Greg said yet another very bad word. “I’ll talk to her. She’ll apologize. I’ll see to it.”
“I, um…” Megan’s eyes burned with the tears she was trying so hard not to shed. She pressed her fingers to her eyelids, in a futile attempt to cool the burn.
Greg took her wrists and gently pulled her hands away. “Look at me.”
She made herself do it. “Oh, Greg….” He tried to gather her to him. But she resisted, pulling back, tugging on her wrists until he finally let her go. “There’s more,” she told him bleakly.
His big shoulders slumped. “God. I’m so damn sorry.”
“It’s not your fault, truly. I know it’s not. Not in the least….”
“Just tell me, okay? What else?”
“Well, you, um, you know Marti, next door?”
He frowned. “Marti Vincente? Of course. What about her?”
“She was out on her lawn, this morning when you dropped me off. Remember?”
“Yeah. I guess. Vaguely…”
“She, well, she looked at me strangely.”
He scowled. “Strangely? What the hell does that mean?”
“She just…she barely waved. She didn’t smile. So I went over there. I asked her, you know, what was up? She told me that there’s a rumor going around that you and I…a rumor that we were lovers before you and Carly broke up.”
“But…that’s crap.”
“I know. And now Marti knows. She promised she’d start setting people straight about it. But Greg, it’s all over town, that I broke up your marriage, that you and Carly would still be together if it wasn’t for me.”
He was shaking his head. “But it’s just garbage. It’s not true. Ignore it.”
“It’s not that easy for me, to ignore it. I…I like things kind of…low-key, you know, in my private life? I’m not used to having everybody gossiping about me. It…it doesn’t work for me.”
He sat very still. His eyes had gone flat. “Are you trying to tell me something, Megan? If you are, I think you should go ahead and get to the point.”
Now was the time. She had to explain it to him, to make him understand. The problem was, it wasn’t coming out the way she had planned it. “I just think, well, that this has all happened really fast, hasn’t it, between you and me? Maybe a little too fast, you know?”
His face was expressionless. “No, Megan. I don’t know.”
She fumbled along. “I, um, well, and now you’re moving to Rosewood and—”
He cut her off, coldly. “Let me get this right. What you’re really saying is that you don’t want me to move to Rosewood.”
“No. No, I didn’t say…well, yes. I mean, I could come and be with you, in the city. We could still be together….”
“Where no one in town would see us, you mean?”
Miserably, she stared at him. What could she say? He had it right—only it sounded so awful. So small-minded, didn’t it? “I…”
“That is what you mean, isn’t it?”
She gulped. And she nodded.
He said, “You’re not chasing me out of Rosewood, Megan. Carly already did that once. I’m not letting it happen to me again.”
“Oh!” Megan put her hand to her throat and swallowed again, hard. “Oh, of course I don’t want to chase you out of town.”
“You just don’t want to be with me here, right?”
“I just…I don’t know if I can handle it. All the neighbors hating me. Your own mother hating me. It’s all just too ugly and, well, I was only thinking that if we were to sort of cool it for a while, let everybody find something else to talk about for a change, wait until Carly maybe meets someone else or something, then…” Megan didn’t know how to go on. And she couldn’t. Not with him looking at her as if she was someone he didn’t like much and didn’t know at all. Not with him angrily shaking his head.
“No,” he said, and he stood.
“Oh, Greg….”
“Don’t.” The word was heavy with disgust. “Okay? Just don’t. The deal is this. I’m so far gone on you I can’t see straight. And you know what? I’ve always wanted what I have with you. But I didn’t know the downside of it, of feeling like this. Not until the past few days, when you’ve been pulling away from me. It hurts. It hurts like hell. There’s only one woman—you, Megan. And when you turn on me, it cuts like the sharpest knife.”
She let out a cry. “Oh, no. Greg. I don’t mean to—”
“But you are. You’re messing with me.”
“No—”
“Yeah. And I can’t deal with it. I won’t stand for it. Yeah, I know I said we could take it slow. I was wrong. I don’t want to take it slow. I want to go for this thing with you one hundred percent. But if you think you can waffle on me and see me now and then, meet me in the city where nobody knows us…uh-uh. No way. Now and then and on-again, off-again is not what I want with you.”
Why wouldn’t he see? “You just don’t understand. In my personal life, I need to, um, fit in. To get along with everyone. I have all the stress I can deal with already, at work. I can’t take it at home, too….”
He backed up. He was shaking his head again. “I don’t believe you just said that. I don’t even know you when you talk like that. You’re braver than that. Better than that.”
She hung her head. Her throat had clutched up again. She whispered through the tightness. “Well, no. Not really. I’m not…”
There was a silence between them. Awful. Endless.
Finally, he said in a hollow voice, “Look at you. You’re…Carly all over again, aren’t you? It’s all completely different. And yet it’s exactly the same. Carly had secrets that kept her from being happy and really alive. And you, Megan? Brave, bold, beautiful Megan. You’ve got a cowardly side, a side that has you skulking away to hide in a corner when things get rough.”
She made herself face him. It hurt just to look at him. She felt so…ashamed. She should say something, argue, tell him he had it all wrong.
But he didn’t have it wrong. He had it horribly right.
He said, “Okay. I get it. I hear what you’re telling me. This isn’t going to work.” He was at the door in three long strides. Softly, he told her, “Megan. Goodbye.”
The hot tears started to well over. She shut her eyes, dashed those tears away.
When she looked again, he was gone.
Chapter Sixteen
It shouldn’t have been that bad, should it? Shouldn’t have been so hard.
But it was. The days went by: Saturday, Sunday, Monday. Megan went to work. She came home. She watched the kids. She went back to work in the evening. She and her team were making miracles with the Banning’s account, getting raves from the Banning’s executives. Gregory, Sr., liked where this was going and he made a point of telling Megan so.
Greg, however, was silent on the subject; he didn’t call, e-mail or instant-message. Tuesday, one of the vice presidents on the project told her that Greg had turned the redesign over to him. Megan forced a smile and said she was sure that they would work together beautifully.
Marti heard that Greg had moved into the house on Sycamore Street. Irene Dare told her when Marti dropped in at Rosewood Market for a loaf of bread and a gallon of milk.
“You can bet I gave that woman a good talking-to,” said Marti. “Megan, dear. Are you…all right?”
“Fine,” she lied.
So Greg was in Rosewood now. He lived five blocks away—and it might as well have been five thousand miles. Lord, how Megan missed him. He was the ache in her heart, the empty place inside her, the space full of nothing that such a short time ago had been filled with light and joy, with heat and passion.
With love.
Yes. She knew it now—now that she had lost him: she loved him.
But she was a coward and he wanted—demanded—someone brave. Every night, she’d go home to her apartment and sit at the table and stare at the flowers he had given her that last day. They were dying now, drooping on the
ir stems, the petals curling, turning brown, looking so sad, so far past their prime. Still, somehow, she couldn’t bring herself to throw them away.
Wednesday afternoon, while she was with the kids, the doorbell rang.
Her heart raced. Greg? Could it be? Was it possible?
But when she pulled back the door, she found Vanessa Banning standing there. She looked Greg’s mother square in the eye. “Vanessa. I don’t have a thing to say to you and I’m not going to ask what you’re doing here, so just head on back to the Hamptons and leave me alone.” She started to shut the door in the woman’s face.
But Vanessa said, “Please. I came to apologize for my behavior last week.”
“Apology accepted.” Again, she tried to shut the door.
“Please,” Vanessa said again.
Megan peered closer at Greg’s mother. The woman really did look kind of…distressed. Odd. To imagine someone like Vanessa Banning having actual emotions.
Mentally calling herself a hundred kinds of hopeless wimp, Megan gave in and let her in. The kids were in the kitchen, so Megan led Greg’s mother to the living room. She gestured at a chair and took the couch for herself. “Okay,” she said with mock cheer. “Go ahead. Get it over with.”
Vanessa sat ramrod straight. “My son has cut me out of his life. He has told me that if I ever wish him to speak to me again, I must properly make amends for the things I said to you last Thursday. I refused. Then, yesterday, my husband came to me. Evidently, my son had talked to Gregory. Now I find my husband is making ultimatums, as well. Gregory says I have behaved very badly. He likes you—admires you, he tells me. And he will not be speaking to me, either, until I manage to make amends to you. So that’s why I’ve come. To apologize.”
“Oh,” said Megan, for lack of anything more imaginative.
Vanessa tightly cleared her throat. “Tell me. What do you want me to do? How can I show my…regrets?”
Megan sighed. “Look. It doesn’t matter. You’ve gotten your way. Greg and I broke up.”
Vanessa actually blinked. “You’ve laid down a condition, is that it? I must apologize, or you won’t take him back?”
“No condition. He broke up with me, more or less. At least, he was the one to walk out the door.”
“But I don’t understand. If you’re no longer together, what does it matter to him if I apologize to you or not?”
Megan almost smiled. “Of course you don’t understand.” Funny how, now she’d lost Greg for being a coward, she was finding it a lot easier to speak up to his terrible mother. To be, at least right now, a certain kind of brave. “Your son’s a wonderful man. He knows that you hurt me. He wants to be sure I know you’re sorry.”
“Well. All right, then. As I said at the door, I’m sorry.”
For the first time since Greg had left her, Megan laughed. “No, you’re not. But it’s okay. Tell Greg you’ve been here and I accepted your apology. He can call me to confirm it if he doesn’t believe you.”
Could she bear it, if he did call? Could she keep from breaking down at the sound of his voice?
Vanessa pressed her sculpted lips together. “Well. If you’re sure…”
“I am. That should solve your problem.” Megan rose. “And now, I really do have to get back to the kitchen. The kids are having macaroni and cheese and if I don’t hurry, there’ll be none left for me. We fat girls, we really need our mac and cheese.”
Vanessa flinched. “I’m sorry for that, too, for calling you fat.”
Megan nodded in acknowledgment. Vanessa stood and brushed out her skirt, as if it had wrinkled, which it had not. “All right then. Thank you.” She held out her hand.
Megan didn’t take it. She only nodded again and gestured toward the door.
At six, with Angela home, Megan went back to Poughkeepsie.
When she returned for the night, she found her sister standing out on the front step, in the dark. Ange signaled her over. Megan nodded to let her know she’d be there.
When Megan came in from the breezeway, the kitchen smelled of something good. “Umm. Hot cocoa? In July?”
Angela chuckled. “You know you love my hot chocolate.” She poured them each a mugful and they sat at the island.
“The best,” Megan said, after that first delicious, comforting sip. “And what did you need to talk about?”
Angela wrapped her hands around her mug and looked down into it, as if the answers to the basic universal questions were held in the chocolaty depths. “I’m not the one who needs to talk.”
Megan sipped again before admitting, “Greg, you mean?”
Angela nodded. “Marti tells me a certain amazingly chic older woman dropped by today.”
“Greg’s mother.” Megan shrugged. She’d already told Angela all about the lunch from hell the previous Thursday. “Vanessa came to apologize for the things she said last week. Greg made her do it. Apparently, Gregory, Sr., backed him up.”
“So the woman really is sorry?”
“Doubtful. But I have to confess, sometimes it’s nice to make a really awful person crawl.”
The sisters looked at each other. They both giggled at the same time.
Then Angela said softly, “You miss him really bad. Don’t you?”
Megan’s throat did that clutching thing again. She gulped—and nodded. “But he wants—and deserves—someone braver than me. Someone who can stand tall and proud when the rumors start flying. Someone who doesn’t mind being the talk of the neighborhood….”
“So.” Ange sipped more cocoa. “Be that someone.”
Megan blew out a frustrated breath. “Oh, yeah. Great idea. Piece of cake….”
“I’m serious. I mean it. You’re brave. You just need to…have a little faith in yourself. To give yourself a chance to be your whole self. To quit telling yourself that you can only be strong and forceful at work, that somehow, if you stand up for yourself at home, you won’t have a home anymore.”
Out of nowhere, Megan felt the tears welling. They welled and they slid down her cheeks. “I am doing that, aren’t I?” When her sister nodded, she said, “I didn’t realize it, until just now, hearing you say it out loud….”
“And now that you realize it, I think you should stop.”
“How…did you know?”
Angela’s smile was infinitely loving—and so very wise. “You told me. Don’t you remember? About a year after Mom and Dad adopted you, before the divorce? You said that you’d learned to be quiet, not to argue, ever. To do whatever people wanted you to do—to be what they wanted you to be. Because then, maybe, the next family wouldn’t send you away again….”
“Oh, God…” The tears kept on falling. They dripped down her cheeks and off her chin. Ange got her a tissue and waited until she blew her nose and wiped up the flood a little.
Then her sister said, “We didn’t send you away. I would never send you away. You’re my sis. You’re my kids’ precious aunt Megan. You’re no lost little orphan. Not anymore. You have a family and you always will. Me and Anthony and Olivia and Michael—we’ll stick by you no matter what anyone says. Ever. Going along and fitting in might have worked for you once. But Meg—that was then. Now, you’ve got true love at stake. You’ve got to follow your heart where it leads you. You’ve got to stand up and be brave.”
“Oh, I don’t know….”
“I know you can do it,” Angela said. “I know you will.”
Chapter Seventeen
After her late-night talk with Angela, Megan began to see that it was time, at last, for her to be brave.
But she didn’t feel all that brave. Not brave enough to call Greg and tell him how wrong she’d been. Not brave enough to pick up the damn phone.
Thursday went by and she took no action. Friday, too.
Saturday, for once, she didn’t go to Poughkeepsie. She’d been working like a demon since Greg left her, trying not to think of him, trying not to yearn for him. As a result, she was about as caught up at Design Solutio
ns as she’d ever been.
So she stayed home and cleaned her apartment. She even made herself throw out the dead bouquet Greg had given her. She saw now that she couldn’t go on clinging to a bunch of dead flowers as if they signified some kind of hope. If she wanted hope, she would have to get out there and make it happen.
The cupboards, as the old rhyme went, were bare. Though she took most of her meals with the family, she did like to keep the basics on hand at her place.
She sat down and made herself a list. Then she grabbed her purse and headed for Rosewood Market, where she strolled up and down the wide aisles, piling stuff she didn’t really need into her cart, humming to herself, even grinning a little when the demonstration lady over in the produce section made a joke into her microphone that could be heard throughout the store.
Really, a Saturday off was a great thing. A day just for herself. A day to…
The random thought fled her mind half-finished. She stifled a gasp. There, right ahead of her, coming toward her in the cereal aisle, pushing a half-full cart of his own, was Greg.
Greg.
Oh, God. Her mouth went dry as a cotton swab. She licked her lips. Nodded.
He nodded back and walked on by.
Megan stared straight ahead. She forgot all about the Pop-Tarts and the Cheerios she was supposed to get in that aisle. She just put one foot in front of the other, pushing her cart blindly ahead of her, until she’d turned the corner into spices and baking goods.
About then, she shook herself.
Oh, just look at her!
Still a coward, still the same. Still a gutless, spineless, mousy little wimp. She’d walked right by him without saying a word.
What was her problem? Would she ever learn?
With a sharp cry, she abandoned her cart and raced back to cereal.
He was gone. She looked down the aisle, all the way to the end. Other shoppers stared at her. She ignored them. She whispered, miserably, “Greg. Oh, Greg…”
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