Chapter 28
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
TATUM
Iopen my eyes to an immediate feeling of dread, settled into my bones like it had all night to etch itself there.
I’d had a job since the moment I turned fifteen, saving every penny I earned until I went off to college, which I luckily had a full-ride scholarship for.
But this trip has had me flying through my savings faster than I expected, even though Maeve and I were going half and half on everything.
And if I end up having to be stuck in Seattle for nearly two weeks…
I suppress a groan so I don’t wake up Maeve, who is buried in the pillows, sound asleep.
For a moment, I’m distracted as I look over at her, observing the way her dark hair is a tangled mess from tossing and turning all night and the way her hoodie is all twisted around her body.
Her hands are perched under her head and her lips are smushed as she snores.
As I turn my head to stare back up at the ceiling, I rub a hand down my face slowly, sucking a deep breath into my lungs and exhaling as steadily as I can.
Maeve hums sleepily.
I must not have been as quiet as I was trying to be.
Crap.
“Good morning,” she mumbles, pressing her face into my bare chest as she scoots closer to me, draping an arm over my body and pulling me tight.
“Good morning,” I rasp, cursing mentally at how out of it I sound. She catches onto it immediately, her head lifting as she narrows her sleepy eyes at me, assessing my face.
“What happened?” she asks.
I swallow thickly. “W-what do you mean?”
Maeve blinks rapidly now as she tries to wake up, propping her weight up on her elbow as she stares at me for a moment. Rubbing her eyes, she grips onto my arm. “What happened, Tate? What’s wrong?”
This isn’t something I want to worry her with, which I know will be exactly what happens if she finds out about it.
It’s not her burden to bear, and it’s also…
kind of embarrassing. I’m the one who offered to take her on this trip, for starters.
I know we couldn’t have predicted that all this would come out of it, but still. It’s not her problem.
“Did the hospital call?” she continues when I don’t say anything. “Did your results come back?”
“No,” I sigh, “no, it’s not that.”
“Then what is it?”
“It’s nothing, Maeve.”
“But you just said it wasn’t that, so that implies it’s something—”
“I just meant that it wasn’t the hospital calling,” I rush out, “that it was nothing.”
She doesn’t look the least bit convinced of my words, her eyebrows twitching slightly as they furrow. Letting go of my arm, she pushes herself into a sitting position, wrapping her arms around her knees as she stares down at me.
“Please talk to me, Tatum.”
The pleading tone in her voice has me wilting at the sound, dragging my thumb back and forth across my forehead before I meet her gaze.
“It’s really nothing,” I whisper softly. “It’s my problem, not yours.”
Her head tilts as her gaze softens, a trace of sympathy there. “What are you talking about?”
Oh God.
You could make something up.
“Clark,” she rasps.
At that, I push until I’m sitting up next to her, the blanket pooling around my waist as I look down at my hands in my lap. “I…I don’t have enough money to stay here for two weeks and for the trip back to Pennsylvania.”
The words are like acid in my mouth. I hate admitting that to her.
I hate admitting that, once again, I’m not man enough to take care of something.
If I can’t provide for myself, how could I ever reassure her that I could provide for her?
No wonder her mind can’t seem to make itself up about me. I mean…look at me.
I don’t know what I expect her to say, or even do, but I definitely don’t expect her to cup my face in her hands, forcing me to look up as she looks at me with the biggest, brown doe eyes I think I’ve ever seen.
“Okay,” she murmurs.
I frown. “O…kay?”
“Talk to me. Tell me more about why you’re freaking out.”
I’m shaking my head immediately, gently grabbing her wrists as if that’ll convey that it’s not important.
That I shouldn’t have brought it up in the first place because I don’t even know the test results yet.
“Maeve, it’s nothing. I don’t know why I’m even worrying about it right now when I don’t need to. ”
Her shoulders rise and fall as she takes a deep, steadying breath, before a small smile spreads across her face. “Okay, Tate… I can still help out. I know I won’t physically be here but—”
“No.”
She blinks, momentarily speechless. “Wait, what?”
“No, Maeve, you can’t do that,” I tell her feebly, tugging her hands from my face as I scratch at my chin. “I don’t want you to do that.”
“Tate, I really don’t mind helping you ou—”
“No,” I urge, firmer this time, as I fling the comforter back and get out of the bed. Grabbing the hoodie on top of my bag, I slide it on, leaving the hood over my head before I peek over at her, scared I might’ve hurt her feelings when she doesn’t say anything.
“But how are you going to pay for it, then?” she asks, her voice barely a whisper as she frowns up at me from the bed.
“I’ll figure it out.”
Maeve winces slightly, as if she doesn’t like my answer.
“I didn’t tell you because I wanted you to f-fix it for me,” I stutter out, getting irritated that I’m doing that again, and rubbing my eyes tiredly. “I was just telling you…how I felt. Or why I felt this way.”
“How are you going to pay for hotels? An Airbnb? Food? Gas?” she asks again, this time, she’s more confident in her voice, sitting up straighter as she cocks an eyebrow.
My chest feels tight from her questions, but I try to shake it off. “I don’t know right now, but I will figure it out.”
“How?” she repeats instantly.
I don’t answer, my mouth agape as I blink slowly at her, my hands falling to my sides.
I don’t know how to answer. I should’ve lied and told her some made-up reason for my stress, because the last thing I wanted to come from this was her help.
I would never expect her to do something so crazy.
I should be able to take care of myself—
“I’m going to help you, Tatum.”
“Why? Why would you wanna do something like that?” I whine, shrugging my shoulders lamely. “I don’t want your help. I can take care of it. I don’t need your money, Maeve.”
She may not make a sound, but her brows knit together as her eyes widen slightly, taken aback by my response. Even her nose scrunches as she starts to shake her head, throwing her hands in the air as she searches for words.
“Because it’s what you do,” she practically growls, and I wince. “It’s what you do when you…”
The rest of the sentence hangs in the air, silence shrouding us as her features falter. Her hands fall into her lap as she quickly diverts her gaze away from me. What was she going to say?
“When you what?” I rasp after a moment.
She doesn’t look at me, but I don’t get a chance to say anything else before my phone starts to ring on the nightstand. Every fiber of hope in my bones is screaming for what she was about to say, even if I’m delusional and making it up in my head.
I feel myself deflate as I walk over to grab my phone, dread filling me as I see who it is.
The hospital.
The results are back.