountain of pillows again. He doesn’t look like the man I remember, the man who I grew up with, who’s been by my side through the worst days of my life.
I glance at Maria, who’s still in the room, a silent watcher. The fact that she didn’t tell me, that she was willing to let me believe whatever I wanted to believe, fucking hurts. The fact that Aaron didn’t tell me and just made me agree to look after Sofie—I wouldn’t have even known either—that hurts too.
“Fuck,” Aaron sighs. “I gotta say, this might be worse than our benders back in the day.”
A weak smile tugs at my mouth. “Yeah?”
“Yeah. The pain meds really knock me out most days. You remember your bachelor party?”
I do, though the memory isn’t as fond as it used to be.
“You were out cold for almost a whole day,” I reply, my smile stretching a little wider. “Pussy.”
“I’d like to see you handle that shit like I did,” Aaron replies, that familiar playful smi
le coming to his face for the briefest moment. “You’d be a big bitch on the meds they give you for this shit.”
“Probably,” I murmur.
Aaron sighs again, then winces. “It kinda makes me regret giving all that up,” he admits. I turn and look at him, arching a brow with a small smile. “Glad I did, obviously.”
“You wouldn’t have met Anna, otherwise.”
“I miss the old days,” he says, a wistful smile on his face. “Us and the band. The music.” His voice is getting weak again, his blinks lasting a little too long. It’s obvious that he’s tired, but I haven’t seen him for ages and now, knowing that there’s going to be a time, soon, when I’ll never see him again…
Fuck, I wish he would just keep talking forever.
“Maybe I’ll slip you some LSD in your meds or something,” I tease. “Give you one last good trip before you go.”
Aaron grimaces. “LSD was never my drug, asshole,” he mutters.
I laugh weakly. Maria, in the corner of my vision, rolls her eyes, but she doesn’t comment. I know she doesn’t look back on our old days as fondly as I do.
Aaron sighs again, closing his eyes. I get up, sensing that he’s going to go to sleep.
Maria looks at me, pressing her lips together. I nod and then walk out with her. It’s weird, going from storming in here like a drunken asshole, ready to fight for my honour, to feeling so… drained and empty. I stop, at the door, my hand on the knob.
“You let me think you were having an affair,” I murmur, not looking at her.
She sighs. “I was having an affair,” she admits, making my lips curl back into a snarl. “It just wasn’t with Aaron.”
“And the work conference you went to? What did that have to do with Aaron?” I ask.
“He wanted a second opinion,’ she explains. “He needed my help. He needed your help with Sofie.”
“And I betrayed him,” I say, swallowing harshly.
She doesn’t deny it, which doesn’t make me feel any better, but to be honest, I’m glad she doesn’t try to make me feel better. That would be worse because I don’t deserve it.
I leave, walking to my car, but I don’t go anywhere for a long time. I just sit there, staring up at the roof, playing it over and over in my mind. All this time I thought Aaron was cheating with my wife, and he wasn’t.
He was fucking dying.
I want to scream, cry. I want to fucking punch the shit out of something, but most of all, I want to feel numb. I can’t go back to the house. I can’t face Sofie just yet. I’ll want to tell her the truth, which is the one thing I can’t do.
It was the last thing Aaron asked me to do—keep his secret.
I have to honour that.
I have to.
Chapter 18
Xavier
It’s been four days since I found out about Aaron and the only reason Sofie doesn’t know about it is because I’ve barely seen her. Thank God she’s distracted by her exams, because I’m a fucking mess. My only option right now is to put more hours in at the bar in order to avoid her. I can’t be around her. I know I’ll want to tell her about her father, because all I can think about is how much she’s going to hate me for not saying anything.
How can I, though, when I promised Aaron I wouldn’t?
I have to hide it away like a terrible secret and hope like hell she’ll understand once…
Once what?
Once her father dies without her being able to say goodbye?
Yeah, she’ll forgive me, no problem.
I’ve been visiting Aaron every night when I finish up at the bar. Avoiding him because I’m sleeping with his daughter feels wrong when my friend has limited time left on this earth. Tonight, I finish up at the bar later than usual, but I still stop by. I don’t care if he’s asleep, I just want to spend as much time with him as I can to make sure he knows I’m there for him. It’s a switch up from my usual style—running away and hiding from an emotional situation rather than dealing with it—but I figure I owe him that much.
I knock on the door and a few seconds later, Maria opens it, her eyes flickering in surprise. She grips the door, like she’s undecided on whether to let me in.
“He’s probably asleep,” she says, eyes narrowed and tone sharp. “You do realise how late it is?”
“Yeah,” I say, and push past her, anyway.
She sighs and follows me into the living room. The townhouse is plainly decorated with as little furniture as possible. I sit down on the uncomfortable couch. Maria, always prim and proper, sits down on the other end of it.
Usually, the moment I arrive, she can’t get out the door fast enough. Like we can’t even have a civil conversation without fighting. In fact, this is the longest we’ve managed to go without fighting or exchanging barbed words in a long time—maybe because tonight I barely have enough energy to be nice to her, let alone get worked up.
“Are you okay?” she asks me.
“No,” I reply, and stare at the ceiling. “Not really.”
“So, you’re still with her, then?”
I can feel her eyes on the side of my face as I laugh at the edge to her voice.
“I don’t need your judgement,” I say quietly. “I’m doing enough of that on my own.”
She’s silent for a moment, but then she presses her lips together and sighs through her nose.
“What is it about her?” she asks. I turn and frown at her, not sure how to answer that. “I spent years trying to break down your walls, Zave. I tried so hard… you know I tried. And then she comes along, bats her precious eyelashes and you’re falling over yourself trying to please her.” My frown deepens at her cheapening my connection with Sofie, but I bite my tongue. “Do you have any idea how much of a failure that makes me feel like? How much I fought, for us, for that long, and it was never enough.”
I stare. “Do you hate her for that?”
“You know I don’t hate Sofie,” she murmurs, her voice softening. “I just… I hate that I wasn’t the one who was able to get through to you.”
A deafening silence fills the air. I stare at my hands because I’m not sure what to say to her. For once, a snarky remark doesn’t feel appropriate, and explaining my feelings for Sofie to my wife doesn’t feel right either. As much as I hate to admit it, I have to acknowledge that it was Maria who got through to me, in some fucked-up way. It took her cheating on me to realise I wanted to enjoy life again.
Sofie was just… in the right place at the right time.
“Maria.” She stands up as Aaron’s wheezing call for her floats down from upstairs.
I stay on the couch until a few seconds later when I hear the sound of footsteps. I look up and see Maria hovering halfway up the stairs.
“You can go in and see him, if you want,” she says.
I nod and go up to Aaron’s room. My eyes widen when I take him in. He looks like absolute shit warmed over. Even in the small span of twenty-four hours, he’s so much worse. He’s a skeleton with skin, wasting away, the deep circles under his eyes so dark they’re almost black.
Fuck. He looks like he’s dead already.
Aaron meets my eyes and grins at me. “You look about as good as I feel.”
“That’s rich,” I rasp, coming to sit beside him.
“The upside is, I won’t get much worse than this, right?”
He chuckles, the sound like a soft breeze over old paper, rattling around in his lungs. The way he can just laugh and joke about dying like it’s nothing rips my heart out all over again. God, I haven’t hurt this much since the accident, since I lost Dylan. Aaron was the rock through so much of that, and now I’m going to lose him too.
“You don’t have to come here every night, you know.”
“I want to.”
“Isn’t there something better you could be doing with your time?”
“What could be better than spending time with your sorry face?” I say, smiling in spite of the fact that I don’t feel even the slighte
st bit happy.
I’m angry and upset at the world because someone else is being taken from me, and this time I get a front-row seat to sit and watch it happen. Losing Dylan was so sudden, it happened so fast that I had no time to prepare myself. Sometimes, I’ve even caught myself wishing his death wasn’t so instant, so that I could’ve had a chance to say goodbye. Seeing how much Aaron is suffering right now makes me feel sick at how fucking selfish that was.
“Then you need to get out more.” Aaron grins at me. “Maybe try and reconcile with your wife. For my sake.”
I cough to smother a laugh. Yeah, there’s no way in hell that’s happening.
I sneak a glance at my friend, my heart aching. Every breath in and out is a struggle. I can tell from the way his chest slowly rises, then caves in as he sucks air into his lungs, but it doesn’t stop him from trying to talk, making the most of the little time we have.
“What do you think the afterlife is like?” he muses aloud.
I shrug. “Nothing.”
He turns his head and lifts his brows, his eyes lit with amusement.
“Nothing?”
“Yeah. We do what we do when we’re alive and then we’re done.”
Aaron hums. “That sounds boring.”
“I don’t think you’re aware of it.” I shrug. “It’s just… nothing.”
He tilts his head. “I think it’s gonna be like… a never-ending night out,” he says. His voice is wheezy, slurring a little, but his eyes are still as sharp as ever. “That moment when everything makes you feel on top of the world, forever.” His cracked lips lift into a smile and he laughs, triggering off another round of coughing that makes me cringe. “Like that time we went out for Benji’s birthday, remember that?”
I chuckle. How could I forget?
We were twenty and our good friend’s little brother had just turned eighteen, so we took him out for a night to remember. I don’t recall much of that night, to be honest, other than the bits I saw on the news the next day, because apparently getting drunk, naked, and storming into a Country Women’s Association awards night is frowned upon. I shake my head, because it feels like a lifetime ago. The ironic thing is we were older than Sofie is now.