Chapter 14
WALKER
The next morning, I’m in the kitchen before seven, which is actually late for me. I didn’t sleep more than an hour or two. I kept seeing the look of disappointment and hurt on Naudi’s face.
Since her family has been here, the kitchen has been full of delicious aromas at most every part of the day. Today, there are no smells of spices or coffee or anything mouthwatering.
There’s only the dim early light and the sound of my feet shifting on the tile floor. I put coffee on because I don’t know what else to do.
A few minutes later, Dad comes in, dressed and keys in hand. “Headed somewhere?”
“They asked me to take them to the airport.”
That seems about right. Don’t stick around and try to make things better for your daughter. Hit the road and never look back.
“I didn’t think their flight was until noon.”
“It’s not. They asked for an early start.”
We look at each other, and I can tell we are both thinking the same thing. “Arya going with them?”
“Yeah.”
I have a death grip on my coffee mug. “Does Naudi know they are leaving this early?”
Dad gives me a look. “I don’t imagine there’s been any communication between them.”
That sits between us for a second. Then we hear footsteps coming down the stairs. Luggage rolls across the old wood floors. Doors open and close and low voices drift into the kitchen but not clearly enough to make out words.
Dad walks over and places a hand on my shoulder. “You don’t have to fix this one.”
I let out a breath through my nose. “I know.”
“Do you?”
No. Not really. Every part of me wants to go upstairs, knock on her door, and make sure she’s all right. Every part of me wants to stand between her and her family and make them realize how they’ve hurt their daughter.
She made it clear last night that she doesn’t need saving. She needs space to stand on her own. I have to respect that, even if it’s eating me alive.
When Dad and I walk into the foyer, Rajesh is surrounded by suitcases and bags. His features wear the same unreadable sternness.
Anita is straightening a bag that fell over. Every inch of her is pulled together. Hair neat. Clothing perfect. Expression composed enough to fool anyone who hadn’t watched her cut her daughter open the night before.
Arya stands to the side. Her eyes are swollen, and she doesn’t look at me. None of them do. Dad sighs and steps forward. “Car’s ready when you are.”
Anita nods. “Thank you, Tom. For your hospitality.”
Hospitality. That’s all this has become.
Dad’s jaw clenches, but he remains polite. “You’re welcome.”
Rajesh gives a single nod, then walks out. Arya trails behind him without a word. Anita pauses at the door, looking toward the stairs. For a second, I think maybe she’ll go back up and make things right with Naudi. Maybe there is still enough mother in her to choose her daughter over pride.
She doesn’t. She walks out and lets the door close behind her. Dad looks at me. He picks up a suitcase and mutters, “Damn fool family” on his way out.
I grab the rest of the luggage and follow.
Standing alone on the porch, I listen to the slow crunch of gravel as they drive away. Dad will be gone most of the day. I wait until the car pulls onto the road and disappears before going back inside.
There’s no sign of Naudi, and I hope she’s getting some sleep. Back in the kitchen, I pour myself another cup of coffee, grab a banana from the bowl on the counter, and head out to the processing barn.
For someone that’s a daily hands-on person, I have surely been absent for the past week. As it turns out, a hive has been damaged by an animal trying to get to the honey. That rarely happens. Most animals are discouraged by the bees, especially on the island.
I take the tools and supplies I need and jump in the Gator to go repair the hive.
Three hours later, I pull up to the front of the house and find Naudi not only dressed and sitting in a rocking chair deep in thought, but also her suitcase sitting beside her.
“What are you doing?” I ask as I climb the steps.
“I love this porch. I needed one more therapy session on it.”
“You’re leaving.” It’s not a question. I can see she’s already checked out.
“It’s time.” She lifts her eyes to mine, and I see the distress she’s trying so bravely to mask. She pushes to her feet.
“Stay. You don’t have to leave.”
“My parents are gone. There’s no reason for me to stay and be an imposition any longer.”
“You’re not…” Frustrated, I run a hand over my neck. “What about us?”
The question comes out before I can stop myself. Maybe I should let her walk down the stairs, thank me politely, and leave with the lie cleaned up nice and tidy. But I can’t. Not after those kisses. Not after last night when she held on to me like I was the only solid thing left in her world.
Her mouth trembles once before she presses her lips firmly together. “There isn’t an us, Walker.”
That hit goes straight to my heart. How can she deny what we have between us? I don’t move. Don’t speak. She looks away first.
“Listen,” she says, “we got caught up in something that was never real.”
“That’s not true. Maybe it started that way.”
“It is the truth.” Her voice shakes as she stands. “We were pretending. Everyone was watching. Everyone expected us to act like a couple, so we did. And somewhere in the middle of that, it started feeling real and mixed up.”
“No.” I don’t believe what I feel for her are confused feelings.
“We bought into our own lie,” she tries to explain.
I take one step closer, then stop, because if I get too close, I’m not sure I’ll let her walk out. “That kiss on the beach wasn’t for anybody but us. Can you tell me you felt nothing?”
Pain flashes across her face. “I can’t tell you that.”
“Don’t tell me none of it was real.”
She looks down at the suitcase like it’s the only thing holding her upright.
“I left the ring on the bedside table. Thank you for letting me wear it. I can’t stay here while my whole life is falling apart.”
I understand that. I hate it, but I understand it.
“I need to go back to my shop,” she says. “My apartment. My routine. I need to remember who I was before all of this happened.”
“And what if this is part of who you are now?”
She closes her eyes. She wants it. I can see it on her face. When she opens them again, there are tears there, but she doesn’t allow them to fall. “Please… don’t make this harder.”
My chest hurts for her. Actual pain, right through the middle.
I want to argue with her and tell her she’s wrong.
She needs to be reminded that she’s laughed here, slept here, eaten here, kissed me here.
I want to tell her that the woman she was before all this was lonely and the woman standing in front of me deserves more than going back to that.
But that isn’t my choice to make. So I nod. Just once. “Alright.”
She stares at me, waiting for more. Maybe hoping for it. She should know me better by now. I may be a man of few words, but if I hold on too tight, I’ll become another person deciding her life for her.
She values her ability to lead her life the way she wants. I will never be the man that puts a cage around her.
She swallows hard. “Thank you…”
I hate those words. I can hear the distance they create between us.
“For everything you and Tom did for me and for my family. I will never be able to repay you.”
Words are something I can’t trust myself with at the moment. All I can give her is another nod. She waits a second longer before turning to go. I follow, not close, but I can smell her shampoo.
She goes down the steps, pauses, and looks out over the drive. Sunlight filters through the oaks and the whole place looks calm and peaceful. The exact opposite of how I’m feeling.
“I’m sorry,” she whispers.
I should carry her suitcase. I should say something. Instead, I stand there while she puts the suitcase in her car and gets behind the wheel.
She doesn’t look back until she reaches the end of the driveway. She stops, and I can see her eyes fix on me in the rearview mirror. Neither of us move.
Then she pulls onto the road and disappears behind the trees. I stay on the porch until I can’t hear the car anymore before going inside.
The house is too empty. Too quiet. Too still.
Her coffee mug sits in the dish drainer where she washed it and left it to dry. The quilt she’d used on the porch is folded over the back of a chair. In the hallway, one of her hair ties lies near the table, small and forgotten. At least it’s proof she had been here.
It’s also proof she’s gone.
Without thought, I toss the hair tie onto the table.
In the next second, I’m picking the dang thing up and making a quick detour upstairs before heading out the back door.
I have to get out of here. Work. I need to cut wood or dig holes.
I need something physical to work the pain out that threatens my heart.
Near dusk, weary and dirty from my day of tearing down and cleaning all the equipment in the processing plant, I walk back into the house.
Dad is sitting at the kitchen bar with a plate of food in front of him. Leftovers. Not sure I can stomach them. Unfortunately, they smell good and I worked up a major appetite.
“Any trouble getting them to the airport?”
“No. No trouble. I don’t think a dozen words were said the entire three-hour drive.”
“Figures.” I fill a plate, stick it in the microwave, and hit sixty seconds.
“Naudi left?” Dad asks.
I nod and grab my plate and a glass of water from the crock before joining my dad at the bar.
“I figured she might.”
I turn toward him. “You could’ve warned me.”
“Would it have changed anything?”
No, damn it. It wouldn’t have and that’s the worst part. I fill my fork, stick it in my mouth, and chew. “She said there wasn’t an us.”
Dad stills, his own fork hovering near his mouth. “And you believed her?”
I look out the back door to the area beyond where we’d shared a kiss in the moonlight. “No.”
“Then don’t act like you do.”
I let out a bitter breath. “She needs space.”
“She does.”
“She needs to choose.”
“She does.”
He’s usually much more chatty than he’s being tonight. Maybe he’s talking my language to get a point across. I just don’t know what the point is.
“It’s important to give space to a woman who’s had her independence stifled, but that doesn’t mean you disappear from her life. It means you don’t crowd her while you show her exactly where you stand.”
I don’t answer, but what he said gives me a glimmer of hope. Then he has to go and ruin it by asking, “You love her?”
The question shouldn’t startle me. Maybe because the answer has been sitting here for a while, waiting on me to stop being stubborn enough to admit it.
I think of that hair tie I’d put on the foyer table and then made a special trip back to move it beneath my pillow. “Yeah,” I confess quietly. “I do.”
Dad’s smile is sad but proud. “Then quit thinking so much.”
I huff out a breath that almost becomes a laugh. All my life that has always been his one constant. When I couldn’t hit the baseball, he told me to stop thinking so much. When I went for my driving test, for the second time, he told me to stop thinking so much. I guess I do overthink things.
“What am I supposed to do?”
“You listen to what she told you. She needs her life back, so let her have it.”
“That sounds like doing nothing.”
“No,” he says. “That sounds like not making it about you.”
I frown. He isn’t making sense.
“But when the time comes, you remind her that not everything you two made up was a lie.”
Ahhh, I see where he’s going with this. I remember the story we’d concocted to tell her parents that day on the Gator. Our dates. The ones we’d built sitting in the Gator, trying to make a fake engagement believable. All of the dates.
Dad catches my gaze. “There’s a difference between chasing a woman and showing up with the truth.”
He stands up, collects both plates, and dumps the contents in the compost jar. “Come on, let’s go into town and get a pizza.”
He’s already out the back door before I can catch up.
As we’re driving into town, I think about what my dad said.
The ache in my chest subsides into something manageable.
Naudi said there isn’t an us. Fine. I’ll let her have that for now.
But she’s wrong about one thing. We didn’t get caught up in the lie.
Somewhere along the way, we told the truth by accident, and I’m going to make sure she knows it.