So, once Mom, Claire & Kate have left, it’s just me and Grandma.
“Are you hungry?” I ask her.
“Oh, maybe for something light. How about some soup and buttered toast?”
I smile. When we’d come to see Grandma during the summer, she’d always make us soup for lunch, even if it was ninety degrees out. She’d say it was good to be well hydrated from the soupy liquid. She’d butter some toast too and then give us actual summer treats like watermelon or popsicles later on.
“What kind would you like?” I ask.
“Surprise me,” she says.
I check the cupboards and open a can of minestrone, warm it up and toast and butter some bread.
“How are things going with Garrett?” Grandma asks after finishing off a piece of toast and waiting for her soup to cool.
“Uh… not the best.” I’ve taken two spoonfuls of the minestrone, but I’m not sure I’ll have an appetite if we end up discussing Garrett.
“You both looked so good in your prom pictures,” she says like she’s looking at them right this very moment.
“Yeah, that night was pretty amazing.”
“Does he like school?”
“Yeah, but I think he’s glad to be home for winter break,” I say, trying to get the image of his bloodied face out of my head.
“You should have him over,” she says. “You don’t want to waste time while you’re young, honey. Spend as much of it in love as you can.”
Mom stayed true to her word and hasn’t let it slip to anyone, including Grandma, about my breakup with Garrett, and the way she talks about being in love makes me tear up. I feel like I’ve made a complete mess of things with the boys I grew up with.
“What’s wrong, dear?” Grandma asks.
“A lot,” I say.
“You and that boy are fighting?”
“Pretty much, but Grandma… I’m not in love with Garrett.”
“No?”
“I’m in love with Evan.”
She takes a moment before she responds. “The dark-haired one. Well, I always did think he was handsome.”
“So did I,” I say, and I feel myself crack a smile, remembering that first day I saw him in the fourth grade, coming to my rescue, and how I’d wished after school that day that I could have run next door to tell Emma Chambers all about how cute he was.
“What’s the problem then? Is it because you don’t want to hurt Garrett?”
“I already have,” I say.
“Oh. Well, let’s see then. What’s stopping you from being with Evan?”
“There’s nothing stopping me from being with him really…”
“Goodness, then, what’s the problem?”
“It’s complicated, Grandma.”
“Life is like that, dear! Why don’t you tell me and see if I don’t have some words of wisdom for you.”
She’s responsible for making me smile again.
“It’s just that he’s lied to me about some really big things, and I’d kept something from him too.”
She looks at me, nonverbally asking, “Like what?”
“I don’t want to bother you with it,” I say.
“It’s no bother. I could use a little drama in my life.” Grandma takes a bite of her toast, and I can’t help but to laugh.
“Okay, well he did kind of lie to get me to go to North Carolina with him, and there are things about him and his ex-girlfriend that Garrett said, stuff that could be bad, but I’m not sure… and I know that none of it matters in the long run because I love him so much, but I’m scared too… like what if I change my mind about it? What if I decide in a month that I really don’t forgive him? What then?”
I hadn’t really even thought through in my head why I needed the break from Evan, but I suppose it’s for all of the above reasons. I know without a doubt that I love him and want to be with him, but the lies, no matter how well-intentioned, were still lies, and I worry I’ll hold them against him. And that doesn’t even take into account what may or may not have happened with Lexi.
“Hmm… that’s a lot of stuff for someone so young.”
“I just have to find a way to get past it all, to trust him completely,” I say, pushing my soup away and wiping my tired eyes.
“And what is it you’re keeping from him?”
“Hmm?”
“The thing you said you weren’t telling him. What is it?”
“Well, he already knows… sort of. Evan and I have been together for a while now, and I’d broken up with Garrett, but I still went with him to Pullman. It was completely innocent, but Garrett did try to kiss me the other night here in Basin Lake.”
“And you didn’t tell Evan about that?”
“No.”
“Well, dear, there are many things that are key for a long relationship, and one of them is honesty. If you can’t get that right, then it’s going to be a rough road ahead.”
“I figured as much,” I say, realizing I wouldn’t want it any other way. “So, what should I do? I told him I needed a few days, but now I think he’s mad at me.”
Grandma takes a sip from her mug of apple cider and takes a moment to formulate her response. “My advice is not to wait. Come to terms with whatever is going through your mind today, and I can assure you it won’t be all that different than what you’re feeling three days from now. If you love the boy, then you’ll work through these things together.”
“Is that advice what kept you and Grandpa together so long?”
“Not exactly.” She laughs. “Your Grandpa and I had some real disagreements through the years, and had we been living in more modern times, I’m not even sure we’d have stayed married. Just don’t ever tell your mom that.” She winks at me. “But these sage words I’m offering you are from watching that Oprah network and Dr. Phil re-runs. I don’t know if they really work, but they sure do sound good!”
I’m the first to crack up at that, and pretty soon our stomachs are hurting from all of the laughter.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
PAIGE
I did my best to resolve my feelings last night, lying in bed and thinking of everything that’s happened in the last six months and a lot of what has happened in the last nearly nine years. Evan and I have a tremendous history together, and I realize it’s not realistic to imagine all of those moments we’ve shared would have been perfect or without fault. I think it was three in the morning when I finally succumbed to exhaustion, and as I wake this morning, Evan is right back on my mind.
I’m the only one up, so I head down to the living room and finish decorating the tree. Then I text Natalie to see how she’s doing on her Christmas break. She sends me pictures of her and her family at the North Carolina coast where it’s sunny and warm. In response, I take a picture of the snow that is still settled all around us and send it to her.
Natalie: I want snow!
Me: It’s freezing, and I can’t even go for a run.
Natalie: Poor baby. Snuggle up with that man of yours, okay?
Me: Okay.
I wish I could snuggle up to Evan, but there is still so much that we need to discuss. And then there’s Garrett. The way things ended the other day weren’t okay. To see him walking away all bloodied up and going off by himself still makes me sad and wishing there was some way I could make him happy too. When I see Mom’s keys out on the kitchen counter, I make a decision. I head upstairs and take a quick shower and throw on some clothes before slipping back downstairs and leaving Mom a note that says I’m borrowing her car to run some errands.
Mrs. Hevener is the one who answers after I nervously rap on Garrett’s family’s front door at seven in the morning.
“Is everything all right?” she asks, sticking her head out like she’s looking for some sort of calamity to be right on my tail.
“Can I talk to Garrett?” I’m about ninety-nine percent sure he won’t want to see me, but I feel like I have to try.
Mrs. Hevener looks back toward me
, and with the very slightest of smiles says, “Come inside, and I’ll go and check on him.”
The smell of food cooking permeates the house, and Garrett’s parents have probably been up for a couple of hours already, being the early risers that they are. I expect Mrs. Hevener to come back and tell me Garrett isn’t feeling well, but I instead watch as he rounds the corner from the kitchen and walks toward me, already fully dressed for the day in a flannel shirt and jeans. His face is bruised but clean, and he even offers me a very slight smile.
“Hi,” I say. “Can I talk to you for a few minutes?”
He looks toward the floor before nodding. “Let’s go into the sitting room.”
The sitting room is a small rectangular space at the front of the house with antique furniture that belonged to Mrs. Hevener’s parents. It’s formal and not all that comfortable, so I know Garrett expects this will be a short visit. I might as well get right to the point.
“You don’t know how sorry I am,” I begin, sitting directly across from him in a stiff wingback chair. “I’m not sure if there are really any words that will convey exactly what I feel, but please know that I never wanted to hurt you—I still don’t.”
“I’m sure you didn’t,” he says, “but you did.”
“I know,” I say, “but you hurt me too.”
He raises an eyebrow.
“Why did you tell Evan that I didn’t like him that way? All the way back to eighth grade, Garrett? Was it really because you didn’t think he was good enough for me?”
The color goes out of Garrett’s face, but he straightens up, like he’s ready to face whatever it is he may have done. “I don’t know anymore, Paige. He was my best friend, and honestly, I was scared. When he first told me that he really liked you way back in like seventh grade, it kind of freaked me out. I’d never thought about it before… I mean, we were just three friends, and yeah, I always thought you were pretty, but you were my friend first. But Evan wanted to change that, and I thought I might lose you both if I didn’t stop him.”
I can see how relaxed Garrett is becoming, how perhaps unloading a truth it had been so hard for me to imagine is something he’s needed to do for a while.
“I can kind of understand that,” I say, trying to put myself into his shoes, worried that his two friends might pair off and drift out of his life. “But you should have known better in senior year. Not wanting to lose us isn’t a good enough reason to break up with your girlfriend and ask me out before Evan could.”
He nods quickly in agreement and sighs. “But by then, I’d fallen for you, Paige. And yeah, maybe it was wrong, but I didn’t want to give Evan the chance. I’d seen how screwed up Lexi was, and I couldn’t let that happen to you.”
“And you think he’s the one who screwed her life up?”
Garrett doesn’t look altogether sure. “I think Evan does things without thinking of the consequences. He couldn’t play on the team because of bad grades he didn’t want to fix, and I loved the guy, but I still felt like he was a fuckup.”
“But he was still your friend,” I say.
“Yeah, I know,” he admits. “I was hard on him because he was throwing so much away, and it made me mad when he didn’t fight to stay on the team. So, I guess I thought I could be better for you, and it seemed like the only way to keep you in my life.”
“But I don’t want to be out of your life, Garrett… even now. When I told you I loved you, I meant it, but I came to understand that love was as a friend, and that’s all it can ever be. No matter how imperfect Evan is, I’m in love with him.”
Garrett deflates, his features permeated with perhaps shame for keeping Evan and I apart. “Yeah, I know that now. I just didn’t want to see it.”
I know he’s hurting, and I can understand it—it’s how I felt when Evan was with Lexi and I thought that maybe I should be with him instead. It was painful, but I hadn’t tried to interfere by telling a lie to Lexi about Evan.
“So, can we forgive one another and be friends?”
“Yes, of course,” he says, rising from his chair, the very beginnings of a smile on his face. “But no promises I’m going to be wanting to hang out anytime soon, okay?”
“It’s a start at least.” I get up and walk the few steps it takes to cross toward him and give him a hug, not as a girlfriend but as the childhood friend he’s known for so long.
We separate, and he walks me out and watches me get into Mom’s car, waving at me as I turn around to head down their driveway. When I look into the rear view mirror, he’s already gone inside. I want the best for Garrett, and I hope that he’ll find love someday soon because, even with what he’d done, I’m not sure I’ll be entirely happy until he does.
Feeling as though one of my relationships is on the mend, I head toward town to do some early morning grocery shopping. I’m in the grocery store that Ben Forester’s family owns for at least an hour, looking up a recipe for some chocolate candy-cane cookies on my phone and making sure I have all the ingredients.
After loading the car up with groceries, I drive back through town and feel a surge of excitement when I see Evan just outside of Pamela’s in his black pea coat, hands stuffed in his pockets. I know I’d asked him for time, but now that I see him in the flesh, looking adorable and handsome and perfect, I want to pull over and tell him about my talk with Garrett—I want to be honest and let him know Garrett confirmed everything Evan told me. I want to share with him Grandma’s advice and reiterate a hundred times over that I’m in love with him and that everything will be okay.
I’m about to make a u-turn when my heart pretty much does a freefall at the sight of Lexi DeNero who is two steps behind Evan. She’s just exited Pamela’s but is now standing right next to him with a coffee in her gloved hands. I’m not sure why they’re together, and I slow the car and consider rolling down the window and actually asking when they draw closer to one another and hug.
I throw my hand up to my mouth, feeling like I could literally hurl at the sight of them. I roll past and stare straight ahead, unable to risk seeing anything more.
I’m fuming when I pull into our driveway and nearly forget to pull the groceries out of the back of Mom’s wagon. I realize there has to be some logical explanation for Evan being with Lexi, but that hug—It just looked so intimate.
I unload all of the groceries and bring them inside, putting them into the cupboards and the refrigerator, wanting to slam doors but stopping myself because everyone is still sleeping—it’s still not even nine in the morning—and I don’t want to be responsible for waking them up while they’re on Christmas break. When I’m done putting everything away, I just want to keep moving, feeling like I could jump out of my skin. And even with snow all over the roads, I decide the only thing for me to do is go for a run.
I hit the snow-covered trails that I know by heart behind the house first and decide it’s not enough, and against my better judgment, I run toward town. I’m half hoping to find Evan and Lexi so I can confront them both. Maybe Evan has decided I’m too much drama, though I can’t imagine I’m more drama than Lexi. And how would I even process that information? I feel like I’d go insane if they ended up together. The more I think about her and Evan, the harder I run, and I try to ignore the stares I’m getting from drivers or the clouds of cold air puffing out from my mouth or my skin that feels prickly and frozen. At least I’m wearing a pair of running pants instead of shorts, but it’s still freezing as I navigate my way around heavy piles of snow.
Once I’m downtown, I realize that I’d like to live beyond this run and stop into Pamela’s to get some hot cider to warm me up. I’m surprised when I stop just outside to catch my breath and see Beth working behind the counter. She hadn’t said anything about working here when I’d run into her and Ben, but her eyes light up when she sees me come inside.
“Hey,” I say, still a little out of breath. “I had no idea you worked here.”
“For the last couple of months,” she says with a
smile. “I’ve been taking classes at the community college, and this helps with tuition.”
“That’s great, Beth. You didn’t mention anything the other day.”
She shrugs. “I still get a little nervous around Garrett. I just didn’t even think about it.”
“Well, Pamela is great,” I say.
“She is,” Beth agrees and then folds her hands and sets them on the counter.
“Beth!” Almost immediately, my eyes are drawn to the ring on her finger, one I hadn’t noticed the other day.
“What?”
“Your ring!”
“Oh, yeah.” She smiles. “Just happened last night. We’ve been dating for almost six months now, so it was time, and it’s not like we won’t be waiting for at least another year. That will give us time to, you know, decide if either of us have any huge deficits.”
“I’m really happy for you guys, and I think deficits come with the territory of being human.”
Beth tilts her head and nods. “Thanks, Paige. Now, what can I get you to drink? It’s pretty dead in here, so we can sit down for a while if you’d like?”
I agree that I would, and after she fills two mugs with warm apple cider and toasts a couple of bagels, we sit down on the velvety blue couch.
“I hear you and Evan are dating now,” she says before tilting the mug toward her lips.
“News travels fast.”
She sets her mug down. “What do you expect, it’s Basin Lake.”
“Yeah, I guess it shouldn’t be a shocker.”
“Garrett taking it okay?”
“I think so. We had a good talk this morning.”
“I’m glad. He’s a good guy, Paige.”
“He always has been. That’s why all of this is so hard.”
“He’ll be fine,” she says. “He’s a football star for God’s sake.”
“Do you miss him… as a boyfriend?” I ask.
“Well, yeah, kind of. Like I said, I still get a little nervous around him, but I knew our time was limited. If it wasn’t obvious to you, it was to me and everyone else that he and Evan were both in love with you from at least the tenth grade on. So, I survived, and now I’m happy with Ben, and Garrett will be happy too. He’ll find someone else.”
Between the Boys (The Basin Lake Series Book 1) Page 33