Chapter Twenty-Eight
Ripley
It’s a hard pill to swallow, holding on to the realization I love a man who can so easily toss me aside.
Again.
My thoughts swing back to the last time he left me. How his face shuttered when I told him how I felt. How quickly he got dressed. How he didn’t glance back on his way out the door.
How foolish I felt.
Well, as agonizing and fucking embarrassing as that was, it has nothing on how I’m feeling now.
Now I’m just fucking pathetic, still wearing the same clothes I wore to the wedding.
Three days ago. I’ve convinced myself they still smell like him, that those ten minutes in Thea’s office imprinted his scent all over my clothing, and now I can’t take them off.
God, I don’t learn. Somehow I’d gotten it into my head I’d finally been chosen.
That I was loved in the same way I love him.
People constantly leaving me is practically ingrained into my DNA.
How do I keep forgetting there’s something about me that makes it so easy for everyone to leave?
First my parents, entirely by their choice.
Then my grandparents—in death, so I won’t hold it against them—and then Seth the first time.
And now Seth again because of work—supposedly. The emergency at Carina Cove may or may not have been a cover, and in reality, it doesn’t matter. He always told me his job was the most important thing in his life, his career is always his top priority.
It was a real punch to the gut to see how quickly he exited my life.
By the time the wedding was over and I returned to my house, all of his belongings were gone.
He didn’t leave one thing behind. Every last sock, tie, and dress shirt were inevitably folded and packed into his suitcase.
Even the fucking smoothie tumbler with the shaker ball no longer rested on my dish drying rack.
I should have seen it coming. His declarations of feelings were never concrete, just vague statements of him being “with me.” What did that even mean? With me while he’s on vacation? With me in the same room? With me in the biblical sense?
Of course I took it to mean with me as in a relationship.
We may have tiptoed around the labels, but it felt like one.
Falling asleep wrapped around each other like vines, waking up to coffee dripping just for me.
They were small, insignificant things, but I built them up because I’d never had that before.
The more I think about it, the more I’m realizing how ridiculous I am, blowing tiny actions that barely meet the standards for common decency into something so much more. Into fucking love.
Truly pathetic.
I haven’t left the house since I came back here after watching his taillights disappear out of the RED parking lot. I’ve been wallowing and mostly ignoring everyone. I’ve checked in with Thea just so she knows I’m still breathing.
And maybe I’m hiding away a little bit too. I’m not ready to face all of Indigo Hill. It’s bad enough being heartbroken and having it be town gossip, it’s a whole other nightmare of having everyone you know find out you’re gay and then witness that heartbreak in real time.
I’m not proud of myself, but I’m off my couch today, so it’s a step forward. After two days of doom scrolling on social media, I’ve decided I need a new hobby to get me out of my funk.
That’s why Thea finds me in the kitchen when she comes over for a wellness check. Her eyes wide as they take in me and my surroundings.
“What’s going on?” she asks. Her tone careful and more than a little surprised.
I look down at myself. My shirt is ruined, covered in flour and God only knows what else.
The pants aren’t faring much better. Both are wrinkled, telling her exactly how I’ve spent the last seventy-two hours. “Are you… baking?”
I clear my throat, continuing to knead the dough on the counter. “Yes, I’m baking bread.”
“Okay… Can you pause for a second?” She sounds concerned, and distantly, I think I don’t blame her. It’s not my best moment. I stop working the dough and drop it into a bowl I’ve lined with the “Whisk Taker” tea towel I’ve been using as a proofing basket. “Why are you baking?”
I run my hands under the water at the sink, my back to her. They’re shaking, my fingers itching to get back to the dough, to have something to do. “I saw a video online. Seemed like something I could manage.” Somehow my voice doesn’t sound as destroyed as I feel inside.
“And how’s it going?”
I turn around and look over the graveyard of burned loaves, or what I’m calling loaves. “I won’t lie, it’s not going well, but I feel really good about this one,” I say, pointing to the bowl.
“Good, yeah,” she says, nodding. “You look like you feel good.” She’s approaching me like one approaches a stray dog, with a calming, quiet voice, but there’s definitely sarcasm in her tone.
She takes my hands in hers, stilling the shaking, and gently tugs me away from the counter all the way to the living room, before we both drop onto my old sofa.
“Talk to me.” She doesn’t let go. How does she know I need her to hold me together right now?
“What is there to talk about?” I say. “He’s gone. Again. And I’m left here with all of these goddamn feelings. Again.” Thea’s eyes are filled with concern and sympathy. I love her and hate it at the same time. “I was doing okay. I was moving on… kind of. I had—”
“Wait, you were moving on? With who?”
Shit. I guess I have to tell her now. “I’ve been fucking Archer for the last few months,” I say with a hand flurry meant to convey just how inconsequential it was.
“Last few months?! What do you mean? And you didn’t tell me?” She’s screeching now. I’m not sure if she’s truly hurt by my omission or just shocked.
“You were busy, and it wasn’t important, just sex. He’s cool about it.”
“We are so going to revisit this at another time. I need to know everything.” She pauses, looking like a disappointed mother.
“But back to Seth. All of this,” she waves her hand around my living room, which looks like a warzone that used take-out containers as artillery, “is very reminiscent of seven months ago. I’m so sorry, I should have been here sooner to check in with you. ”
“It’s fine, you were busy getting dicked down by your new husband—as you should.
” She smiles, but the worried furrow between her eyebrows remains.
“I won’t lie, this feels a lot worse than November.
I thought we were building something, you know?
He never said it, but there were moments.
I really thought we had something.” My gaze shifts to our linked hands, her thumbs gliding back and forth across my knuckles. I draw comfort from the small gesture.
“You do, he’s just scared,” she murmurs.
I scoff. “I’m scared too. I wanted to be scared together.
But he hasn’t called me, not even a text.
He told me there’s nothing here, nothing between us.
I guess I was just a fling again. It was all a fling.
We flinged. Now I just want to fling myself off a cliff.
” I fold over and drop my head into her lap, feeling very sorry for myself.
“Okay, that’s dramatic,” Thea chides.
“Sorry.” I sigh. “That was too much, but give me a break, I’m heartbroken.” And whiny apparently.
“How about we get out of here?” she says, her tone lighter. “Let’s have a date night.”
“No, I’m not ready to be cheered up. I want to wallow a little longer.” And now I’m pouting.
There’s a long pause before Thea says, “He told me he’s in love with you.”
“I’m sorry, what?” I shoot up to sitting, and she looks chagrined. “Why the fuck wouldn’t you lead with that when you first got here?”
“I figured you’d be the next person he tells. Honestly, with the way you were looking at each other at the wedding I thought he already had.”
“He didn’t. He never told me.” Anger and the ever-present hope—I know, I’m still pathetic—bubble inside me.
I stand and pick up random food containers and my suit jacket from the wedding.
“I need to hear it from him. He needs to tell me to my face he loves me. Or to get lost again. Either way, it has to be in person.”
“What? What’s happening right now?” Thea’s face says it all: I’ve officially lost it.
And I think I agree with her when I say, “I’m going to go see him.”
“You’re going to fly to Seattle? Across the country? Do you maybe want to take some time to think about it first?” She’s up now too, following me as I continue to try to tidy the living room.
I stop short and turn around, and she almost bumps into me. “Okay, not all of us have eight years to pine, Thea.”
“Wow, that was a low blow,” she says, taken aback. “I’ll allow it since you’re sad, but just this once.”
Now on top of being pathetic, I’m also an asshole. I’m doing great. “I’m sorry. I love you, but I have to go.” I continue my trek through my mess, gathering trash along the way to the kitchen. “I’m going to get my man.”
“Okay, but at least try calling him, this is insane,” she pleads.
“So is love, Thea, so is love,” I say as I drop my armful of containers into the sink.
“Okay, you’re being dramatic again.”
I ignore the comment. I need to find my shoes. And shower. And pack. “You can either leave with your judgment or stick around and help me. Which will it be?”
She blows out a long sigh. “I guess I’m driving you to the airport.”