The Rules of Regret

by Megan Squires

  “What?” I yanked it out quickly, totally embarrassed.

  “Was that out loud?”

  “Yes,” I said on a laugh. “Yes it was.”

  “I love you.” Torin closed his eyes. “Was that out loud, too?”

  “Is there an issue with your hearing?” I couldn’t think of what else to say, though I knew in most instances an ‘I love you, too’ was the appropriate response.

  “The issue lies not in my hearing,” he explained, sounding once again like some ancient thinker. “The issue lies in my sensor. As in, I don’t have one when it comes to you, Darby.” Again, he pulled at his hair with frustrated fingers. “I do things like fly all the way across the country to be with you, join you in the shower fully clothed, and admit to loving you after we’ve just discussed the death of siblings and relationships.” His eyes were still held shut. “There is no sensor. Not when it comes to you.”

  I pressed my thumb back to my lips, mostly just to see what it did to Torin when he opened his eyes and glimpsed me. I liked what I saw. “What is my official status with Lance?”

  “He broke up with you. He wants you back. But as far as I can tell from the letters and from his behavior at the airport, he still thinks you’re broken up. I foresee some serious attempts at wooing over the next couple of days. Be prepared to be smothered with roses, chocolates, and poorly-written poems. But yes, you guys are broken up.”

  I nodded, satisfied with that answer. “That’s a relief. I’m not fond of red capital letters on my clothing.”

  “Huh?” It took him a minute to process, but he got it. “You’re not a cheater. Honestly Darby, the whole time you were at camp, you were technically single. And I’m the one that kissed you.”

  “I’m not talking about the plane. I’m talking about the night in the sleeping bag.”

  His eyes narrowed. “What about it?”

  “You don’t remember?” I asked, knowing full well that he didn’t, but holding out hope that somehow what we’d experienced transcended his state of unconsciousness. “Like, you seriously don’t know?”

  He shook his head, hesitantly. “No, I don’t, but sounds like I might have missed out on something pretty monumental. Why don’t you remind me? And I’m all for reenactments if you happen to want to test out your acting chops.”

  “No joke, your sensor’s MIA.”

  “I just admitted to loving you and I want to make out with you, Darby. What’s so wrong with that?” His eyes crinkled playfully around the corners and his lips tipped up, making me really want to feel them on mine.

  “Why do you think you love me?”

  “Why does anyone think they love anything?” he asked, squinting past me. I almost wanted to move to the left a little bit to position myself in his line of sight.

  “Why are you answering a question with a question?”

  “Why are you answering my question with a double question?” I opened my mouth to reply, but he continued before the sentence could work its way out. “We can talk in circles if you want with our questions to the nth degree, or we can make out. I’m a guy. I opt for making out.”

  “I just really want to know why you think you love me,” I said. “That’s a statement, not a question. See how I did that?”

  “I love you because as far as I can tell, I’m the first person you’ve ever felt safe enough around to just be you,” he said. “That’s an incredible honor, and so, it is also an incredible honor to get to love you for that. I told you I get attached easily, Darby, and you’ve made it beyond easy for me to not only get attached to you, but to wholeheartedly love you.” He rolled onto his side. “You gave me a gift: the real you. I’m giving you a gift: my heart.”

  And that, I realized as I stared at this philosophical, complicated boy draped across my hotel bed, was exactly how love was supposed to be done. After six years of searching, it finally made sense.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  We didn’t make out. Which was a bummer to say the least, because making out with Torin could quite possibly have been the best way to commence this new chapter of my life.

  Instead, Lance, a character that—in my mind—had already exited the scene, showed up for an encore performance. He’d knocked loudly on our hotel door three times, and when I answered, the plastic, white bag that fluttered between us obscured my vision. When he dropped it and my eyes locked with his, I realized Torin’s analogy was way off.

  Life was not a book.

  It was not made up of chapters and we did not get to write them. How ridiculous to think that we could end one part, tie it up in a neat little bow with perfect shifts and transitions, and then move on to another section. For as often as he joked that I was crazy, the more I thought about it, the more he earned that title with that comparison.

  Life wasn’t scripted; he’d said it himself. Because if it was, Lance wouldn’t be standing in the threshold of my hotel room. I would have found my happily ever after with Torin. I could have edited out the parts that I didn’t like. But you couldn’t do that. How stupid to think that we had any control over any of it at all. If it was any book at all, it wasn’t our own to write.

  “I bought this for you.” Lance thrust his hand into the room, the hanger jutting toward me. “For the gala tonight.”

  Over my shoulder, I heard Torin whisper, “Wooing attempt number one.” Luckily, Lance was oblivious, which I realized was a good word to describe him as he pressed his way into the room and took up residence on the fold-out couch. He was an unsuspecting, oblivious man that assumed Torin was gay, that we were still broken up, and that somehow—beyond all reason—we’d end up back together. Just like we always did.

  Lance didn’t look at all at ease as his legs jumped up and down, and he wrung his hands over one another, twisting the skin in a violent manner. His shifty gaze also made him look a little maniacal, which was alarming, because he’d mastered the cool, collected thing long ago. He still appeared a polished politician, just one that was in some serious hot water. “Just so you know, Clara will be there.”

  “Oh.” In that moment I was so grateful for all that had just transpired between Torin and me, because had it not, I’d have no clue who Clara even was. It was nice to be able to save a little face. “Okay.”

  “There’s nothing going on between us now, Darby.”

  “Okay.” I said it again, because that’s what it was. It was all finally okay.

  I saw Lance’s jaw tighten like it was almost wired shut, and when he opened his mouth, I was surprised the words even fit through the small space. “She thinks she's pregnant.”

  “Hold the phone,” Torin, who had been silent up until that point, blurted into our tennis game style conversation. “You got Clara pregnant?”

  Lance’s eyes narrowed. “Can Darby and I have some privacy?” He cocked his chin swiftly, indicating the door.

  “No.”

  I tried to stifle a nervous laugh, but I failed to keep it contained. Torin obviously wasn’t aware of the well-established fact that no one ever told Lance no. Ever.

  Like he could somehow move Torin’s body with his eyes alone, Lance drilled an impressively intimidating stare his direction. But Torin didn’t budge, not even to flick away the lock of hair that had slipped into his brow. Though much less menacing, Torin could hold his own, and I thought for a moment I might have even seen a slight cower in Lance’s frame.

  “You’re sort of a bastard, you know that?”

  I figured it wouldn’t be long before Lance would rise from his position on the couch, because no one talked down to him, physically or figuratively. And right now Torin was doing both. I found myself starting to worry about that really nice jaw of his, because I was fairly sure if he kept it up, it would become acquainted with Lance’s fist at any moment.

  Lance sprung to his feet.

  “Excuse me?”

  He took two measured strides toward Torin. I slunk into the wall that divided the suite into two rooms, pressing my back aga
inst an oil painting that hung there, wishing I could be swallowed up in the serene landscape drawn onto the canvas.

  “I said you’re sort of a bastard,” Torin reiterated. “But I take that back.”

  Lance nodded knowingly. “Then you’re a wise man—”

  “Because you’re a complete bastard.”

  “She’s pregnant?” I uttered through a hand cupped over my mouth. He’d said it several minutes ago, but it was as though the words took their time traveling through the air and space to get to me because they were so heavy, so much weightier than any of the other words he’d ever spoken. They took even longer to register in my brain. “You got some random girl pregnant?”

  “She’s not a random girl,” Lance quickly defended, but it wasn’t the defense I was hoping for. ‘I wasn’t the one that got her pregnant,’ or ‘It’s not my baby,’ would have been nicer to hear. Not the confirmation that wasn’t quite a ‘yes’ or a ‘no,’ but every bit as definitive. “She’s Congressman Reynold’s daughter.”

  I almost threw up. “You slept with your boss’s daughter?” The words spewed out of me like verbal vomit.

  “I don’t know much about politics, but I’m pretty certain knocking up the bossman’s daughter must be considered a conflict of interest.”

  “Why are you still here?” Lance growled, whipping his head around. His chest puffed up like he was collecting all of his anger, ready to hurl it forth in one irate outburst. “Why the hell are you here at all?”

  Torin crossed his arms over his body, an air of condescension seeping through his mannerisms. “I’m Darby’s plus one for the gala.”

  “No,” Lance breathed hotly. “I’m her plus one. That position has been taken.”

  “Buddy.” Torin outstretched an arm to rest his hand on Lance’s broad shoulder. The smirk he added was a nice theatrical bonus, but one that would probably cost him greatly. “You already have a plus one—actually it sounds like maybe even a plus one and a half.”

  I should have expected it because everything was building up to this inevitable moment, but nothing could have prepared me for the sickening crack that was Torin’s cheekbone nearly splitting in two as it collided with Lance’s fury. All of that pent up aggression was loaded and fired through his right hook, and Torin’s face didn’t stand a chance against the fist that catapulted toward him, narrowly missing his eye socket, striking the bone that stretched from his temple to his nose.

  I thought for a moment that Torin was literally turning the other cheek when he tucked his chin to his left shoulder, wincing under the pain. But when Lance’s body flew back several feet and his shoulders curled over as his spine arched out my direction, I realized Torin’s fist connecting with Lance’s stomach proved he was the first to ever challenge Lance. Because Lance wasn’t prepared. He wasn’t prepared for the retaliation in the form of a slug to his gut. And when he righted himself, shook off his surprise, and smirked at Torin, whose face was bloodied and already starting to bruise, the look he held—the look of disbelief and arrogance smugly mixed together—made me despise him.

  Because I think I did. Or at least I felt like I had to. I had to feel something toward him, because it wasn’t appropriate to feel nothing. After all these years, I had to feel something. But the reason I was feeling—the reason I wasn’t just completely numb anymore—was because he’d hurt Torin.

  Yes, he’d hurt me, but I could handle that. He’d cheated (again). He might have gotten some girl pregnant (again). That should have devastated me. But it didn’t, because it didn’t feel like he was actually doing any of that to me. The girl that had been in that relationship with him wasn’t me anymore. She wasn’t Anna, either, I knew that much, but she wasn’t me.

  I saw Lance staring at Torin’s face, and instead of looking like a proud fighter that had significantly marred the physical appearance of his opponent, he looked horrified. He lifted a hand to his own cheek, and cupped it in his palm. “Alright,” he said, stepping back from Torin, who had a look in his eyes like he wasn’t about to give up. If anything, it looked like he was readying for the next round. “Let’s be men about this.”

  Torin took a breath and Lance flinched, and I suddenly realized the real reason for his abrupt stop. Torin looked like hell. Like he literally looked as though his face was split in two with a dull carving knife, and the blood that leaked out of it stained his hands and shirt. And Lance, though he’d sustained a punch to his stomach, was unblemished. He stopped fighting, not caring about protecting his ego, but about protecting his face. In true McIverson form, Lance was keeping up appearances, even in the heat of battle. He was a coward—but remained a beautiful, twisted coward—one that couldn’t physically be linked back to this altercation at all.

  But there was one thing that he was still linked to.

  “She thinks she’s pregnant?” I said it again, and I realized I sounded like one of those wind-up dolls, because nothing out of my mouth was new. It was all on repeat.

  Lance’s blue eyes softened slightly, like remorse was pulling at their corners just enough to provide a hint of transparency. He truly did wear the look of regret. “Oh my God, Darby. I’m so sorry.” He reached out for me, but I pressed into the wall even harder, though there was nowhere else to go. “You have to understand how sorry I am.”

  “I understand.”

  His head snapped up like a rubber band. “You do?”

  “We weren’t enough.”

  “Darby—” Torin called out from his corner of the room. He had his hand on his face, and blood coated it as though he’d been finger painting with only red paint. Though Lance’s eyes appeared mildly expressive, Torin’s were a completely readable. “Stop Darby.”

  “No, I get it.” I shook off Torin’s attempts to come to my defense. “We never were. I don’t know who I was kidding… I’m not right for you and the life you want to lead.”

  “Darby, you’re everything—”

  “No,” I reiterated, “I’m not. I wasn’t the right person to pick up the phone that night. I wasn’t the one you were supposed to fall in love with. It never should have been me. The fact that there have been all of these other girls over the years should have been proof of that. You’ve always been searching for something more, because we weren’t enough.”

  Lance finally looked like he’d been slapped in the face, and the way he drew his chin back made me realize he felt the impact of my statement and much as I felt the weight of it as it fell from my lips. “Is this about Anna?”

  “It’s always been about Anna.”

  His brow strained painfully. “We were kids, Darby. Kids.”

  “And what are we now? Because I don’t feel like an adult. But I don’t feel like a child, either. I’m stuck in some weird in-between and I don’t know how to get out.” I breathed in deep through my nose, feeling the air finger out into my lungs. “And I think I’ve spent too long hoping you were going to be the one to pull me out. Like I could cling to you and somehow be able to move forward with you, because you seemed to have a path you were on.” I swallowed and pinched my eyes together, not wanting to cry. Lance would interpret that one way. Everything was always about him. But these tears that pressed the back of my eyes—they weren’t for him. They were for me. He could never understand that.

  “But you didn’t help me move forward,” I continued. Torin sat down on the couch, his elbows digging into his knees, his head in his hands.

  Lance’s mouth hung open, like somehow it helped him process the words. “I don’t understand.”

  “Of course you don’t. Because it’s not about you. It’s about me. And you don’t know me.”

  “But I do.” Lance’s tone took on a pleading. He walked the path across the room to get to me and placed his hands on my hips, pulling me to him. Torin kept his head in his hands and I was grateful, because I didn’t want him to see this. Even though there was nothing intimate in it, I didn’t want him to see Lance with his hands on me. It would provide a visual
and I didn’t want him to have that image to build upon. “I know how you hit the snooze button three times every morning before finally rolling out of bed. I know that you like one packet of sugar and two spoonfuls of honey in your tea. I know that you like sleeping with the window open at night, but hate what the salty air does to your hair. I know that you want to have two kids—a boy and a girl—and you want to name them Jacob and Abigail. I know you Darby. You can’t tell me that I don’t.”

  Torin didn’t lift his head, didn’t even make eye contact with either of us, but his voice startled the silence and drew our attention when he said, “But did you know that she blames herself?” He finally looked up, his hands still fisted over his mouth, his eyes straining with anguish. “Did you know that she’s carried a burden that wasn’t hers for the past six years?” He shook his head. “And did you know that she’s incredibly brave?” I felt the memory of the wind on my face high up on that rope in the tree. “That she puts her fears aside to do what is asked of her? She doesn’t like letting people down, most of all herself. But she’s completely fine—to a terrible fault—with others letting her down. And she’s had a lot of practice in that with you.” Torin and Lance exchanged a heated glare. “Did you know that she has been living her life as some sort of guilty tribute to her sister? That she’s that incredibly selfless that she would give up on her own dreams in order to keep Anna’s memory alive—however crazy that made her? And do you know what you’ve done with that? You’ve completely hijacked her. You let her take on your own dreams, never once thinking she might have her own somewhere deep in there.” Torin stood to his feet. His face was mottled with gashes and blood, but he was beautiful. In fact, he was stunning. “Because you didn’t take the time to look. You didn’t take the time to look for her.”

  Lance’s jaw pulsed and I could hear his teeth grit together. He dropped my hands and twisted at the waist to face Torin in aggravatingly slow motion.

  “I looked for her.” Torin thrust his index finger into his own chest. His eyes welled. He pressed his finger in harder. “I found her.”