40. Tatum
40
TATUM
I feel like I might throw up. I shouldn’t be surprised. It’s not like this call will be a walk in the park, but the physical response to the whole thing? It makes me hate it even more. Forcing myself to push the call button, I wipe my hands against my thighs one at a time, then shift my phone to my opposite ear.
“Hello?” my sister answers.
“Hey,” I murmur.
“Tatum?” Ophelia asks.
“Yeah, it’s me.”
Silence greets me, so I check the screen, confirming the call is still connected. It is. Which means I’ve rendered my sister speechless. I’d give her crap for it if I wasn’t as surprised as she is. Don’t get me wrong. I’ve known I’d have to rip this Band-Aid off at one point or another, but actually going through with it? It’s kind of a modern day miracle, and she knows it as well as I do.
“Uh, hey,” Lia finally says. “Hi. How are you?”
“I’m good, how are you?”
“Good, just…hanging out with the girls.”
“Oh.” I gulp. “You can call me later or whatever.”
“No, I’m good,” she rushes out. “I can chat.”
“Okay? Uh.”
Why is this so hard?
“Hoooow’s the wedding planning going?” I press my hand to my forehead, willing the conversation to move forward.
God, I sound so stupid.
At least I waited until Rory was in the shower to call so there isn’t a witness to this stilted conversation.
“It’s good,” Lia answers. “Overwhelming, but good.”
“Awesome. I, uh, I’ve been meaning to call to congratulate you.”
“Yeah?”
I don’t miss the surprise in her voice. It isn’t bitchy or snooty. It’s genuine, only tacking on more guilt for the time I spent avoiding her.
“Yeah.” I chew on the edge of my thumb, then drop it to my lap. “Sorry I didn’t…respond to your texts.”
She doesn’t answer, but the background noise goes quiet. She probably went to another room or something. I’m grateful for it, though. The privacy. It’s not like her friends don’t know about the drama we’ve had as sisters. Nope. I’ve made my feelings crystal clear from the very beginning, and even now, I don’t regret it. Not because my sister deserved my asshole behavior, but I spent years shoving aside my feelings, pretending like they didn’t exist, and where did it get me? Absolutely nowhere. At least Lia knew where I stood when it came to her and Mav, even if it did paint me as the bitch.
“I get it,” Lia finally murmurs. “Why you didn’t respond to any of my texts.”
Part of me wonders if she does get it. If she understands why I’m so hot and cold. So unpredictable. Why I’ve spent years distancing myself from her and Mav and…everyone, even if it isn’t fair to them.
“I want you to know I’m excited for you,” I add. “I think you and Mav are…are really great together.”
“Thanks, Tate.” The sadness in her voice tugs at my heart. “That means a lot.”
“You’re welcome.”
“Listen, I’ve been meaning to ask you something.” She hesitates. “And you can say no, okay? Like, genuinely, I totally understand if you want to say no, but?—”
“Spit it out, Ophelia.”
Silence greets me, and I squeeze the edge of my cell, praying for patience.
“Would you…would you be my maid of honor?” she asks.
What?
I pull my phone away from my ear, convinced I’ve heard her wrong. Did she really just ask me this? After all the bullshit we’ve been through? After my lack of support for years, not to mention the way I totally threw her under the bus with Archer before and after he passed?
“Y-you want me to be your maid of honor?” I ask.
“Is that weird for you?” She hesitates again. “If it is, I totally get it, I just…”
Twisting the blanket in my lap, I admit, “I kind of figured you would’ve already asked Fin or Dylan or Raine or…” Anyone else but me , I silently finish.
“You’re my little sister, Tate,” she returns. “You mean more to me than almost anyone else in the world.”
My mouth ticks up, catching me by surprise. “Almost?”
She laughs. “You know what I mean, smartass.”
And I do. I know what it’s like to love someone. To put them above everyone else. Even my big sister. Shame and regret twist inside of me at the reminder of how much time has passed since we really spoke. Since I refused to hear her out or let my hate go. Too long.
Cotton fills my mouth, but I force out, “I’d be honored, Lia.”
It’s only half a lie. Honored? Yes. Absolutely losing my shit about all the situations that are guaranteed to be a mind fuck throughout the process? Also, yes. And sometimes it sucks how two opposing feelings can be on the same coin like this one. Even so, Paxton’s right. Carrying the hate I’ve carried for someone I’m supposed to love—my own flesh and blood—is exhausting. And I’m tired of lugging it around day in and day out, knowing it doesn’t do me, or anyone else, for that matter, a single fucking speck of good.
“You’re the best, Tatum,” Ophelia breathes out. “You really are. Thank you.”
“Don’t mention it.” I pause, caught between ending the call on a good note and opening the puss-filled sore refusing to heal, no matter how much time I’ve given it. “Can I…can I ask you something?”
“Yeah, of course.”
Just say it, Tatum.
“Do you ever…” A lump clogs my throat, and I force it back, well aware if I don’t say it now, I never will. “Do you ever think about him anymore?”
Him.
I don’t need to say his name. Ophelia already knows.
“I think about Archer every day,” she whispers. “Every. Fucking. Day.”
Me, too. The words are on the tip of my tongue, but I swallow them, replacing the admission with another question. “Do you miss him?” My voice cracks, and I rub at the corner of my eye, willing the pressure behind them to go away. But it’s too much. All of it. Ophelia. Archer. His absence. My pulling away. It’s killing me.
“I miss Archer more than I will ever be able to describe,” Ophelia promises.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.” She sniffs. “And I know there is nothing in this world I can say to convince you otherwise, but I wasn’t happy when I found out, Tate. I promise you I wasn’t. I was heartbroken. I didn’t look at Archer’s death as a solution to a problem, and neither did Mav. It wasn’t fair. It’ll never be fair. Ever .”
“And that’s it?” I bite the edge of my thumb as a tear slides down my cheek. “Learning to accept that life isn’t fair, and it is what it is?”
“Honestly?” Her pause settles into my bones, siphoning the last of my hope that one day, with enough time, I’ll stop missing him, and it won’t hurt so much. “Kind of, yeah.” The defeat in her voice pulls at me, strumming an ounce of grace I’ve refused to give her before now. Before this moment. This conversation. This confession. “I know it isn’t the answer you want to hear,” she adds, “but…but there is no answer in the universe that’ll bring him back. That’ll make everything okay. That’ll take away the sting of fate’s twisted idea of balance. Mav and I have spent years working through it. Processing the guilt we carry every single day for Mav surviving when Archer didn’t. It wasn’t fair. It still isn’t fair. And if we could go back and have a say in how things went down, I know Mav would change places with his brother in a heartbeat. But do you want to know something, Tate?”
My grief grows and grows until I swear I can’t breathe, but I force out, “What?”
I can’t fucking breathe.
“I think the real reason you’ve hated me for years is because we both know I can’t say the same,” she whispers. “I can’t say I would go back and choose to bury Maverick instead of Archer, and that brings a whole other messed-up wave of guilt I have to carry.” Her voice cracks, and my head falls forward, knowing this is the crux of my frustration and pain and feelings when it comes to my big sister. The person I’ve always looked up to. Always envied. Until the truth came out that proved she wasn’t the person I thought she was, and I can’t even blame her for it. “Now, if I could put myself in that casket so Mav and Arch could walk away together, I would, but that isn’t an option either, you know?”
She sniffles again, and I want to tell her to stop talking. To stop saying things like this. But I don’t. Instead, I sit silent, memorizing her words as if they have the power to heal everything we’ve been through, even when it feels impossible.
“But what I’m most sorry for?” she continues. “Is how I was too self-absorbed at the time to recognize the pain you were going through. I’m so sorry I wasn’t there for you. That I didn’t know…”
We’ve never talked about it. Even dancing around the subject made me want to bite Ophelia’s head off over the years. The fact that I loved Archer and am now stuck with living in Ophelia’s shadow for the rest of my existence. Or at least, it’s what I thought until…until Pax showed me I don’t have to live in the darkness of her shadow. That I can let go and move on. That I have more power than I’ve given myself credit. I should remember that.
“You’re not the only one who screwed up,” I murmur. “I was hurting, and I took it out on you. It isn’t fair, and I’m sorry it took me so long to reach out and to…” Breathe. “To forgive you.”
“Dammit, Tatum,” she cries. “You couldn’t let me fly out so we could finally have this talk in person and I could give you a hug?” A pathetic laugh filters from my speaker. “I’m a mess over here.”
“Me, too,” I admit with a laugh that’s just as pathetic as hers. “I love you, Lia.”
“Love you, too. More than you will ever know.”
And for the first time in…forever, I honestly believe her.
“Thanks for calling,” she whispers.
“I’m trying,” I admit.
“I know you are.” She sniffs again, and so do I.
I’m trying.