Whit #3
“So, we’ve gathered here today for two things.” Blair bends to take a sip of wine from her glass, which is so full that even looking at it the wrong way will send wine spilling over the edge. “First and, for me, most important. Denver and I aren’t getting married next summer.”
I nearly leap from my seat. “Wait. What? Why not?”
Blair untucks her left hand from her sweatshirt sleeve, and I breathe a sigh of relief at the sight of her ring—Denny’s mom’s ring.
It’s beautiful and simple and so perfectly Blair.
A flashback to watching my sister grieve the death of Lucy Wells floods my synapses.
At the time, I was still a kid and couldn’t understand why she was so distraught over her boyfriend’s mom dying, but now I understand that she was as much of a mom to Blair as our own mother was…
if not more. No other ring would make sense for Blair and Denny.
“We decided we don’t want to wait any longer to do something we should’ve done years ago.” She reaches forward to grab her wineglass, smiling to herself when her engagement ring clinks against it. “Plus, I really want Mom to be there, so I don’t want to wait until next summer…just in case.”
“Yeah…yeah, that makes sense.” The wine coats my suddenly ragged throat.
Talking about Mom potentially being in a place a year or two from now where she wouldn’t be coherent enough to handle a wedding is devastating.
Of course, it’s something I’ve known for a while, but it’s not something I’ve put any real thought into before now.
If the day ever comes when I get married, I doubt my mom will be there.
“We don’t have a date yet, but I’m leaning toward doing it the moment I get out of this walking boot.” She knocks her knuckles against the ash-gray plastic boot. “So…that leads us to topic two. Will Colt be your date for this wedding? In other words, have you talked to him like you said you would?”
Blair cornered me at the Labor Day party and made me share all the details.
Everything from our first kiss to how we were managing to keep it hidden from Jonas.
And, of course, whether I had told him about my hysterectomy.
She was about three drinks in during this conversation, and she pinched me when I told her I hadn’t, as if we were little kids again.
“Don’t hurt me for what I’m about to say.” I put my hands up in surrender. “I still haven’t told him. In my defense, it hasn’t been the right time.”
With Jonas back in school, he doesn’t have Colt bringing him home.
Lots of phone sex, but the only face-to-face was when he came over Wednesday to have lunch with me.
And that timing didn’t feel right because I was a tad preoccupied with being railed on the kitchen counter while on the phone with my ex-boyfriend.
It’s not like my lunch break is that long.
This girl had priorities that didn’t involve imploding my entire life before sitting on an hour-long conference call with a bunch of old white dudes who own a chain of senior care facilities.
“Oh my God, Whit.” She throws her head back with a groan. “Just tell him. If it turns out that not having more kids is a dealbreaker, you guys keep up this casual hookup thing until one of you meets somebody new—which, in my opinion, is better than always having Alex on speed dial.”
“It’s not that simple. He wants official, not casual.
He’s only agreeing to take it slow for Jonas’s sake.
If it were up to Colt, he’d probably be moving his stuff into my house right now.
” I blink down at the floor, following the grooves in the planking and tracing over them with my socked foot.
“But I also really like him, and I’m scared of how much it’s going to hurt if he decides it’s a dealbreaker.
If…if he doesn’t want us because I’m broken. ”
I drown myself in red wine as tears run in rivulets down my cheeks.
They splash across my sweatpants, spidering out along every thread until they’ve contaminated large swatches of the fabric.
Somewhere inside my body, I imagine, there’s something similar happening with my fear.
It’s seeping through and replacing the hope I once felt about us.
Blair watches me quietly, not offering unsolicited answers or suggestions.
With a heaving breath, I let out a squeaky whisper: “What if I’m not enough?”
The words leave my soul feeling wafer thin.
“You are.”
But I’m not.
I’ve had this inkling since I was a little girl. Since the first time my mom blamed her new gray hair on me moments after hanging Blair’s spelling test on the fridge with a gold star magnet.
I wasn’t good enough for my parents.
And Alex liked that troublemaker girl, but I still wasn’t good enough for him because we had a baby and I wasn’t fun anymore.
And I’ve never been good enough to make it past a second date with anyone because I come with a kid and a shitty ex and all kinds of unwelcome baggage.
And I’m not good enough for Jonas, because I can’t get my shit together enough to give him the mom and the family and the life he deserves.
I’m not enough, and I’m too much.
Why would Colt think any differently?
“What if I’m not enough for him?”
“You’ll be enough—the perfect amount—for the right person.” She slips her palm into mine. “For your person. They won’t think of you as broken or whatever bullshit you’re telling yourself, just like I don’t think those things are true. Nobody who knows and loves you would think that way.”
“I get you probably want me to have an awakening where I suddenly believe you, but…” I fiddle with the ring on her finger. “I’m scared.”
“Lucy Wells used to say, ‘Do it afraid.’ You wouldn’t be scared if your heart wasn’t already invested, and that’s not going to become less true the longer you hold out, is it?”
“Is it exhausting always being right?”
Her grip tightens around my fingers. “Can you please go tell Denver I’m always right? He doesn’t believe me.”
“Bullshit. That man hangs on every word you say.”
Blair smiles to herself, then looks up at me through dark lashes. “Because he’s my person, Whit. You’re gonna find that.”
I’m equal parts doubt and hope.