by Stacy Lane
He touches me, watching his own hands caress my legs and rise until he’s holding on tight to my thin waist. Luke bends his head to my chest. None of it is sexual. His touch feels like one of worship, but his eyes carry pain. He hides them as soon as I catch the first glimpse. Back rising and falling with a struggle I don’t understand.
Combing my fingers through his hair, I ask on a soft whisper, “Babe, what’s wrong?”
His response is muffled between us. “Something you said last night is keeping me up. I close my eyes and it’s all I hear. Your face is all I see, except it’s laced in hurt. Because of me.”
Deepening my brows, I reply, “So you’re having a nightmare.”
He shakes his head. “This is too real, Liv.”
“Tell me about the dream. Maybe if you talk about it out loud it won’t come back—”
“It’s not a dream.” Luke raises his head, somber eyes clashing in to me. “I wanted to protect you by not telling you, but then you said secrets, no matter how small, have big consequences.”
I stiffen.
I don’t want to know.
I don’t want to know.
“There’s something I haven’t told you.”
There’s not even enough time for a deep breath before he’s delving in to his story.
“I lied. To protect you, I lied when you asked if Della and I ever hooked back up after you left Calusa.” My heart races, and I can’t speak. “It only happened once. It was stupid and I regretted it instantly. Della hated me because immediately afterward I told her it was a mistake. That I…I was in love with you and I missed you.”
We’re all stupid at nineteen, Liv. Remember that. You have to remember that.
Frozen. Ice cold veins freeze all blood flow to my heart. I feel nothing but the rapid pounding of a fatal blow to my chest. Waiting for it stop, to freeze, to shatter. It’s coming. Any minute now, it’ll quit and the pain will go right along with it.
Any.
Minute.
Oh my god it’s not going to stop. The pain will never stop.
I try to move from his lap but Luke holds me down.
“Please, let me explain, Liv.”
“No,” my voice breaks some of the cold.
“It’s in the past. You said yourself you wanted to forget the past, and more forward. That’s what I want too. I didn’t want to tell you because I didn’t want this to hurt you. But then I realized I was only hurting everyone by keeping this a secret. I couldn’t do it any longer.”
“Commendable,” I retort through clenched teeth. “Maybe you should have thought about that when I asked the first time.”
“I did and I wasn’t willing to hurt you or lose you. At first, we all agreed to wait a little before telling you.”
I shove away, moving five feet from him but turning back when I have more to say. “How can you all be my friends and keep things from me as easily as you do? Is this what Della’s problem was last night? It finally ate at her conscience long enough that she had to spew it out at dinner.”
“She’s been wanting to tell you. But I wouldn’t listen. I was afraid of this right here. You freaking out and taking it all wrong.”
“You lied. How can I not take that wrong?”
“I lied, but I want to tell the truth now, Liv.”
“You slept with Della again. I don’t need the details. You’re cleared from that.”
Luke buries his hands in his hair, scrubbing down his face. “It was over five years ago. Paul moved past it. Please, tell me we can too?”
“If you weren’t hiding it from Paul, then why did y’all hide it from me?”
Taking a deep breath, he musters, “Paul knows because it affected him. Della and Paul had just met but they weren’t together yet. To get back at me she slept with Paul. Only I didn’t know that until months later. When she found out she was pregnant with Ethan.”
“Della played you both. Whatever. It worked out for them.” Hands on hips, I shrug it off.
“Will you come here, please?” he asks with frustration, standing from his chair.
I gaze around the quiet house. I feel the pull to go back to him, but I stand my ground and refuse. “I’m fine right here.”
Working his bottom lip with his teeth, Luke takes extra care before speaking again. “Della flew out to be with Paul a few months after we… She found out she was pregnant. I was happy for her when she told me, except she wasn’t telling me as her friend. Della said it was mine. That Ethan was mine.”
“Oh my god.” I spin around, unable to bear looking at him.
“He’s not. Ethan is Paul’s son.”
Shaking my head, I stumble, “I-I don’t understand.”
“Della said based on the time of conception the doctors gave her, he should have been mine. We all believed that. Paul wanted nothing to do with us.” Scoffing in the middle of his speech, I couldn’t agree more with Paul. “It wasn’t until Ethan was born much later than anticipated the doctors concluded they had the conception date wrong.”
Anger and hurt forges on, but it can’t overcome the sympathy I feel in a instant. Luke believed for months he was going to be a father, and then it was ripped away. Tears hit my eyes. Sadness for him and I, on complete opposite fields, takes over.
“We told Paul after Ethan was born, and testing proved he wasn’t mine.”
“Luke,” I sigh.
“I don’t need the pity, Liv.” He holds a hand up. “It’s been five years, and they are happy and Ethan is where he is meant to be. It tore me up, but I learned to move on. Della moved out, and her and Paul started their family.”
Della moved out.
“Della was in Georgia. With you,” I say slowly, drawing out the conclusion as the words fall off my tongue.
“We lived together.”
“For how long?”
“Six months,” Luke replied, reluctantly.
Ethan will turn five in a few months. He’s younger than Brielle but not by a full year. If Della didn’t find out about her pregnancy for a couple of months and then moved to Georgia with Luke…
“Brady wasn’t lying,” I whisper.
“What?” he shakes his head in confusion.
“He told me on the last visit he made to Tampa that Della left Calusa to be with you.”
Luke’s brown eyes flickered back and forth over mine, figuring out what I just solved.
“And when I told you what he said, you didn’t deny it.”
“No—” He starts shaking his head in denial.
I’m quick to cut him off. Flaring with anger once more. “You’re unbelievable.”
“I didn’t put it together then. It was a lie that we were engaged. I never asked Della to marry me.”
“Jesus. You didn’t just sleep with her once. Y’all lived together, and were about to start a life together with a child.”
“Even if Ethan turned out to be my son Della and I would have never worked. I was hung up on you. She knew it, too. I wouldn’t touch her, couldn’t touch her, because I didn’t feel anything for her.”
Images of possibilities flash through my mind and I’m disgusted.
“But you did when you fucked her the last time?”
“Don’t be crass, Liv.” Luke holds his ground, but I caught the flinch he made when I snapped at him.
“I’m being honest. You should take notes.”
I can’t be here. My heart is breaking and I want to put on a show of bravery. I’m too stubborn to let him see me wilt.
“Liv. Olivia.” Luke hollers after me when I turn heel and walk away. I flick the light switch on with unnecessary force when I make it back to his room. My bag sits in a chair. I yank it open and start shoveling my belongings inside. “What are you doing?”
“Packing.” Breezing by him, I gather up toiletries left in the bathroom.
“It’s five a.m. You’re not leaving.”
“You’re right. But I’m not staying because of you. When Brielle wakes up, we’
re out of here.”
“That’s it? You’re going to let this…what…this jealousy ruin what we have?” He’s reaching, grabbing with all his might to hold me in place by the one string he knows I’ll react the most to. Anger.
Losing my temper, I grab the nearest item off the counter. A bar of soap. The smooth, dense bar flings out of my hand from where I stand inside the bathroom, through the door and lands square in the center of his stomach. The thud of it smacking his skin is so underwhelming I grow more pissed that all I’ve done is left him smelling better than he already did.
Once upon a time, I compared jealousy and envy when referring to Brady’s behavior. I’d never categorize myself in the same bracket as Brady. I am not like him.
Between the threshold and a bar of soap, I search the brown eyes I love falling into. I stare so long my vision blurs.
“It’s not jealousy. I was envious she had you first. It sucks, but I really can’t complain because if you and her were never together then I wouldn’t have ended up with Brady, and gotten pregnant with Brielle. Della may not have had Ethan. Life is one giant domino effect. I’m content with the way mine is turning out. But all of you played me for a fool. You held onto lies and secrets like they were a litter of puppies. And when the time came for them to get off the tit, that’s when you felt ready to let them go. I want to be your equal, your friends. I wanted to feel included, and like I finally had people to count on and share everything with. That’s not what this is, and I refuse to be yours or Della’s goddamn dog.”
Zipping my bag, I reach for the shorts I left on the bathroom floor. Stepping in to the denim, I feel Luke’s stunned gaze watching me.
“I only wanted to protect you from the pain, Liv. It was a lose-lose situation no matter what I decided.”
“Not every body wins at life, Luke. We got our second chance. Maybe we were just always destined to lose.” Without a backward glance, I breeze by his immobile form. “I’m sleeping on the couch. As soon as Brielle wakes we’re leaving.”
He pauses. Sighs. “Okay.”
A tear breaks loose when he concedes without toil.
Right when you think you know what you want, it turns out be the opposite. But us women are such flip-floppers, right? If he fought for me to stay, I would be wishing he’d just let me go.
Maybe it would hurt less if I wished for Luke to let me go.
I don’t know why I thought it would be better to not feel so frozen. If the ice chipped away my heart would thaw and go back to normal. But hours later, driving away from Luke’s house with a silent little girl in the back seat, the summer heat shines a new light on this cold body of mine, and the pain burst open. I don’t even make it out of town before I’m pulling over and emptying myself of all that water. It has to go somewhere, and it has to come out.
“Mommy, are you okay?” Brielle asks timidly from the back of the car.
I’m broken. I’ve shown her nothing but resilience so she could look up to me and learn from me. Be better than me.
Gasping to suck it all back in, I fight to stop any further tears begging to rip free. I scratch at my aching chest. This isn’t pain from the lies Luke withheld from me. I care, yet I don’t care at the same time. It was six years ago. The past. Everyone has a past. What I’m feeling, why my heart is empty and has nothing else to give is because I just walked away from the love of my life.
We never said it. We didn’t have to, but it’s over.
I walked out and he let me go. Wether to protect me from further pain or something to do with loving me enough to let me go, we’re done.
Chapter Twenty Six
“Dammit,” I grunt, wiping tears away with both open palms. It’s the kind of cry that takes fingers, hands, and forearms to clean up the mess.
“Mom,” Brielle calls my name again.
“I’m okay.” No you’re not.
“No you’re not.”
Never realized the voice of my conscience was the same as my daughter’s.
“Ugh,” I exhale, letting my head fall back on the headrest. Maybe this position will keep anymore tears from falling. “I’m not, but we’re not gonna talk about it.”
“Because you haven’t had coffee yet?”
Face falling to the right, I stare at my little genius. “You know me so well. That’s exactly what I need.”
“I’m hungry,” she adds.
“All right. Let’s get on the road and we’ll stop somewhere in Port Charlotte.”
“Mom,” she replies with a bored tone. “We’re parked in front of a diner. Can’t we eat here?”
Just ahead is the rustic diner I worked at before I moved away. When I threw my car in park, I came to a stop in the diner’s parking lot.
“Well, you wanted to see where I used to work, here it is.”
Unbuckling her seat belt, she scoots to the center and leans between the driver and passenger seat. “It’s empty.”
“Everyone’s probably on their way church. Perfect time for us.”
Because after glancing briefly at my face in the rearview mirror, no one in this town needs to witness this mess.
Red and blotchy, I climb out of the car with my sunglasses covering a third of my face. Before we left Luke’s house I threw on a bra, but left his t-shirt on. Walking inside, I felt ridiculous in a baggy, navy blue cotton shirt tied at my lower back, jean shorts, and flip flops. The rest of Calusa was going to have a field day with Olivia Benson’s Sunday best.
We have our pick of tables and choose a booth to the left of the long counter running in the middle of the diner for those eating alone. Other than Brielle and I, there is one older gentleman at the counter.
Pop, the owner, hasn’t updated a damn thing and probably never will. Hell, I wouldn’t put it past him to haunt whomever gets this place once he’s gone if they try to decorate or upgrade even a little bit.
The leather booths and chairs are red with white tabletops. Light ceramic flooring is scuffed and darkened beneath the tables with chairs, years and years of dragging back and forth across them. A classic pinball machine and Pacman arcade game sits behind our booth in the corner.
Dishes clink and clatter behind the wide serving counter separating the kitchen from the long countertop in the center.
“Well I’ll be,” a sassy, charming, sweet voice comes from the left. Following the old but familiar sound of Frances’s lilt, I smile as she comes out of the swinging kitchen door. “If that ain’t a spittin’ image of Liv Benson, I don’t know what is.”
“Ms. Frances,” I say in greeting, taking in all her affable features. Nothing about this woman has changed. Short, curling gray hair covers her head with the same almost purple tint its always had because she tries to dye it herself and never gets the color right. Tall and slender and upper sixties, Frances had been waitressing at this diner for over forty years.
“I heard you were back, but considering I hadn’t seen you with my own eyes I thought for sure somebody’s been telling some tall tales. There’s just no way the Liv I remember wouldn’t come by and see me at least once.” She shakes a finger at me like a child being scorned.
Personality just as I remember it too. Firecracker.
“Sorry, Ms. Frances. This is my daughter Brielle.”
“You’re a doll, Brielle. Now what can I get you two for breakfast.”
We place our drink and food order all at once. Within a minutes time, Frances comes back with my coffee and Brielle’s orange juice. The diner’s strong brew hits my taste buds and takes me way back. It’s nothing special or spectacular, but it’s a distinct blend that no one can ever duplicate. It should be packaged and sold as a Calusa original.
The first sip goes down smooth, exploding with flavor. The second calms my nerves enough to finally breathe and let reality take its hit. Pain clenches at my heart.
“Did you and Luke break up?” Brielle asks, eyeing where my hand rubs above the beating organ.
“It’s complicated, sweetie.”
“I really liked my room,” she says sullenly, like she’ll never see it again.
“Bri, he’s your uncle. You’ll stay with him again in the future.”
“It won’t be the same. I know he’s my uncle, but the three of us were a family.”
Blinking away troublesome tears, I put on a brave face. “We were. Everything will work out the way it’s meant to be.”
“I believe you and Luke are meant to be.” Across from me she sits tall and smiles. “And he’ll come to his senses and fix it.”
“How do you know it wasn’t me that broke up with him?” I smirk. So grateful for this beautiful sunshine in my life always finding a way to make me smile when all I want to do is cry.
“Doesn’t matter. You told me once, only give my heart to someone who isn’t stupid enough to throw it away. Luke’s not stupid.”
“I love you, sweet girl.”
“Love you, too, Mommy.” She slurps at her juice, then asks, “Can we go see Grandpa after this?”
Crap.
Crappity crap crap.
“Uh. He’s not home.”
“Grandpa never leaves his house. Where’s he at?”
“Uh. He’s…” I let a long breath of air. “Bri, Grandpa’s in the hospital. I didn’t tell you because he’d rather you not see him like that.”
She circles the straw in the tangy liquid in a whirl wind motion, brown brows furrowing in concern. “Is he okay?”
“He will be. We can call him before we leave and see how he’s doing. He might be going home this morning. Janice was going to pick him up once he gets discharged.”
“Is he sick?” Blue eyes peek up at me over the glass rim of her cup. “I’ve noticed he’s a lot skinnier than when I first met him.”
“Have you now,” I mumble. When will adults learn? Children see more than we believe they do. “He fell and hit his head, but the doctors said he’s okay. And he is sick. We were going to tell you later on. I’m sorry, sweetie.”
“Is he going to die?” she whispers and it breaks another part of my heart. After today there won’t be anything left of it.