by Elise Faber
Scar ran her hands over the skirt and made a face at her in the mirror. “Fine. Be logical, why don’t you?”
Fanny smiled. “I will.” A beat. “Are you getting the dress?”
Scar tilted her head from side to side, the red waves of her hair sliding from shoulder to shoulder. “Yes,” she said with a decisive nod. “I like it and even though it is way too much money for a freaking scrap of fabric”—this was true, the dress revealed more skin than it covered—“it’s sexy and looks amazing on me, and that’s good enough for me.”
“As it should be.” Fan nodded to the curtain. “Get changed. Let’s get some stuff to go with that fabulous dress.”
“Lace things?” Scar asked.
“If that’s what you want,” Fanny replied, hiding a smile, glad that her friend was finally getting on board with her plan.
“And shoes?”
“Duh.”
Scar grinned. “What about you?” she asked as she slipped back behind the curtain to take off the dress. “Are you going to buy any lacy things for that ex of yours?”
Fanny’s throat spasmed for a moment before she managed to get a reply out. Of course Dani had dished about Brandon . . . to everyone. The Gold gossip train was notorious and efficient, as thus Fanny had been getting questions about “the ex” from everyone—players to support staff to the front office—that entire day. But not from Scar, apparently, who had just been waiting for her moment to pounce.
“I think you already answered your own question,” she muttered. “He’s my ex for a reason. No lace for him.”
Scar poked her head out from behind the curtain, her brows lifted.
“What?” Fanny asked.
“Nothing.” Scar disappeared again, the curtain fluttering. She reappeared a moment later, the dress back on the hanger and all the others she’d tried on before the emerald one in her other hand.
Fan moved forward and took the rejects. “Let’s go to shoes first.” She hung them on the rack of go-backs, started for the exit of the dressing rooms. “I think I saw a pair that will look perfect—”
“Who is Brandon, really?” Scar asked, catching her arm. “Because he doesn’t look at you like you’re an ex.”
“How does he look at me?”
“Like you’re something he’s desperate for.” She clicked her teeth together, nom-style. “Like he wants to eat you up.”
Franny inhaled sharply, shook her head. “I-I can’t. It’s—”
“Complicated?” Scarlett asked, tugging her toward the displays of shoes. “Everything that’s really good in life is complicated.”
“This is really complicated, Scar. Not just normal complicated.”
“Why?”
This wasn’t really a conversation she wanted to have in the middle of a department store. Okay, fine. This wasn’t a story she wanted to share ever. But also . . . she wanted to talk about it. She wanted it off her chest, for the pain and longing to stop eating at her. She wanted her friend to understand, wanted someone to understand.
So, as they wandered through high heels, she told Scarlett everything about Brandon—how their friendship began at thirteen and fifteen, him becoming her first love when she’d turned fourteen and he’d been sixteen, the cancer, and that horrible week of him not recognizing her, not remembering. She told her friend how amazing it had been when he’d gone into remission, how his family had become hers and supported her during her skating career, how they’d made long distance work despite it not working for so many others. Her voice shook when she told her about the seizure when he’d been driving and how they’d discovered the cancer had come back, the surgery, him waking up and not knowing her.
“I tried for months,” she whispered. “I tried everything. I brought out albums of us, made new ones with all of the things we did together, hoping that he would see something and it would spark his memories. I made playlists and brought him on field trips to our favorite places. I baked for him. I put on our favorite movies and TV shows.” Her eyes burned. “I spent months and months doing that, along with accompanying him to his physical therapy, his checkups. I spent hours with him, all while loving him desperately, and he only looked at me like I was an acquaintance or a new friend he barely tolerated because I was so close to his parents.” A sigh. “It never grew into anything, and I could have handled him not remembering me, could have put all my new energy into building a new future together, but . . . he didn’t love me.” She sniffed and wiped a tear that threatened to leak from the corner of her eye. “And then I watched him fall for his infusion nurse. I saw him light up for her every single time he went in for treatment, when they happened to run into each other when he was there for a different appointment. There was chemistry and potential, and I saw what it did to him to pretend those feelings weren’t there.”
“Oh, Fan.”
Swallowing hard, she kept her focus on her hands. “Because even though he didn’t love me like I loved him, he was still a nice guy and didn’t want to hurt my feelings.” She closed her eyes. “I waited six months. And then I rejoined the pro tour.” She’d still held out hope that he would remember. That she would come home to visit her parents, and magically he’d know her and declare his undying love. “A little while after that, I saw a picture of them together on Instagram, and I knew that I needed to let him go.” She sighed. “So, I did.”
Scar was quiet, but only for a moment. Then she was wrapping her arms around Fanny, holding her tight, and saying, “I’m so sorry, babe. I’m so, so sorry.”
She smiled, shook her head. “It was a shitty situation, but I’m fine—”
“No.” Scar pulled back, gripping the tops of her arms, and she was going to wrinkle her dress if she kept that up. “Don’t you dare minimize what happened to you, to both of you. Yes, it was shitty. Yes, neither of you could control it. No, you don’t get to tuck your pain away into some deep, dark hole inside you while putting on a mask, pretending to be okay. You don’t have to pretend with me. You don’t have to be okay.”
Fanny’s heart thudded, her eyes burned like a motherfucker.
Scarlett was . . . well, she was right.
And incredible. There was that, too.
“You’re going to make me cry for real if you keep being so wonderful.”
“Don’t worry, it won’t last.”
That had Fanny snorting out a laugh, albeit a watery one. “Come on,” she said, linking her arm with her friend’s. “Let’s go spend some money.”
“You should give him a chance,” Scar said a little while later, as they walked through the selection of shoes again. They’d already each found a pair and then had moved onto lingerie. Now they’d been ensnared by all the pretties again, and Fanny had been contemplating the need for another pair of strappy sandals.
For the record, she was well aware that she didn’t need the sandals.
Want, on the other hand?
The want was real.
Fanny’s feet slid to a stop, and she gaped up at Scarlett. After all she’d told her friend, Scar was just going to throw that out there like that? It wasn’t for casual conversation, especially now that she knew the history. Plus, they’d been talking about going to Molly’s after this, and friends didn’t throw friends curveballs when it came to drooling over or consuming carbs.
It was as simple as that.
“You know why I can’t,” she said.
“I know why you haven’t,” Scar countered.
“Plus, I don’t even feel that way about him anymore,” Fanny counter-countered, knowing it was a lie, but sticking by it anyway. Sometimes a girl had to lie to herself, and that was okay in her book.
But not, apparently, in Scarlett’s book.
Her friend tossed her red locks over her shoulders, fixed Fanny with a look, and declared, “Bullshit.”
“Hey, that’s not—”
Scar held her in place with a piercing blue stare.
Fanny narrowed her eyes right back. “You’ve spe
nt both interactions with him either telling him off, glaring at him, or staring at him longingly, with your face having gone soft.” She said the last like it was a direct quote.
And it probably was.
Fucking Dani, spilling everything. “Yeah, so?”
“So?” Fanny asked incredulously. “So, you’re supposed to be on my side. He’s the bad guy in this—”
Scar lifted a brow. “To which I would have to say, that’s more bullshit.” A beat. “Also, which you know.”
Okay, that was bullshit.
Scar smiled, probably knowing she’d won. The bitch.
She glared. If only Fanny didn’t love her so much, she’d . . . do something.
Scarlett ran a finger over a pump. “Plus, I can’t be the only one to get all the orgasms. He’s hot, Fan. Those chocolate eyes—a woman could get lost in eyes like that. And not to mention the curls. Hell, I’m going on a date and spent the last couple of days thinking he was evil incarnate until Dani dished, but that still didn’t stop me from imagining plunging my fingers into those curls and holding on tight while he—”
Fanny groaned, let her head fall back, not about to admit to all the times she’d lost herself in Brandon’s eyes, nor how soft his curls had been against her bare skin, or how easy it had been to grip them when he’d positioned himself between her thighs.
He was probably even better than Scar could imagine.
And she’d bet her friend could imagine a lot.
And all her touching and getting lost in Brandon’s eyes had been when she was barely an adult, both of them barely out of their teen years. He’d been all gangly muscles and still growing into himself. Nothing like what he was like now—the lines of his jaw fiercely defined and coated in a few days’ worth of stubble, pecs she could grab on to, biceps that stretched the sleeves of his shirt, thighs and an ass that competed with the guys’ on the Gold, and everyone knew that professional hockey players had the best thighs and asses. He was leaner than the guys but still fucking yummy.
This was a dangerous line of thinking, she knew, as her gaze moved to the fluorescent lights on the ceiling, and she sucked in a breath.
“He’s hot, and you know it.”
Her gaze flew down, met Scarlett’s, and Fanny found herself cracking up when her friend waggled her brows and mimed something obscene and definitely not department store appropriate.
This conversation should hurt, especially after everything she’d told Scar, but instead, Fanny felt lighter, as though it were finally okay to have a normal conversation about Brandon. To be attracted to all his pretty, yummy muscles. To maybe even joke about him, or if not joke, then to at least withstand a little bit of teasing when it came to him and their interactions. It was that lightness that prompted her to say, “Oh, God, here we go. You didn’t even like him two days ago.”
“I have faith that he’ll table the asshole.”
Fanny snorted. “Because Dani bullied him into it?”
“No. Because Dani says he looks at you right.”
Her lungs froze on a sharp inhale.
“Plus, he’s not what I thought, and you know why,” Scar went on, snagging her arm and jostling her slightly as she dragged her away from the pair of sandals Fanny definitely didn’t need. “This would be different if you were over him or if it was obvious that you didn’t feel anything for him or if he didn’t look at you like you hung the moon and the sun and all the stars in the sky.”
Fanny sucked in more air, liking that last part far too much for her mental well-being.
Scar squeezed her arm. “I’m not trying to push—”
“You’re not?” Fanny said dryly.
“No.” A shrug. “Well, okay, yes, I am.” Scarlett grinned. “Because I can see on your face, your feelings are still there. You’re not over him, even if you want to be, and I think . . .” She trailed off, nibbled on the corner of her mouth.
“What?” Fanny found herself asking.
“I think you’re still in love with him.”
Fanny stumbled back a step, shaking her head. “No, that’s not—”
“Shit.” Scar squeezed her arm again, drawing her to another table of shoes. “Just forget I said that. You’re not ready and—”
Panic gripped Fanny, and she whipped around, picking up a random heel. “Look at this one. It’ll be perfect with a dress, and you can even wear them with jeans or a—”
“Fanny.”
“Or slacks. You could wear them with slacks!”
“Fanny.”
The sharp tone had her freezing, the heel in her hand.
“Ignore me,” Scarlett murmured. “You’re not ready.”
Fat lot of good that did her with the words already swirling around her mind. Her emotions churned through her—the past and the memories and the growing glimmer of hope that was pushing her to track down Brandon, to tease out all the rest of her feelings, to take a step that would have her plummeting over the edge for him a third time.
Part of her wanted him. Part of her would always want him. Fuck.
“Fanny.”
She glanced up at Scar, her pulse pounding in her veins, her throat tight and dry and—
“It’ll be okay.”
“I’m not so sure.”
“Trust me.” A beat. “And then ignore me.”
Fanny shook her head. “Am I supposed to do both at the same time?”
“I believe I gave you an order for how to execute those two things already.”
She glared, but at least her heart was slowing down, and she didn’t feel at risk of passing out—at least for the moment.
“See?” Scarlett said, her lips turning up. “You’re doing it already.”
“What? The trusting or the ignoring?”
“Either.” A grin. “Both.” She plucked the heel Fanny didn’t even realize she was still holding out of Fanny’s hand and declared, “I like these. Let’s both try them on.”
Fanny swallowed hard, released a shaking breath, whispered, “I don’t think I can.”
“The shoes or Brandon?” Scar asked gently.
Fanny just looked at her.
Scar smiled kindly, nudged Fanny’s shoulder with her own. “You don’t have to decide today.”
It felt that way, felt like Fanny needed to drop everything and figure out what to do with Brandon. But Scarlett was right. It was too much too soon, and she wasn’t ready. “I—” she began, wanting to say something touching or emotional, or to at least express how much Scarlett’s understanding meant to her.
But the words wouldn’t come.
Luckily for Fanny, Scar heard them anyway.
“I know,” she whispered. Then her chin came up, her volume increased, and she said, “Now, let’s go ask the salesperson for our sizes. We both absolutely need these shoes.”
She’d put away her new shoes—two pairs, the heels she and Scarlett had both tried on and the strappy sandals that she hadn’t been able to get out of her head.
Funny how that kept going around, huh?
But she wasn’t thinking about that, nor about Brandon or the notebook that was sitting on the kitchen island, burning a hole in the granite (figuratively, not literally, otherwise she would have much bigger problems in her life than an ex-fiancé with a memory problem).
And look.
She was joking in her own mind.
That was good, right?
That had to mean she was right to talk to Scarlett about Brandon and everything that went down, rather than continue to bottle it all up and pretend it hadn’t happened. It was on the surface and exposed and—
Why that notebook was burning the proverbial hole.
Because she’d put away her purchases, had whipped up dinner—salad and leftover soup from Molly’s, which Scarlett had treated her to after they spent their wad on shoes and lace (for her, not for Brandon, Fanny promised herself). Then she’d gone the whole popcorn, movie, wine route.
But that hadn’t held her attention.
Every time she moved into the kitchen to refill her glass or get more popcorn or . . . hell, who was she kidding?
She kept going into the kitchen because she wanted to look in the damned notebook. It was time she admitted that and stopped lying to herself and . . . she wanted to know what Brandon’s mom had intended her to have.
There. That was the truth.
No amount of fake blood and suspenseful music would change the truth.
She’d already torn open those barely scabbed-over wounds, had already told Scar everything, and plus, she’d forgiven Brandon long ago, was now nurturing the spark inside her that kept telling her to move forward.
And . . .
No more excuses.
She put down the wine glass, left the movie running in the background because the sound of the film was oddly comforting, and she moved to the island.
Releasing a shuddering breath, Fanny flipped open the cover.
The picture pasted to the inside had her breath shuddering all over again. It was of her and Brandon, both looking so damned young. He was in his hockey gear. She was in her skating leotard, earmuffs covering her ears, the fingertips of her gloves damp. Their arms were around each other. Their smiles huge.
God, she’d never stood a chance without him, had she?
He’d owned her heart, been that missing piece she hadn’t even known she was lacking from the first moment he’d teased her when they were teenagers.
Sighing, she turned the page and began reading what appeared to be Grace’s journal, or maybe it was more of a memory book. The entries were sporadic and only mentioned Brandon and his activities, and as she read about Brandon’s hockey tournaments, the paper he got an A on in school, a memory sparked across Fanny’s mind. She remembered seeing Grace writing in this, and her breath caught as she realized what the entries began to include.
Her.
Fanny was in these.
Grace had written about Brandon being infatuated with a girl. Then the first time she met Fanny and how much she had liked her.
Fan let her fingers drift across the words, wonder sliding through her. Grace had liked her.