12. Caius #2
I don't answer. Can't seem to force words past the knot that's formed in my throat, past the weight sitting heavy on my chest like a cinderblock.
My jaw works, teeth grinding together as I gander at a spot on the table, a water ring from someone's glass, the wood grain swirling beneath it in patterns that blur the longer I look.
"Because you weren't acting, love," she says, her voice dropping to something gentler.
"Neither of you were. You were just finally giving yourself permission to want what you've always wanted.
To reach for what's been right there in front of you all along, waiting for you to be brave enough to take it. "
"It doesn't matter what I want. I'm a mechanic who barely graduated high school. She's a librarian with a master's degree who speaks three languages and knows the Dewey Decimal System like it's gospel. She belongs with someone who can give her the life she deserves."
Mom's quiet for a long moment, and the silence stretches between us like taffy, pulling thin and uncomfortable. I can hear the kitchen clock ticking on the wall behind her, each second marked with a sharp little click that seems too loud in the stillness. When she finally speaks again, her voice is careful, deliberate, each word chosen with the kind of precision I imagine Hallie uses when cataloging rare books. Measured. Controlled. "Did Hallie tell you that? That you weren't good enough for her? Because there are all kinds of ways to be educated. Hallie’s smart enough to know that. Just because you didn’t flourish in a traditional educational setting doesn’t mean we don’t know you’re not brilliant.
So? Is this something Hallie said to you? "
The question hangs in the air like smoke.
"She doesn't have to," I say, and even I can hear how flat my voice sounds, how defeated. How goddamn resigned to a truth I've carried around since I was sixteen years old and realized that Miller money and O'Conner poverty were two different worlds that weren't meant to collide.
"So you decided for her. Decided what she needs, what she deserves, without bothering to ask." She shakes her head. "You're not protecting her, Caius. You're protecting yourself."
The accusation lands like a sucker punch straight to the solar plexus, knocking the air clean out of my lungs and leaving me winded, defensive, scrambling for purchase on solid ground that suddenly feels like it's shifting beneath my boots.
"That's not—" I start, but the words die in my mouth because what the hell am I supposed to say?
What defense do I have that doesn't sound hollow even to my own ears?
"Yes, it is." She sits down now, reaches across the table to grab my hand.
Her skin is warm, callused from years of cleaning houses to keep us fed.
"You're terrified that if you let yourself have her, really have her, something will come along and take her away.
Like everything else good in your life."
I pull my hand back from her grip, the warmth of her touch suddenly too much to bear, and push myself up from the table so fast that my chair legs screech against the worn linoleum floor—a harsh, grating sound that matches the chaos ricocheting around inside my skull. "I need to go."
"Running again." There's no question in her voice, just a weary statement of fact, like she's watched me do this same dance a hundred times before and knows all the steps by heart.
"Taking a trip," I correct her, the words defensive and thin even to my own ears as I turn away from the table and head for the door, my boots heavy against the floor.
Like there's a difference. Like putting a few hundred miles between myself and this town will somehow make the ache in my heart bearable.
"The ceremony starts in twenty minutes, Caius."
I freeze mid-step, my entire body going rigid, my hand hovering just inches from the doorknob like I've suddenly forgotten how doors work.
Twenty minutes. Jesus Christ. Twenty minutes until Erin and Nick say their vows, until Hallie stands up there in whatever dress she picked out, until I have to watch her smile through the whole thing knowing what I did to her.
Knowing that I'm the reason her eyes won't quite reach her smile.
"Hallie's going to walk down that aisle and stand up at the altar next to Kyle.
She's going to smile for the pictures and give her Maid of Honor speech and pretend her heart isn't broken into a thousand pieces.
" Mom's voice follows me, relentlessly. "And you're going to drive to Portland and spend the next week convincing yourself you did the right thing. "
My forehead drops forward until it connects with the door, the wood cool and solid and real against my overheated skin. The only thing in this entire godforsaken morning that feels like it makes sense. I close my eyes, let the smooth painted surface that grounds me, anchors me.
"I can't fix this, Ma." The words are scraped raw from somewhere deep in my neck. "Not this time."