Been There Done That

by Smartypants Romance

  “And deceitful.”

  He acknowledged that with a shrug. “Yeah. But he did it for your own good.”

  “That sounds so condescending—”

  “Life isn’t fair, Zora. Nick would know that more than most people, especially given how far he’s gotten from where he started. Good guys finish last, and girls don’t like them until they’re weightlifting in college. In real life, the nerdy girl doesn’t just take off her glasses, put in contacts, and become popular.”

  “Why do I even talk to you? And what movies have you been watching?”

  “Because you know I’ll tell you the truth, even when you’re going all Lisa Simpson on me.” He caught my gaze, pointed at me. “And because that man loves the hell out of you.”

  “You don’t even like him.”

  He waggled his head from side to side. “Eh. Well, for one thing, we weren’t really in a position to like each other. I was standing in the way of what he wanted. And he was always such a smug, sly little—”

  “What’s the second thing?”

  He put down his burger. “I talked to my dad.”

  “Huh?”

  “My dad. He was there the night Mrs. Rossi overdosed and Nick got into it with the Iron Wraiths. Said he drove up on Nick getting his ass kicked by a mob of them.” His gaze stayed on the surface of the table, fingers drumming. “Hearing how things went down that night, the state of mind Nick was in? I can’t help but sympathize with what that guy’s been through. Even if he was the smartest, cockiest kid in high school. I mean, so what? Yeah, he was taking college classes. Didn’t make him that special.”

  “What did your dad tell you?”

  Jackson hesitated. “Some of it you should let Nick tell you. But the one thing I feel comfortable telling you is something my dad said he was floored by. He said that even as worn out, scared, and shocked as Nick was, his first thoughts were about protecting you. Said he didn’t think an eighteen-year-old could be capable of such selflessness, especially under the circumstances.”

  I sat back, mind racing.

  “Can you blame him?”

  “What?”

  “Can you blame him if he did the exact same thing again, all these years later? I see how it’s controlling; I see how you might call it manipulation. But I also see how the guy might act that way, seeing as he was backed in a corner all those years and figured out how to make it on top. Just so he could protect you again.”

  We sat in silence. Jackson stuffed his face with more burger, chased it with a beer.

  “But,” he said, so abruptly I jumped a little, “There’s no dismissing the fact that he deliberately deceived you. Again. As a law enforcement officer, I’m always conscious of how patterns in a person’s behavior can increase the odds of recidivism.” He pointed his beer bottle at me. “So, you can’t make it easy for him, you can’t teach him that this kind of behavior will ever be overlooked in the future. Let him sweat and make him convince you he’s reformed. But for what’s it worth, I do think he’s capable of reforming.”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You think he is, too. Besides,” he said, “you gave up all this,” he gestured to himself with a flourish, “to explore a relationship with this guy. You had to be in love to let a prize like me go. Admit it.”

  “Did you even chew any of that?”

  “Admit it.”

  “I was trying to avoid a venereal disease, that’s why I threw you back in.”

  “He’s still in town, you know.”

  I’d wondered about that.

  “How do you know?”

  “Because I gave him a ticket this morning,” he said, joy all over his face.

  “Couldn’t help yourself, huh?”

  “Of course I couldn’t. Broken heart’s hard for a man, but it doesn’t give you license to drive five miles over the speed limit.”

  “God, Jackson.”

  He reached across the table and clasped my hand. “I love you, Zora. I do. And I wouldn’t be talking this way if I didn’t think the guy had your best interests at heart. Or that he really loved you. I guess the only question is, what are you willing to do about it?”

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Nick

  “Are you dead?”

  I jerked awake. Eddie’s faded jeans and ratty athletic shoes stood three feet away from the couch where I’d fallen asleep, face-down. I grimaced at the greasy seal between my face and the faux leather, slowly peeling myself up from the cushion. Sitting upright, I saw Eddie with a duffel bag slung across his chest. He looked beyond pissed, his normally good-natured expression murderous.

  I rubbed the sleep out of my eyes. “That remains to be seen,” I said.

  “You look like you’ve got one foot in the grave if that’s your goal, so, congrats.”

  “How did you even get in here?”

  He sent me a dark look before settling at the end of the couch. “Your front door is standing open and the screen was unlocked.”

  I gave a half-hearted shrug. “It’s Green Valley. Not Manhattan or San Francisco. And if someone did come in here to put me out of my misery, I’d thank him.”

  “Where’s Sir Duke?” he asked, a clear thread of disapproval running through his voice. “He didn’t come to the door.”

  The weight of my head seemed to test the limits of my neck’s strength, so I rested it in my hands. “There’s something to be said for silent camaraderie, don’t you think?”

  “I’m in no mood for your smart-ass comments right now. I just had to take a plane out here because your staff is convinced you’ve had some kind of nervous breakdown. Then I get,” I heard him rummaging around, “these bullshit papers from our lawyers.”

  “Sir Duke is with the sitter, some kid in high school. She’s much better company right now, anyway.”

  “And I’m holding papers approving the sale of all your shares to me, why?”

  Scratching the back of my neck, I caught a whiff of eau de rotten onions wafting from my armpit.

  “Nick,” Eddie said, sharply.

  “Yeah?”

  “What makes you think I have any intention of letting you step down or leave Rocket?”

  “Doesn’t work that way, Eddie. I don’t need a permission slip from you to quit.” Where were my pants? What day was it?

  “I don’t want to buy your shares,” Eddie said, his tone so petulant I couldn’t help a half-chuckle.

  “That’s fine. You can have them. My gift.”

  I pushed to my feet and stood, stretching muscles and sinews gone stiff from disuse. When was the last time I’d eaten? Was there anything in the fridge? I made three steps toward the kitchen before Eddie spoke again.

  “You must be a dead man walking. ’Cause you just told me you’d give me what amounts to the GDP of a small country.”

  Hopelessness and grief reassumed their respective perches on my shoulders. Life had been unbearable since Zora turned Sir Duke and I out of her house. I did feel like a dead man walking.

  I turned back to Eddie and found him watching me with wide eyes. Anguish clotted my throat, and I attempted to clear it. “It doesn’t matter, Eddie. Don’t you get that? I don’t care about those fucking shares or how much they’re worth or whether you decide to stick them up your ass. It’s just money.”

  A slow smile crept across Eddie’s face. “This is great.”

  I looked around for something to throw at him. “Would you stop it? You look like some kind of creepy-ass clown. There’s nothing funny about any of this.”

  He was full-on grinning now. “Aunt Nan said it was bad, but I didn’t think you’d fallen this low. Friend, I have to say, rock-bottom looks good on you.”

  “Fuck you, Eddie.”

  He sat back against the couch cushion, making a show of burrowing into its plushness. “Well, you’ve done a fantastic job of fucking yourself. I told you not to lie to her, didn’t I?”

  Smug bastard. “Is this why you came here? To say, I told you s
o?”

  He shook his head, still smiling that idiotic smile. “Nah. You already know, and you’re living the consequences from the looks of this trashed house and the fact that you smell,” he sniffed experimentally at the air, “like you’ve gone at least three days without a shower.”

  He wasn’t far off. “Go back to San Francisco, Eddie. Leave me alone.”

  “So this is your plan?” He gestured around the dark living room and empty containers of carry-out strewn all around the tables and floor. “Quit Rocket, leave us on the hook for the projects you started that only you can finish, abandon everything we took so much time building. Just walk away from it all. For what? To live in Green Valley indefinitely with the hope that she might speak to you again?”

  I fell into the nearby armchair, no longer caring about eating. “She won’t speak to me. Leigh said if I call or come by again, she’ll run my nuts through a cheese grater.”

  Eddie winced and slid a protective hand over his crotch. “That’s hardcore. But then again, you fucked up—”

  “I know,” I yelled, and Eddie fell into laughter, infuriating me even further.

  “This is the best thing that could have happened to you,” he said, sobering. “You finally get it. I truly believe you’ve learned from the error of your ways and you’ll keep that meddlesome shit to yourself in the future. Now you just need Zora to know that.”

  “She won’t—”

  “Don’t be so passive. You sure as hell weren’t when you took off on this mission and made life hell for the rest of us. Take your licks, do what you have to do. Use that same persistence and hardheadedness that got us this far. If your nuts have to be grated in the process, so be it,” he said, his voice full of meaning.

  I sat back, considered his words. “I’m still not coming back. You’re taking those shares, one way or the other.”

  “Okay,” he said, unconvincingly.

  I sat forward, elbows on my knees. God, this place, this house was terrible without Zora. I couldn’t even contemplate another day, let alone a lifetime, without her.

  “I’m ready,” I told Eddie. “Ready to run my nuts through the woodchipper.”

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Zora

  “I know what I need to do.”

  Leigh looked up from her sideways perch in the armchair and lowered her magazine to face me.

  “Now who’s using someone’s house key without warning, hmm?”

  I ignored her and rushed in to sit on the opposite couch. “Listen. I know what I’m gonna do.”

  She tossed her magazine to the floor, peering up at me with mussed hair and mascara-smudged blue eyes. “About which part? There’s so many things you need to address.”

  “I heard back from the NIH today, about that Hail Mary grant I submitted last month.”

  She sat up, her eyes wide. “What did they say?”

  “The committee scored my grant. I got a great score. An amazing score. Way above the pay line. It’s most likely going to be funded.”

  She jumped up from the chair. “Oh! Oh my God!”

  Then she screamed, arms in the air, and ran several laps around the living room.

  I watched her, bemused, reflecting on how much I loved her.

  She made a victory lap back to me, frowning. “Okay . . . why are you not happy? I thought you’d be deliriously happy. Like, run-out-in-the-street-naked happy. What’s going on?”

  I sat back. For the first time since losing Nick, I felt a glimmer of hope that mixed with the ever-present pain.

  I’d accepted the hurt would never go away. Someway, somehow, I’d have to live without Nick in my life.

  Leaving him would always be my biggest regret. I now knew from experience I’d never get over this pain, but I had to carry on. Keep pushing on.

  I took a breath, pushed down the sadness.

  “I actually sat down with patients today. Carly was in a car accident—”

  “She okay?”

  “Yeah, thank goodness. But when I sat with them, I remembered what I loved so much about this kind of work. It reminded me of the days when I worked with the ladies in my mother’s support group.”

  Leigh stared, silent.

  “I realized what was wrong. Finally. The thing that got me into this work, the thing that I loved most? I don’t do it anymore. I don’t work with people one-on-one, I don’t do any of the education, the coaching, the counseling. I got so caught up in the machine of it all that I lost touch.”

  Leigh looked cautious. “So, what does this mean?”

  “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but . . . I’m quitting my job. I’m not going to take on the grant. I checked with the grant administrator. Adesola is my co-investigator on it and they’re reasonably sure she’ll be able to keep it. My employees will have jobs, long-term funding. They’ll be okay, thank God. That’s the most important thing.”

  Leigh’s mouth hung open. “You just said what?”

  “Yep. I’m quitting.”

  “And you’re smiling about it. But,” Leigh spluttered, “you just got tenure. Finally. I’ve spent the last two years listening to you explore every possible doomsday scenario. How you would end up homeless and unloved if you didn’t get a grant or didn’t get tenure. And now what? You’re just going to throw it all away?”

  “Yes.” Certainty that I’d finally done the right thing rushed through me.

  But it was bittersweet.

  Because the first person I’d wanted to tell?

  Nick.

  Even with the brave face I put on, inside I was bleeding.

  She sat down, looking dazed. “All right. Okay. Anything else?”

  “Yes. I’m going to start a nonprofit. It’ll be very small at first, just here in Green Valley. We’ll focus on patient advocacy to start. I’ll actually use all the patient materials, the decision aids, the question prompt lists, all the tools we developed to help patients better communicate with their doctors. I’ll get help from other clinicians and educators to do education classes and teach people how to manage their chronic illnesses. We’ll provide space for support groups, right here in Green Valley. Maybe even have a day where we get a volunteer nurse practitioner in to see folks, so they don’t have to drive all the way to the hospital. That’s just to start. Then, I’m going to work at a national level, pick some of my colleagues’ brains about advocacy work for burned-out clinicians. I’m going to travel, try to learn more about what works in other health care systems. I can’t lie, I don’t have it all figured out at all. I’m sure I’m gonna mess up. But I’m excited to see where this takes me.”

  I was breathless, excited by the possibilities, eager to find another piece, another dimension of myself.

  I was simultaneously heartbroken Nick wouldn’t be by my side.

  Leigh looked stunned. “You’re serious.”

  “I am.”

  “Wow.”

  I lowered the last boom.

  “And I’m going to London for a few weeks.”

  “Who are you?”

  “Remember Christen, from grad school? The exchange student from Oxford? Well, we kept in touch over the years. She’d been begging me to visit, and I finally said yes. She runs a patient advocacy organization out of London and said I could shadow her to learn more.”

  Leigh sighed. “That’s why you’re going to London?”

  My smile faltered.

  “Just be honest. It’s me. You can always be honest with me.”

  “I miss him so much.” I swiped away a tear. “Even now, when I should be so happy I’ve finally figured things out, all I want is him here with me.” I sniffled. “No offense.”

  “None taken.”

  “I’m gonna call him when I get to London.”

  “Why do you have to wait until then?”

  I let out a shuddery breath. “Because if I see him, if I lay eyes on him, I won’t be able to help myself. I want him, I want a future with him. But things between us can’t work this way.
We’d have to be equal partners, with only complete honesty between us. When I look in his eyes, I see myself and I feel the strength of the love that binds us together. But I’ve gotta make any decisions about my future with my head now, and not just my heart.”

  “Okay.”

  “All right. Will you drop me off at the airport Wednesday?”

  “That’s two days away.”

  “I know.” I shrugged. “It’s hard being here. Getting some distance might help.”

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Zora

  “You got your passport?”

  Outside, the highway passed in a blur of green leaves, grass, and gray cement.

  “Yes, Mother,” I teased, trying to manufacture a cheerful mood. It wasn’t working.

  Leigh was unusually quiet. I didn’t think it was disapproval I sensed from her. More like nervousness.

  Another equally viable possibility?

  I’d projected my own anxiety onto her.

  The farther we drove outside of Green Valley, the more my inner disquiet grew. It was a huge breakthrough to have finally figured out what I wanted and how I would get it.

  I had a new career path to look forward to.

  Yay.

  The initial rush of assurance, the glow of satisfaction? It diminished more and more each day. My grief over losing Nick was like gangrene. It was slowly killing me, choking off all sensation. Blunting any joy. Rendering the world colorless. But I couldn’t cede to his manipulation and control, no matter how happy he made me.

  London will be better, I told myself.

  Right. Rainy, gray, Nick-less London will be better.

  Sure.

  God, my inner voice was a bully.

  Signs announcing proximity to the airport caught my eye.

  “Thank you for everything, Leigh.”

  She glanced at me. “What are you thanking me for?”