Chapter 11 #2
"I nearly called home," she says. Her voice has changed. Quieter. "In my second year of residency."
I wait.
"There was someone. A man I met in my program.
A good man, before you say anything. Kind.
Steady. He cared about me properly." She looks at her mug.
"We were together for almost a year and a half.
He asked me to move in with him. I was so close to saying yes.
I had all the reasons to say yes. He was exactly what you'd put on a list of everything a sensible person should want. "
"What happened?"
"He sat me down one night and started talking about the future.
Our future. Where we'd live, when we'd start a family.
Good things. Things I should have been glad to hear.
" She turns the mug around in her hands.
"And I sat there listening to him and I couldn’t make myself be present in that conversation.
Because you were in my head. Not deliberately.
I wasn't sitting there thinking about you on purpose, you were just there, the way you always were, background noise that never actually went quiet.
" She swallows. "I nearly called home after that.
Not to speak to anyone in particular. Just to hear a voice from here.
Maybe to say your name to someone who knew you. I got as far as picking up the phone."
"But you didn't."
"No. Because I knew that if I started talking about you, I'd have to make it real.
I'd have to admit that I'd been carrying it this whole time and I hadn't moved on the way everyone thought I had, the way I'd been telling myself I had.
" She looks up at me. "I ended it six months later.
He didn't do a single thing wrong, and I ended it because I couldn't give him what he deserved.
I knew why and I wasn't ready to face that. "
She's quiet for a moment.
"I've never told anyone that. Not Luke. Not my mum. Not anybody." She meets my eyes briefly and then looks away. "I don't know why I'm telling you now."
I don't say anything. I know there’s nothing I could say that would be the right thing. So, I just hold her eyes when she looks at me. I waited for her to continue and let what she’d already said sit in the room between us where it belongs.
After a moment she straightens slightly and picks her mug back up.
"I've hated you for ten years. You don't know what that was like.
I didn't want to date anyone because I always compared them to you and nobody was ever the same.
No one treated me the way you did. And I still hated you for what you did.
" She looks at me steadily. "It's going to take me a while to get my head around this. I need you to understand that."
"I do."
"What do you want, Austin? Not what you wanted ten years ago. Now."
"I want you," I say. No hesitation. "I've always wanted you. Seeing you again has made me feel like I’ve a heartbeat again.
I know that sounds like too much, and I know I've got no right to ask for anything.
I'll take whatever you'll give me. Even if that's nothing for a while.
" I hold her eyes. "Even if it's just the chance to prove to you that the man I am now is worth some of your time. "
She's quiet for a long moment. I can see her working through it, all of it, sorting it into things she can hold and things she can't yet.
"I talked to your mom and dad," I say. "Years ago. I asked them not to tell you. I wanted to keep in touch with them, so I knew you were safe and happy. I needed to know that."
"I know," she says. "I went to see them yesterday." A pause. "I'm not happy with them about it. But I understand why they kept it secret."
"And if you hadn't been happy? If you'd needed someone to come and find you?"
She looks at me. "I think I know the answer to that."
"Then you know the answer."
She almost smiles. Just barely. "He's a good kid. EJ. He looks just like you."
That’s the first nice thing she's said about me since I walked in the door. Maybe I can hope.
"He'll be handsome like you when he grows up," she says, and then she seems to realize she's said it and looks back at her coffee.
"So that's one hurdle," I say. "What else do you need from me?"
"I need time, Austin. I need to think without you standing right next to me making it hard to think." She stands and I stand with her. "I'm not saying no to whatever this is. I'm saying I need time."
"I can work with that."
"Don't harass me."
"I can't promise that. But I'll try."
She shakes her head, but the almost-smile is there again, and that's something. That's more than something, because that's the smile I remember from when we were eighteen and she thought I was being an idiot, but she loved me anyway.
“What happened with EJ? Who shot him?”
I take a deep breath. This is why being a member of an MC becomes difficult. We don’t discuss club business with anyone. The old ladies know that. They know that they will only learn a small amount of information, they take that and don’t ask for more.
I know Sav, and I know that she wants the truth. She deserves the truth after what I did to her.
“There’s a rival MC who want to take over our operation and they want to own this town. The Black Saints have owned this town for years and this town likes us. We are not going anywhere. They hurt on of our kids and that is not on. That is bad news.”
“How could they do that to a child?” She has tears in her eyes.
“Exactly, but we will be getting for revenge for what they did to EJ. They can’t do that and get away with it.” I rub my hand over my face. Just the thought of EJ being shot kills me.
“Could you get hurt?” Sav looks at me and I can see worry behind her eyes. I want to smile, but what she is asking is not something to smile about.
“Yes, we could all get hurt, but that isn’t our intention. We need to protect her town and as an MC we will do whatever it takes to get them out of our town.”
She reaches out and puts her hand on my arm. “Thanks for telling me the truth Austin, that means a lot to me.” She looks up at me. “Please be careful. I don’t want to be patching you up next.”
“I will be careful, don’t worry.”
I walk down the stairs to her door and I can't help it.
I pull her into me, arms around her, and I hold on.
She goes still for a second and thankfully she doesn't pull away.
She lets me hold her. I breathe her in and feel the shape of her.
I think, ten years. Ten years I've been carrying this around and right now she's in my arms. She’s letting me hold her and I’m not going to push it.
I kiss the top of her head. "I'll see you soon, Sav."
She holds onto the door as I go down the stairs.
Climbing onto my bike, I start the engine and look up at her in the doorway.
"You're still the only woman who's been on my bike.
You're still my girl." I start the engine and I ride off, and when I look in the mirror to my right I see she's watching me and I think about the almost-smile.
It's enough for now.
It's more than I had this morning.
SAVANNAH
I watch him ride off and close the door, leaning against it.
I keep replaying the conversation I’d had with my parents about Austin visiting them.
"Did Austin come and see you? After I left?" I looked at them both across the lemonade glasses in the back garden, the question I'd been building up to since they opened the door.
Dad nodded. "He came and explained what had happened and why he did it. We hated him until he did." He looked at his glass. "But after that we could see he was doing what he thought was best for you. Not the right way to go about it. But he loved you."
"Why didn't you tell me?"
Mom reached over and touched my hand. "Every time we mentioned his name you changed the subject.
And then you told us you didn't want to hear anything about him anymore.
So we stopped." She paused. "He's helped us, Sav.
Over the years. When the oil heater went and your dad was out of work.
When the car needed fixing. He never made a thing of it. "
"Are you going to give him a chance?" Dad asked.
I looked at them both, the two of them watching me so carefully. "I don't know yet. I just need to think about it."
"Sure," Mum said, refilling my glass. "Sure you do."
I’m still turning it all over in my mind. He explained himself to them. He kept in touch with them all those years to make sure I was okay. He helped them when they needed it and never made them feel like they owed him anything for it.
He's not the person I've been hating for ten years. I don't know what to do with that yet.
I lock the door and wonder if I’m making a mistake. I'm reaching for my phone to see if he's messaged when I see he has.
AUSTIN
Thank you for hearing me out. Have a great day. xx
I stare at it for a long time. The kisses. The particular way he said my name with his forehead against mine.
He told me he sat in the clubhouse until four in the morning that night ten years ago and didn't drink.
He told me he didn't know if he was brave or a coward and he still can't answer that.
Ten years of carrying that question and he laid it out in front of me like he was done pretending it was resolved.
I think about the man I’d let go. The good man who asked about the future and I couldn't stay present in the conversation. I've never said that out loud to anyone before today. I don't know what it means that the first person I said it to was Austin.
I type back before I can overthink it.
SAVANNAH
You too. Maybe you can bring me coffee in the morning from Ruby's. She knows what I like.
I don't put a kiss. I'm not there yet. But I send it and I put the phone down. I lie there on my couch and I think about his mouth, his hands and the ten years between then and now. I don’t mean to, but I soon fall asleep thinking about him.