Chapter Sixteen
Brooks
The women”s—and Landon”s, of course— romance book club was a hit tonight. Everyone who signed up came and got their books as soon as they arrived, and all of them loved the journals I threw in. Sure, giving them away for free took some of my potential profit away. I got a great deal buying them in bulk, though, and it was fun seeing everyone”s reaction when I included them in their purchase of the book.
Wren did amazing, even though she was anxious about leading the group. I know she was nervous about the book club, but I have a feeling something else was going on. Her eyes were a little puffy and red as if she had been crying a lot, and my girl is not a crier. She was also extremely restless throughout the whole meeting and once we got home. I don”t think she realized it, but some part of her body was always moving even if she was stationary.
When I ask her about it, once I get the bookstore closed up and we head up to my apartment, she insists everything is fine. I take her word, but I watch her more closely. She ate dinner with the girls, so while I grab a quick bite, she takes a shower. When she comes out, her face is scrubbed clean, her wet hair is a messy bun on the top of her head, and her legs are bare, with her top covered by one of my shirts.
We snuggle up on the couch to watch a show we both enjoy, but Wren is stiff in my arms. It”s starting to make me anxious, but I don”t want to push her anymore. She looks utterly wrecked. We only make it through one episode when I finally feel her relax. When I look down at her, she is asleep.
We”ve both been running ourselves ragged ever since the bookstore opened. Wren had a few clients she”s worked on for years call for some of their infamous late-night appointments, and I”ve been busy training staff and making sure I am handling my new business. I”m wondering if her lack of sleep and the stress from leading the group tonight was finally too much for her and what caused her tears. It would make sense if everything was compounding.
Scooping my girl off the couch, I head to my room, deciding it”s the perfect night for an early bedtime. I tuck Wren into my side and drift off to sleep. I”d love to say it”s a great night”s sleep, but Wren tosses and turns all night, leaving me more worried than I was before. I”m glad neither of us have an early day tomorrow, so we can sleep in and rest.
I groan when my phone rings, pulling me out of sleep. Reaching over my shoulder, eyes still closed, I try finding the offending piece of technology that had the audacity to wake me up.
”Brooks, answer the fucking phone or silence it already,” Wren grumbles, making me chuckle.
Finally finding my phone, I hold it above my face and squint one eye open. It”s after nine, which surprises me.
The name on the screen is The Dean of the College, so ignoring this phone call is not an option. I try to slide out from Wren”s hold, but she”s like a koala, wrapped around me and not about to let go.
Swiping Answer, I put the phone up to my ear. ”Hello, Dean Ashland. How are you?”
”Hi, Brooks. I”ve been better.” She sounds frustrated. ”I”ll just get to the point. Professor Martin had a heart attack. He”s going to be okay, but he”s got a long recovery road ahead of him.”
”I”m sorry to hear that.” I am.
Professor Martin was kind to me when I started working at the college. He helped me learn the campus and was always around for a word of encouragement or with a helping hand. He honestly became like a pseudo uncle to me and a lot of the other younger professors.
”I”m sorry to be the bearer of bad news. That said, I need you back here. I know you two are close and you”ve both filled in for each other when needed. You know his material best. I need you to cover the rest of his summer semester.”
”Um, I don”t know. I”ve just opened the bookstore, and I don”t know how comfortable I feel about leaving it yet.”
”I understand that, Brooks. I promise I wouldn”t be putting this on you if I weren”t desperate and needed your help.”
I sigh as I run my hand over my head.
The rest of the semester is only three weeks. The campus isn”t too far away, so I suppose I could drive back and forth. If nothing else, I can at least come back on the weekends. The assistant manager I hired for the store has a ton of experience and actually taught me a few things, so I know it would be taken care of. But if I”m being honest, I just really don”t want to leave.
”Okay, I”ll do it. How many classes was he teaching, and when do you need me there?”
”He had three this summer.”
I grunt, realizing that I probably won”t be able to drive back during the weekdays.
”I know it”s a lot, but he had a high demand for the one class, so he decided to add another, and it filled as well. I”d need you to teach the class that starts at three this afternoon.”
That doesn”t surprise me. All the students know how great a professor he is, but if I need to teach this afternoon, I need to get up and head out pretty quickly.
”Alright. I have some things I need to take care of here, but I”ll shoot to get to campus around noon. Will you be at your office?”
”Thank you so much, Brooks. Yes, I will be here. You can stop by and grab a key for his office so you can get in. I had IT get his login information so you can have access to his laptop for his curriculum too.”
”Sounds good. Thanks, Dean Ashland. See you soon.”
It isn”t until I”ve hung up that I realize Wren isn”t in the bed with me anymore. I hear the water in the bathroom running, so I slide out of the bed and tug on some sleep pants. I open the bathroom door and see her frantically pulling her shirt over her head. She”s fully clothed and has gathered all of the stuff she keeps here into her arms.
Without a word, she pushes past me and heads to my closet, grabbing her bag out of it and dumping the things in her arms into it. Back out of the closet, she starts grabbing clothes from the floor and her stuff from the nightstand.
What the fuck is going on?
The whole time she”s frantically racing around the room, she refuses to look at me, and it”s starting to freak me the fuck out.
”Little minx, what are you doing?”
I step in her way, but she rushes past me into the living room. I didn”t realize how much stuff she had here until this moment. Sure, we bounce back and forth between each other”s places, but we haven”t spent a night without the other in over a month.
Unable to watch her pack all her stuff for another second, I growl out her name, drawing her attention to me. Tears are streaming down her face, and her eyes look hollow as if she”s somewhere else in her head.
Taking two quick strides, I”m in her space and my hands frame her face.
”What the fuck is going on, Wren?”
She closes her eyes and tries to hang her head, but I won”t let her.
”Talk to me, little minx.” I beg. My heart is hammering away in my chest, and I”m terrified to hear what she has to say.
”I can”t do this, Brooks. It was a mistake.” She hasn”t opened her eyes.
As if I was punched in the gut, the air in my lungs rushes out of me as my stomach drops like I will be sick.
”This is not a mistake, Wren.” My voice wobbles as I fight the fear and panic rising in me.
”It is, Brooks. This isn”t your home. You”re leaving.”
”It is my home, little minx. Yes, I”m leaving to go back to work, but I will be back this weekend and every weekend after that. My classes in the fall are all online so that I can be here in Sparrow Falls.”
”That might be the case for next semester, but what about the one after that? Do you honestly think your dean is going to let you work remotely indefinitely? Didn”t she say the professor you”re covering for had a heart attack and a long road ahead of him? Do you honestly think you”ll still be able to work remotely when the fall semester starts in four weeks? I don”t see that happening.”
I inhale a deep breath as soon as her words hit me.
She”s most likely right. I doubt Professor Martin is going to recover by the new school year. I”m sure the college could get a substitute, but in situations like these in the past, they”ve looked to their other tenured professors to step in.
”I honestly don”t know, Wren. There”s a lot to figure out.”
”Exactly. There”s a lot to figure out, and you”re not going to fucking be here. You will be there, figuring it out, so I”m making this a little easier for you by taking care of things here.”
”You think telling me our whole relationship is a mistake is taking care of things for me?” I say the last bit as I make air quotes. ”Splitting up is the last fucking thing I want to do and would not be helping make things easier for me. You”re all I fucking think about, Wren. I love you.”
”Stop—” She sobs as she raises her hand. ”Don”t tell me that when you”re about to leave me.” She cries harder.
I watch as she wraps her arms around her waist and sinks in on herself, trying to hold it together. I fucking hate seeing her like this. I take a step closer, but she steps back out of my reach.
”I”ll most likely be gone during the week, but I”ll be back on the weekend. I can”t leave you or the bookstore forever.”
”Okay, say you come back on the weekend. Those are my busiest days, and you will need to be taking care of the bookstore. How much time does that actually leave us together, Brooks? I can”t live for the weekends, and that”s what I would be doing if we stayed together.”
”What do you want from me, Wren? It”s my job. I can”t just tell them to go to hell. I worked my ass off to get where I am right now.”
”Don”t you think I fucking know that, Brooks? Why the hell do you think I”m trying to end it? This way, you don”t have to choose between your dream job, and me and this place.”
”I think you”re trying to end this because it”s the realest, most alive you”ve felt in years. You”re so fucking scared of me leaving you, like your parents did, that you”re going to leave me instead, breaking both of our hearts in the process.” As soon as the words leave my mouth, I know I fucked up.
It”s like I punched her in the face with my words. I stand there, helplessly, as I watch my little minx shut down.
”Fuck. You. Brooks. You do not get to throw my dead parents in my face.”
I wince as her eyes flare with more anger than I”ve ever seen from her, before she turns and rushes to the front door. Her stuff is scattered around my apartment, but apparently running is more important.
”Fuuuuuck!” I roar as the front door slams.
Pacing the apartment, I try to figure out what the hell just happened. I know I fucked up by mentioning her parents, but I still can”t believe she just walked out on us.
Sinking to the couch, I put my elbows on my knees and hang my head in my hands. Tears roll down my face.
The best thing that ever happened to me just walked out my door. I”m so in my head that it takes me a minute to realize my phone is ringing.
When I make it to my room, I see Cameron is calling. I almost don”t answer, but Cameron doesn”t call much, so I need to make sure everything is okay.
”Hey, Cam. What”s up?”
”You sound like hell.”
”That”s because I”m in my own personal hell right now. What did you need, Cam? Today”s been a shit-show, and I”ve got shit to do before I need to head to the college.”
”I didn”t really need anything. I was just going to see how the first book club meeting went, and something told me I should call instead of text. Why are you heading back to campus?”
”Professor Martin had a heart attack, and the dean asked if I could cover the rest of his summer classes.”
”I”m sorry, bro. That sucks. Is he going to be okay?”
”She said he would, but it will be a long road to recovery.”
”So, what does all that mean for you?”
”It means that, for the next three weeks, I”ll have to be on campus to teach his lessons and may have to help out in the fall too instead of only teaching online classes.”
”That sucks, man. What about the bookstore?”
”I”ll come back on the weekends to check in with everything. My assistant manager has a ton of experience, so it should be fine throughout the week. If things keep going the way they are now, I could probably afford to hire two part-time people.”
”That”s awesome, bro. It sounds like you”re going to be busy, though not like you”re living your own personal hell. What”s up with that?”
”Wren broke up with me and said our relationship was a mistake.”
”Fuck, dude. That sucks, but it doesn”t surprise me.”
”Oh, yeah? Because it surprised the hell out of me.”
”I”m sorry, Brooks. It doesn”t surprise me because it seems like her MO. When Jessa showed up and it was too much for her, she bailed. When mom made the comment about not knowing about it, she didn”t necessarily bail, but she bailed on the situation by drinking and dancing while avoiding you.”
”I suppose when you say it like that, I can see it. But it”s bullshit. She”s running because she”s afraid I”m going to leave her, like her parents did.”
”Dude, that”s a valid fear. She was a teenager when her parents passed. I”m not sure if you remember, but being a teenager was rough and we were fairly good-looking, popular guys. Can you imagine going through that shit when you are a teenage girl? Then being raised by your older brother in his early twenties who works as a tattoo artist in a bit of a wild setting?”
”Well, when you put it in that perspective, I”m sure she”s got a lot of scars from that. I was a bonehead and brought up her parents during our fight. That was the tipping point for her. She ran out of my apartment right after that.”
”Yeah, probably not your smartest move.”
”Definitely not. But what do I do, Cam? I don”t want to be done, and I know she doesn”t either. She”s just afraid.”
”I don”t know, Brooks.” He sounds just as dejected as I feel.
People think Cameron is a robot because he doesn”t show a ton of emotion, but he feels deeply. I know he”s hurting for me right now, and having my brother in my corner gives me a little comfort.
”I need to get ready to head back to campus. I need to go home first and grab some stuff before meeting the dean at noon.”
”Alright. Keep me posted with everything that”s going on, and let me know if there”s anything I can do to help with Wren.”
”I will. Thanks, Cam.”
I hang up and take a minute to just sit and wallow.
I feel like I got hit by a truck. I”ve only been awake for an hour, but I”m exhausted and just want to fall into my bed and sleep, hoping that when I wake up, this is just a nightmare.
Unable to ignore my responsibilities, I drag myself off the couch and head into the kitchen.
I start the coffee maker and look for something to eat, even though it”s the last thing I want to do right now. If I am going to make it through this day, I need to do whatever I can to make it a little easier. Coffee and food sound awful, but they will give me the energy boost I need. I scarf down my coffee and some toast before getting in the shower.
The drive back to my old life doesn”t take long, but the anxiety within me builds the further away I get from Sparrow Falls and my little minx. I don”t want to lose her, but I also don”t want to lose my dream job as a professor. My thoughts spiral out of control as I try to figure out how I can keep them both.
If Wren would just try, I know we can make our relationship work. But in this moment, my girl doesn”t even want to give us a fighting chance. Feeling completely resigned, I head to my small tudor house just off campus to grab my work clothes and laptop.
I loved this house the moment I stepped foot inside it. It was perfect for me and close enough to campus to walk but far away enough to have some separation from my students. Walking into it today, the place seems cold and dreary, probably because my heart is back with my home in Sparrow Falls—Wren.
Spiraling again, I shove thoughts of Wren from my mind as I throw on work clothes and check out the house. I hired one of my former students to look over the house while I was gone. They maintained my yard and checked for any mail that didn”t get forwarded to Sparrow Falls.
Finally ready, I square my shoulders and try pulling myself together to head to the meeting with the dean, even though I”m breaking inside. My heart is in Sparrow Falls, and I don”t know how the hell to survive without it.