Chapter Nineteen
MADDOX
Today is my parents' anniversary party.
It’s also day three without Marigold.
I’m being a stubborn asshole right now. I know it. She knows it. My sister knows it. But it scared me to death seeing her laying there on the counter in the kitchen with smoke and flames around her. If I hadn’t been checking on her, I don't know what would have happened.
I know yelling at her in front of others was not one of my finest moments. As a couple, we stand united and hash our differences out in private.
Were we a couple? Are we a couple?
Marigold is the first woman to make me question where my time was being spent. Being a fireman is my passion. It’s my calling and the only thing that brought me happiness.
But now she does that. She’s my passion and brings me happiness. In the short time I’ve known her, she’s changed my total trajectory. My dad told me it’d happen, and it would happen fast. I just didn’t realize how right he was.
And now, I have no idea how to fix this. I don't have a great track record with women. My sister felt she couldn’t come to me. I yelled at Marigold in front of the town. I’m basically left on my own right now.
Taking a breath, I need to get my head on straight for today's party. I feel extremely off balance. I haven't been to the station in days and instead of spending my time with Marigold, like I planned, I've been sitting alone in my house.
I don’t do well with idle time.
I shower and dress quickly, telling myself to just get to the hall, find my sister and make sure all the last minute details are handled.
Grabbing my keys, I hold them in my hand, pausing a moment. Tossing them in the air, I catch them again and place them on the table. I grab a water bottle from the fridge and head outside, passing my truck which hasn’t left its parking space in my driveway in three days.
Ten minutes later, I’m entering the hall where I spot Reece and Isaac immediately. Squinting at their closeness, I remove my sunglasses and do a double take as I see Isaac pat her ass twice.
“What the fuck?” I must speak it out loud, and louder than usual as both of them spin at my arrival. Reece quickly walks closer to me and I see Isaac hot on her heels. “What did you just do to her?”
They glance at each other and Isaac shakes his head. “What are you talking about?”
“Did you just,” I swallow hard, “spank my sister?”
Reece lets out a laugh but it’s not her normal one. It sounds like nervous laughter. Isaac’s face pales a bit. “No-no,” he stutters. “Bro, come on. We’re trying to get stuff ready and?—”
“Maddox, can you just go out to my car and get the balloons?” Reece cuts him off and now she’s staring me down like she's challenging me to say no. There's tension in the air and I don’t know if it's about the fire, about me or about what I know I just saw. Probably all three.
“Mads? Balloons. Please. I need to check on the centerpieces.”
Reluctantly I say yes and turn around to go back out to the parking lot, grumbling the whole way. I need to snap out of this before my parents arrive. The last thing I want to do is ruin today for them. I find her car in the lot and carefully pull out the cluster of balloons. Wrapping the strings around my hand ensuring they don't float away, I go around to the side of the building and enter through the door.
And I freeze.
Isaac and Reece are facing each other with not an inch of sunlight between them. He brushes the hair from her face and she's gazing up at him and my blood runs cold. This is just one more thing she’s kept from me.
“I didn’t see what I saw before, right?” I bark out and they both look my way. But when Reece meets my eyes, I know.
They've been a couple all along.
I untangle the balloons from my hand. “Know what? Not today. I’m not doing this today at Mom and Dad’s party.”
I storm out of the hall needing a breath of air. Within moments, Reece is barging through the side door and back into the parking lot, Isaac right behind her.
“Mads!”
“Sissy! Don't.” I can’t turn around and face her.
“No, Mads. You're going to listen. Enough is enough.”
I turn on her quickly. “You're a couple now? You’re doing exactly what I asked you not to.”
“What you asked me not to? How can you even say that? I’m an adult and I do what I want.”
“What you want? Like breaking my best friend's heart and mine. Again.”
She recoils. “Again?”
“Yea, Reece. Again. Don't act like you didn’t know.”
She looks frantically between Isaac and me, searching for answers.
‘Mads, I?—”
“Listen, I get it. You wanted something more than what Love Beach had to offer. But why do you hate it here so much that you couldn't ever think to come home? Why won’t you stay?”
“I am staying! And if you would have listened to me, or given me five minutes of your time I'd tell you that. You're so busy with everything in the fire department that it’s not until Marigold showed up that you realize there's more to life.”
Hearing her yell out she’s staying has relief washing over me but also confusion. She’s staying, what does that mean for her and Isaac? What's it mean for me and Isaac?
“You're staying?” I choke out.
“Yeah, and you're the dumb shit that's going to get left behind if you don’t realize what you have here in Love Beach.”
Pausing for a moment and trying to make my mind catch up with what I'm seeing, I process what she said.
“I do know what I have here. But she doesn’t want me.”
“And why is that, Mads? Because you talk without thinking? Because you issue ultimatums like ‘stay away from her’ and ‘sell that building’? You always think you know what’s best!”
“That’s just it! I don’t know what's best! All I know is how it feels to be left behind! You left for years! And after the other night, maybe Marigold is already looking to leave. Then what? What happens to me?”
Silence falls amongst us and it's then I realize Marigold has shown up with Logan to bring the cake.
“Yikes, stud.” I hear Logan speak but no one acknowledges him. I just shouted out my worst fear and everyone heard me. “Come on ladies, help me with this cake.”
I watch helplessly as my sister and Logan walk away from me. Marigold lingers for a moment and I wish she would just run to me. Erase all my fears. Instead, she follows them inside and my heart deflates.
Isaac waits for them to go inside and says, “I was here all along for you. I stayed for seven years. Doesn't that count?”
“Yes, you've been the one to stand by me but?—”
“I stood by you, while you ran from fire to fire. Your sister took off and you immersed yourself in fire training. I was the one left alone, Maddox! I could have left. I could have gone with Reece. I should have gone with her. But you made us promise not to be together again.” His voice drops. “She had her reasons for leaving. I knew them. Did you?”
My mind is spinning right now. It seems like there has been a whole life happening around me, that I’ve missed out on. Have I really been so absorbed in my own career that I didn’t see this? I didn’t see that my best friend was hurting, for seven years?
“I had the bar up for sale.” He scoffs a laugh. “You didn’t even know.” His voice pulls me back to the present.
“You what?”
“Yeah. I was ready to sell. Leave. Follow my girl because that’s what you do when a person becomes more important than anything else in life. I’d gladly give it up to see her happy. Because if she’s happy, so am I. I can always find another bar, another job, another town. But I can’t find another her.”
I’m having a hard time right now differentiating between my best friend pouring his heart out about a girl, and that girl being my sister. I love them both dearly and want them to be happy but for it to be with each other? I’ve watched that show before.
But maybe love is something that once you have it with someone, it never truly goes away.
“Mads, you need to figure out what’s on the top of your list here. I know being a fireman was everything to you as a kid, but you’re not a kid anymore. There’s more to life than a job, and you need to decide what life you want. Can you see yourself with someone other than Marigold?”
I think for a moment, processing all he’s saying to me. He’s right. “You know, fire was my number one, for the longest time. But I don't feel that way anymore. I don’t feel the urgency to always be at the station. Or to answer every call that goes out–”
“Unless it's Cakeology.”
I huff a laugh at his smirk. “Unless it’s Cakeology. Dad told me when it happens, it's going to happen fast. And he was right. Marigold is the one for me.”
“I am?” Marigold’s voice is quiet behind me, but I don’t miss it.
Turning to face her completely, her eyes are glistening as I stand and come beside her, taking her hands in mine.
“The thought of you being in this town, close to me each day, yet not with me, is enough to drive me insane.” I lift her hands to my lips. “I need you Goldie. I need you to be the first thing I see in the morning and I need you to be my last kiss each night. I need you first in my life. You’re the fire that lights my life now.”
I speak the words that have been swirling in my mind since meeting Marigold. Sure, I tried to avoid it, but something about our first meeting stuck with me and she’s only grown more in my heart since then.
“I’m sorry I was a complete asshole the other night. I’ve run into fires without a second thought about what’s on the other side or who’s inside, for years. I just need to do a job. But when I saw it was Cakeology on fire? And it was you inside? Every plan I had for myself vanished and a new one took over. You’re my priority, and if I don’t have that? I have nothing.”
“Maddox.” Her tears run freely down her cheeks. “I don’t expect to be first, I expect us to be a team. You give, I give. Some days you give more and some days I give more. That’s all I need.”
“You’ve taught me how to live life again. For something other than fire.”
“And you’ve taught me how to have fun again.”
“Forgive me?” She nods and I pull her in close, wrapping myself around her. “Thank you.”
Reece comes back outside and stands by Isaac. He throws his arm around her as she asks, “Do you get it now, Maddox? It’s a tough line to cross when your sibling’s friend is involved.”
In a small town like Love Beach I should have known there would be no way to date someone who isn’t a friend of ours. And why wouldn’t we want that?
“You’re right Sissy. And it only makes sense that we’re all friends. I need to apologize to both of you, too, for putting that ultimatum on you. I get it now, there’s no way I’d be able to stay away from Marigold. I don’t know how you both did it for all this time.”
“We’re not going to lose each other. We’re only going to gain so much more.” Reece comes over and hugs me tightly. “Hey, where’s your truck?”
I glance at Marigold, suddenly feeling like I’m standing in a scene from a chick flick. “It’s at home,” I mumble.
“I know it’s home. I saw you walk here. Why?”
I look back and forth between the girls. “I didn’t want to drive it.” My sister raises a brow and Marigold steps closer with confusion on her face. “It smelled like you. I couldn’t be in it because it reminded me too much of you.”
“So dramatic, Mads.” My sister laughs at me, but Marigold snuggles in close.
“I think that’s the sweetest thing that’s ever been said to me,” she croons with a smile spread across her face.
I lower my voice and whisper in her ear, “You know the first thing we’re going to do in that truck once we go home, right?”
She blushes and swats at my chest before directing her attention to my sister. “Reece. Is this your plan? Are you really staying?”
She smiles. “I am. I was offered a teaching job right here in Love Beach. How could I turn it down now?” She’s got a giant smile as she holds me tight. “Mads. It was never about leaving you behind. And I'm sorry that you felt that way. I needed to know something more. I needed to learn something different. I needed to not see Moms disappointed face every day since telling her I was pursuing another career path.” She shakes her head and I zero in on her. Is there something between her and Mom that I’ve missed as well? “It had nothing to do with leaving you. Sure, you're a bit much but I love you. You’re my big brother, even if only by under a minute.” She laughs. “But I needed to be something other than ‘Maddox’s sister’. I also needed to be allowed to breathe something other than med school when it wasn’t what I wanted.”
“What are you all doing out here?” We all turn at my dad’s voice. And by the look on my mom’s face she’s heard that last comment.
Mom blatantly checks her watch. “Isn’t the party starting soon? I hope everything is set up.” She lifts her foot, swirling it around. “These heels are meant to look good in, not to work in.”
My dad pats her arm. “It’s fine, Candee. I’m sure the kids took care of it all.”
“Mm. And Reece, really. It’s been seven years, can we stop with the whole ‘nursing isn’t my calling’? We know your little teaching job is important to you.”
I visibly watch my sister stiffen at my mom’s words and I’m kind of surprised to hear her speak like this. I’ve never heard Mom with such a tone before.
But maybe I just wasn’t listening.
Logan steps outside just in time to diffuse the situation. “Ladies and gentlemen. I’d appreciate it if you'd all come inside for this party. I know there have been some revelations happening in this parking lot, but the fun is now happening in here. So, get your asses inside.”
Reece turns quickly with Isaac following behind and heads inside. Dad motions for my mom to join him and Marigold and I follow.