47. Call and Answer
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
call and answer
LOGAN
REYNOLDS VINEYARD
PRESENT DAY
Kat gasps as the wine splashes over Brendan, soaking his crisp blue dress shirt and leaving him sputtering as he stumbles backward, pinching the bridge of his nose.
“Holy fucking…”
Abi throws the glass on the ground, shattering it into pieces before she storms back toward the brick building. Shocked murmurs ripple through the crowd of people. It’s not all scandalized faces though; some of them laugh, and one particularly drunk guest just starts applauding.
“OPA!”
I know there’s something I should be doing right now, but I’m just… stunned.
“Uh, loverboy?” Kat asks, tapping me on the shoulder. “I don’t know if you saw the look in her eyes, but I think you should probably go after her before she snaps Carly like a toothpick.”
Oh, shit. That was the direction Carly took everyone for the wine tour.
I hand Kat my glass, sprinting toward the other building, trailing just far enough behind that I’m a little worried I might not catch her in time.
“Abi! Abi, wait!”
But she ignores me, furiously ripping the side door open and slamming it shut behind her. Someone mutters something about a psycho, but I don’t stop. The only thing that matters to me is Abi.
I run at full speed, hot on her heels as I follow her into the winery. There’s no sign of Carly, thank God, but that doesn’t mean Abi won’t find her.
“Abi!”
She says nothing, making a sharp right and heading down a long hallway. I hear sniffles and light, hiccuping gasps, like she’s trying to hold back sobs.
“Go away, Logan!”
“Not a chance in hell, Shortcake!”
She reaches a large staircase at the end of the hall, vanishing into an unknown abyss. I have two objectives: Console Abi, and make sure we don’t wind up in the newspaper tomorrow morning. Carly could be anywhere, after all.
The smell of must and alcohol hangs thick in the air as I scurry down the steps, finding a large wooden door. When I wrench it open, I spot Abi leaned up against a big barrel with tears streaming down her face. She’s surrounded by beautiful brick work, dark wooden pillars, and racks on racks of wine that stretch all the way to the ceiling.
This must be the infamous cellar.
“I said go away,” she murmurs, wiping her nose on her arm. “This is so embarrassing. Everyone was staring at me and I couldn’t control–”
She buries her face in her hands, sobbing uncontrollably.
Yeah, I’m not going anywhere.
“So what happened?” I ask.
Abi begins to regain her composure, but I keep my distance as she takes a few breaths, staring up at the ceiling. I can see the pain ricocheting through her body like a bullet as she shudders and tenses.
“Do you know what he said to me?” She asks, her lip quivering as she tries her best to keep from breaking down. “He said that when he looked at me, he felt nothing. Nothing, that’s what he said.”
Her voice cracks, and my heart follows suit. I wish I could take this all away from her.
I wrap my arms around her, half expecting her to push me away, but all she does is hug me as tightly as she can.
“He really said that?”
I have half a mind to head back upstairs and finish what Abi started. I’ll give him a swirly in a wine vat. Who the fuck says something like that?
“He wanted a housewife,” she sobs. “And maybe that’s not a bad thing, but that’s not me! He couldn’t stand the fact that I had a future, that I was going somewhere, when his football career died the moment we graduated!”
I want to tell her to forget about him, that none of what he said matters, but I can’t. She’s entitled to this pain; to have closure, in whatever form it ends up taking. It’s not always the simple and clean outcome from the movies.
Sometimes it’s dirty.
Sometimes it’s painful.
“Back in high school I swore that I’d have it all together by the time I was 30, that I’d be someone. And then I get here, and I look around at everyone and they’re so… They’re just so…” She swirls her hand around as her face twists up into a knot of despair. “I look at them and all I see is how little I’ve accomplished. I’m fucking mediocre.”
“There’s not a single thing about you that’s mediocre.”
The tone of my voice surprises even me, far more firm and unwavering than I’m used to.
“You sound like my mom.”
“Yeah, well, maybe she’s right. The industry we’re in? It’s fucking hard. You’re usually sitting in a room full of people who are just as brilliant as you are, and they’re all competing for the same opportunities in a comically small pond.”
Her shoulders slump as she grips the barrel next to her for support, her eyes unfocused and full of exhaustion. It feels like she thinks it’s all over, that she’s failed in some way, but I think it’s just the beginning. If grief has taught me anything it’s that sometimes big pieces of your life need to fall away to make room for something new.
Everything ends, but it’s up to us to build new beginnings.
“There’s nothing wrong with you, nothing broken about you.” I slide my finger beneath her chin, tipping it upward so that she’s forced to meet my gaze. “You are beautiful, and brilliant, and you’ve got a huge heart.”
“You have to say those things,” she snorts, that tiny bit of a cynical edge worming its way back into her voice. “You’re my fake fiancé.”
And it’s in that moment that I know: It might be my last chance to set things right, to fix that mistake I made three years ago.
“No more faking, I don’t want to do that anymore.”
“What do you mean?” Her voice begins to tremble. “Logan, I can’t lose–”
“You’re not losing anything. I’m in love with you, Abi. I think I’ve been in love with you since the first night I saw you, I just didn’t quite understand it at the time.”
She stares past me, her eyes darting back and forth as her breathing begins to speed up… but I can’t stop myself, I just keep fucking talking.
“I know that things have been complicated, and that not everything has ended up right; I even know you might not get another shot at that interview, no matter how much you deserve it. The only guarantee I can give you, the only solid promise I can make is this: whatever happens, I will be there.”
I put a hand on her heart, feeling it hammering beneath my palm.
“Wherever you go, I’m right behind you. Is tú mo chroí.”
She lets out a choked sob, and I can’t quite tell if it’s from sadness or joy.
“I don’t know what that means.”
“It means you are my heart. My dad used to say it to my mom every day. It was his way of telling her she was his reason for being.”
The two of us just breathe together in silence for a moment, lingering in the wake of the long-delayed truth.
“I love you, Abi King. Always have, and that’s all there is to it.”
She shakes her head, squeezing her eyes shut to hold back her tears.
“It feels— it feels like I’ve always known you.”
“Maybe you have,” I murmur, rubbing my nose against hers. “Maybe in all those other universes we figured things out, and we’re just lagging a little behind in this one.”
In every future I imagine, each one worth living in, she’s right beside me.
No matter how different, that part’s the same in every single one.
So no matter how many times we’ve each decided to leave things be, to accept that we just weren’t right for each other, that we would never get there…
This time, I’m absolutely certain.
“I love you too, Logan. Of course I do.”
We make it.
I cup her cheek, nuzzling against her with the tip of my nose until I’m kissing her. And I don’t want to stop. I can’t stop. My confession opened a gate, and now there’s no way in hell I’m going back to quiet pining.
Back to almost.
Everything has changed.
I pull away, grinning from ear to ear as Abi stares up at me with smeared lipstick, and mascara underneath her eyes. The truth seems to have relaxed her a little more.
“We said it,” she laughs.
Above us, I can hear people milling about in conversation. The tour must finally be working its way through this chunk of the winery, which means it might not be long until they make it down here. But until then, I want Abi all to myself.
“Yeah.” I breathe, the adrenaline still coursing through me. “Big step.”
Abi looks as relieved as I feel.
“The biggest.”