Chapter 6
MAISEY
The sound of the rain tapers off, somehow leaving me feeling raw and exposed, despite being curled up comfortably on the couch, a selection of comfort foods spread across the coffee table.
Because when the boy you secretly gave your heart away to a long time ago breaks it for a second time, only one type of metabolic havoc-wreaking caloric crap won’t do. Nope. This requires both salty and sweet. Multiple types of chocolate. And a pie.
Because pies before guys. Always.
Pretty sure Hollie Berry taught me that one.
Shifting my legs out from underneath me, I turn the volume down on the TV, the cast of Bones no longer having to compete with the weather outside to be heard, and grab another handful of Chex mix.
Really, what I need to do is get up off the couch and at least stretch.
My body isn’t used to this much down time—going from twelve-hour shifts on my feet to couch potato is not ideal. But here we are.
I glance at my phone, not sure what I expect it to do.
The inanimate object isn’t exactly going to sprout legs and suddenly perform “Singin’ in the Rain.
” I suppose I could text Emily back and answer her question about how it went at The Booby Trap, telling her no, despite her awkwardly worded question, Ewan did not “take me right there in the camping section” and there was no “epic make-out session.”
Except then I would have to tell her how it really went.
And that I thought I couldn’t hurt any more than I did when I tried to give him my heart the first time and he didn’t want it.
Turns out, the glued-together pieces of your heart being ripped back apart by the same person, once again telling you that they don’t want you, hurts more.
A lot more.
Stupid me for thinking that our pact meant something. That I meant something.
Ugggggh…
Throwing my head back on the couch, I try to clear my mind.
To think of something—anything—other than replaying our conversation in The Booby Trap earlier today.
But the only scene on tap seem to be the conversation.
The one that lives rent free in my head, permanently on playback, in a weird technicolor nightmare, making everything more vivid and intense.
Like watching The Wizard of Oz for the first time and going from black and white to color, the shock hits me, blinding me, even though I know exactly what’s coming.
“Come with me,” I’d said, so full of hope and excitement. The butterflies thrumming through my veins had been working overtime as I’d summoned the courage to lay it all out there.
“Where?” Ewan’s laugh was easy, light, as if he’d thought I was simply being hypothetical.
A week after college graduation, the world was at our feet.
There was only one thing I wanted though.
Him. Same as I always had, but never had the guts to say out loud.
I was pretty sure he felt the same, so the only thing left was for one of us to say it.
To pull the actual trigger on forever. And Lord knows, Ewan Hayes put the silent in strong and silent type, so he would not be the one doing it.
It was up to me.
“I got a job offer,” I told him, climbing into his lap.
We were sitting on the couch in his parents’ house, Magnolia Manor, in the middle of the afternoon, but I didn’t care.
If I was going to do this, I was doing it.
I also knew that if anyone were to walk in, they wouldn’t care.
We’d been so close for so long, it wouldn’t have registered.
And if it had, then any commentary would have been in the about damn time camp.
Straddling him, I wrapped my arm around his neck, making myself comfortable. His hands found my hips as if on autopilot, and the thought of kissing him took over. But that would come after I got this all out.
“To be a traveling nurse,” I continued, holding his gaze with mine. “It’s our chance to see the world. To experience more than Hickory Hills. Go on all sorts of adventures.”
The confused look I got caught me off guard. It was a look that told me that I would have made more sense if I had spoken in ancient Russian.
“You want more than Hickory Hills?”
It was my turn to be taken aback. He knew this. I’d talked about all the places I wanted to go, the things I wanted to see and do, for as long as I could remember. It was the whole inspiration behind applying to work with this international program.
“There’s more to life than our hometown, Ewan. You’ve got to know that,” I laughed.
“No.”
No?
“No? No what?” I asked, sitting back. “No, you don’t think there’s more than Hickory Hills or no, you won’t come with?”
Ewan looked at me like he was examining me. Trying to figure out the right answer to an exam or if he should clip the red wire or blue wire to stop a bomb from going off.
“Why do you want to go?”
“Because I want more than this!” I throw my arms out wide, gesturing to everything surrounding us. Hickory Hills, Georgia, small-town life in general, all of it. “I want to go on adventures. And I want you there with me.”
“Why?”
Wh…what? How can he ask that?
“Because I want you, Ewan.”
He was stock-still underneath me, no part of him moving even a millimeter. If it weren’t for the fact that I could feel his exhale, I’d worry he was dead.
“Not if you want me to leave, you don’t.”
My heart stopped. My stomach plummeted and the entire room spun, but the most important part was that my heart stopped.
“Excuse you?”
Shifting underneath me, Ewan picked me up and placed me on the cushion next to him before standing up. The look on his face was placid and plain, his eyes full of hurt, making me want to reach out and comfort him. Except he was causing the same pain in return.
“I can’t leave here. My life is here. I have obligations to my family. To Hayes.”
“Can’t or won’t?” I challenged, my heart starting to shatter.
“Does it matter?”
“It does. It matters to me, Ewan. If you don’t want me, if you don’t want a life together—”
“So, you’re going? No matter what my answer?” The hurt in his voice sliced through me like a knife through butter.
I nodded. “That’s my plan. But I want you to come with me. I want us to be together.”
There, I said it.
“Then you should go.”
He turned away from me, leaving the pieces of my heart skittering across the floor like broken glass.
“What about you? What about our chance at—” I choked out.
“This town is my life, Maisey—with or without you in it.”
This town is my life, Maisey—with or without you in it…
Fuck, how those words haunt me. No, that’s not true. It’s not those words that haunt me. It’s my lack of response to them.
It’s knowing that instead of following him out to the garage—where he always went to start tinkering with something as a way to get space from his family—and forcing the conversation, I sat there.
I didn’t go after him. I didn’t tell him half the things I had planned on.
Including those three not so little words.
I can’t even begin to imagine how different my life would look if I’d done that. If I’d marched right out there and screamed at the top of my lungs, “I love you, Ewan Porter Hayes! And I know you love me too!” But I didn’t. Instead I slunk back home, accepted the job, and packed my bags.
A week later I rolled down his driveway, told him I was headed to Turkey, and hugged him goodbye.
And because of that, I’m sitting here now, dunking Pringles in Nutella.
The pitter-patter of the rain picks up again, ever so slightly, but it’s enough to knock me out of my headspace. Enough to make me realize that tears running down my cheeks are real and current, not solely part of my memory.
Maybe I do need to text Emily back. Or even call her. Have her come over. Tell her to bring Alice and Rose while she’s at it, and then I can word vomit this all out, getting it out of my system to people who will not only understand, but maybe have some advice.
Pushing up off the couch, I groan, my body not happy with my lack of movement for the last few hours. That doesn’t stop me from scooping up a bite of the pie though, letting the chocolatey flavor settle on my tongue as I stretch.
I tap open my texts, noticing that I have a second from Emily that I missed along the way. This one just as smart-assy as the first.
Emily
Checking to see how the lunch bombing went!
Did he take you right there in the camping section, knocking everything over and making a mess in a seriously epic make-out session?
Since I haven’t heard from you, I’m going to assume that epic make-out session turned into a no pants dance and y’all have scarred poor Dennis for life! Lol
But seriously, LMK how it all went, and if you actually got him to talk
I scoff, rolling my eyes at my cousin. She is the only person I know who can manage to use the term no pants dance well into our thirties. Sighing, I try to figure out what to say, my thumbs moving across the screen slowly, typing and retyping as I carefully choose my words.
I’m all but ready to hit send when a heavy knock on the door startles me.
I drop my phone, the device hitting the carpet with a heavy thud.
Looking over at the door, I wonder why Emily didn’t just call.
Her follow-up texts didn’t come in that long ago, so I can’t believe she’s that anxious to know what went down that an in-person visit was required.
Unless it’s not her.
No, has to be. She’s the only one who knows where I’m staying. Other than my parents. And they are definitely not doing a drive-by.
The heavy knock starts up again, this time more rapidly. Fine, fine.
“I’m coming!” I holler, marching over to the door. “Keep your pants on, Em—”
I throw the door open and stop. Because staring back at me, backlit from the single street lamp, rain-soaked, and breathing heavy, isn’t my cousin.
It’s Ewan.