Chapter Six #2
“I’m not on a hook,” Dex said, a sharpness edging into his tone.
“I can sympathize with your situation, but that’s the end of it.
This is none of your business. You weren’t supposed to read that letter.
I’ll get it to Cat one way or another, but I don’t owe you anything, especially something you took. ”
Phoebe opened her mouth to argue, then snapped it shut. Another gut-punch truth out in the open. I admired Dex’s ruthless honesty. I’d been playing pretend for so long, I couldn’t tell genuine optimism from the facade anymore.
“Fine,” Phoebe said softly, hammering a crack into my heart. She bent down to grab her backpack. “Whatever. Let’s go.”
Thunder rumbled through the building, rattling the bookshelves as we left Dex’s office. I’d run here in a blind panic and now we’d be walking home in a thunderstorm. Great. Just another thing I screwed up.
Rain pounded the windows in the lobby. The woman behind the front desk, Mary, smiled when she saw us. Phoebe walked right over and said, “So, is he a serial killer or what?”
Mary guffawed. “You’re a hoot, Miss Phoebe,” she said. “But no, Mr. Dexter is a good man, if a bit rough around the edges.” She leaned in conspiratorially, adding, “Very rough around the edges.”
Phoebe knocked her knuckles twice on the desk. “Tell him I hate him and he’s an asshole.”
Mary’s face blanched. “I’ll paraphrase.”
With that, we ventured into the storm.
Phoebe muttered something about not bringing an umbrella but left it at that, aware she’d scared me to death.
I should’ve been lecturing her, grounding her.
Instead, I walked alongside her in silence, wincing when the sky lit up overhead.
I didn’t bother calling her out or apologizing, rather floating in this aimless purgatory we’d found ourselves in without Dad. Without each other.
For a split second, I wished I could go back in time. Five minutes. I’d do whatever it took to convince Dex to take that trip, fallout be damned. I’d sell my soul for Phoebe’s smile.
Then a pair of headlights cut through the blanket of rain. A sleek SUV pulled up beside us. Phoebe stopped short, as if she knew it was Dex before the window slid down.
“Get in,” he shouted over the rain. Phoebe crossed her arms. Mascara spilled down her cheeks, yet she held herself tall. I’d never had that confidence, even when I had everything else.
“Why?”
“I can’t afford your deaths on my conscience when you get struck by lightning.”
“Maybe we want that on your conscience.”
“I don’t doubt it.” He leaned over, pushing the passenger-side door open. “Come on.”
Phoebe dove for the back seat, probably under the impression I’d decline the ride. As if a bone-deep exhaustion hadn’t taken over the second Phoebe was safely in front of me. I had no fight left.
As I climbed into the front seat, Phoebe poked her head through the center console.
“A Mercedes, huh?” she said and threw me a look.
What kind of nonprofit pays enough for a luxury car?
it seemed to say, and I would’ve thought the same thing if my brain hadn’t short-circuited somewhere on the sidewalk.
Dex’s long fingers drummed the wheel at an incessant, almost anxious rate.
Rain pelted the car from every angle, wind whistling outside the closed windows; it reminded me of my dad’s old white noise machine, and I sank into the buttery leather seat, shutting my eyes, pretending I was there, back in the hallway of the house I grew up in, padding to his bedroom to wake him up when he overslept on weekends.
This was my life, now. Reminders of my father breaking my heart, over and over.
“I don’t hate you, you know.” Phoebe’s voice wrenched me out of my whirlpool of grief. Lightning flashed overhead.
“Oh, good,” Dex muttered. “I was losing sleep.”
“I know that was your whole plan,” Phoebe continued conversationally. “To make us hate you.”
He squinted through the windshield, the wipers on full blast and barely making a dent in the flow. “Am I supposed to ask why?”
“Nah, it’s obvious. You have trust issues.”
He scoffed. “Sure.”
“You push people away because it’s better to be the one to leave than to be the one left behind,” she explained. “Plus, you’re pissed we reminded you of something you want to forget. Maybe if you, like, actually dealt with your issues, you could move on.”
I resisted the painful urge to laugh. How fucking ironic.
“Is that what you’re doing?” Dex countered, voicing my own thoughts. “Hounding a stranger about a letter you had no business reading? This is you dealing with your issues?”
“I’m fourteen. You’re middle-aged. You do the math,” she said.
His grip on the wheel loosened and a soft sound whooshed out of him, something almost like a laugh. “I’m thirty-one.”
“That’s too old to be arguing with a teenager.
” I could hear the smile in her voice. I stopped myself before glancing over my shoulder to see it.
I didn’t want to intrude on whatever was happening here; Phoebe and Dex going tit for tat with ease, as if they’d known each other forever.
How was it so easy for her to talk to this man?
Why was it so impossible for her to talk to me?
“Look,” she said, her voice dipping into something softer, sympathetic.
“You’re right. We don’t know you. But we did read that letter, so we know how you felt.
And it seems like you’re still kinda steeping in that. ”
The car slowed, blinker ticking. Dex turned into the parking lot of our building, pulling right up to the entrance. Another roll of thunder filled the air.
“Why did that letter show up now?” she pressed. “You haven’t lived here in, what? A year? Don’t you think there’s a reason this happened?”
“I don’t believe in fate.”
“Fate or not, that letter showed up. You cared so much that you wrote it, once. You sent it. How does that not mean something to you?” That muscle in his jaw jumped, but he didn’t respond. “All this time,” Phoebe said softly. “Don’t you think she deserves to know you were sorry?”
Dex winced and hunched over to press his forehead against the steering wheel. He’d been so careful to remain stoic, it struck me somewhere tender.
Two things occurred to me at once: I like him better like this and He’s going to give in.
“Whoa,” Phoebe said, popping up between the center console again. “I think I broke him.”
Outside, the rain picked up, blurring out the rest of the world.
“Dex.” My voice was quiet, but he straightened and looked at me, those dark eyes wide and wild, searching mine. I didn’t know what he was looking for and it made me want to cover my entire body in bubble wrap.
“Why?” he asked. “Why should we do this?”
“Because—” Phoebe started, but he held up his hand to stop her.
“I know why you want to. I know why I should. I want to know her reason.” He tilted his head in my direction. I could feel Phoebe’s sharp gaze on me, but I couldn’t tear my eyes away from Dex. “Is there anything in this for you that has nothing to do with your sister?”
They both expected a knee-jerk answer and I almost complied.
It would be so easy to lean into the desperation to make Phoebe happy, to let it consume me, to let that be my purpose.
Isn’t that what I’d done for the last nine months?
But three stories above us, my best friend’s life tumbled forward at a steady clip without me.
I was so happy for Arden and Noah. I was so fucking devastated for myself.
“My best friend is getting engaged tonight,” I heard myself say.
Phoebe slowly drew back in her seat. Dex kept staring, his expression inscrutable.
“I love her and I’m happy for her, but now I am excruciatingly aware of the gap between us.
How far she’s moved in a year and how I’ve been standing still, hiding from everything.
I’m sick of standing still. I need to do something.
And yeah, this is probably a bad idea and everyone is going to think we’re batshit crazy, but hey! Maybe I am. Grief is fucked!”
Phoebe leaned forward. “Admitting you’re crazy is not the way to get him on board.”
“What do you want me to do? Pay him? We’re broke.”
Dex’s face twisted into a scowl. “I don’t want your money.
I want this done. I want it over with as soon as possible.
” He scrubbed a hand over his eyes, nodding jerkily.
“Okay, yeah,” he said, dropping his hand to his lap.
Thunder crashed over us; Phoebe and I both jumped, but Dex didn’t flinch. “Yeah. What the hell. Let’s do it.”
Phoebe’s hand shot out, gripping my elbow so tightly, it would leave a mark. I swallowed hard over the dread pressing into my throat.
“Oh,” I said. Phoebe’s grip tightened further, a futile attempt to silence my next question.
“Are you sure? I mean, this is…” I trailed off.
Crazy was the word that came to mind. A crazy, impulsive decision neither of us even had the chance to wrap our brains around.
The only person in the car who knew what they were doing was the fourteen-year-old, and that didn’t bode well.
“Are you?” Dex challenged. My posture straightened, eyes narrowing. I didn’t consider myself a spiteful person, but something about this man coaxed the worst out of me.
“Yes,” I replied without hesitation. “Never been more sure about anything.”
“Great.”
“Awesome.”
“Fan-fucking-tastic.”
Phoebe’s face appeared between us, her smile eliminating every ounce of doubt in my mind. Crazy, impulsive, thoughtless, whatever. I would do anything to keep her happy. Even this.
“Chill out,” she said, placing a hand on either of our shoulders. “Road trips are supposed to be fun.”
I swiveled in my seat, darkness edging into my vision. Spots. So many spots. “I’m sorry,” I said. “Did you just say road trip?”
Phoebe’s smile didn’t falter. “Oh, oops. Did I not mention that part?”