Chapter 8 #2
I don’t like mushrooms. Maybe I would if I could try them, but I’m allergic—not dangerously, but enough that I’ll have to pick them off.
I’d rather pick mushrooms off my own slice a dozen times than deny her something she wants.
I know she’s gotten used to settling on things for the benefit of other people.
I want her to be happy, even if it’s at my expense.
I make the call, and we wait. The afternoon fades into golden hour. The sun is dipping low now, casting a warm glow that softens the edges of everything around us.
When the knock comes, I am halfway through breaking down another box. I wipe my hands on my jeans and head for the door.
“Don’t forget the tip this time,” Rachel calls.
I look back, smirking. “Come on, Sunny, it was one time, seven years ago. When are you going to let that go?”
She yells over her shoulder with a clever ass grin, “Never.”
The delivery guy hands off the pizza and drinks, and I nudge the door shut with my knee. When I turn around, she is now sitting cross-legged on the floor, surrounded by half-open boxes and packing paper.
I set the food down on the coffee table, clearing enough space for the box.
“Still hot,” I warn, handing her a slice.
“Thanks,” she offers, leaning her back against the couch.
I drop down beside her and grab a slice of my own, taking a big bite, making sure to secretly remove any mushrooms. I take a peek over at Sunny, and she looks content. And that’s enough for me.
“Look at us. We’re officially grown-ups, Rhett. We’ve hit peak domestic-ability.”
I give her a sideways glance. “First off, that is definitely not a real word. And secondly, speak for yourself. I’m currently sitting on a rug my old roommate left behind when he moved out.
I don’t even know where it came from. This might be my rock bottom.
” I nudge her leg with mine and continue.
“You’re lucky I even let you sit on it. This thing has seen some things. ”
“Impossible. You can’t be at rock bottom while you’re sitting next to me. The two can not coexist.” She smirks and nudges my leg back.
I watch as she eats her slice the same way she always has—removing all the toppings first, then folding the bare crust in half like it’s some kind of delicacy.
It’s beyond weird. Normally, I’d tease her for it, make some sarcastic comment about her being a serial killer in disguise. But tonight, I don’t say anything.
Because the truth is, I missed this. I missed that specific, ridiculous way she eats pizza.
It is one of those things I forgot I remembered, tucked away somewhere in my brain.
Watching her do it now hits in a way I’m not totally prepared for.
For reasons I can’t explain, it brings me a kind of comfort I didn’t know I needed.
After a few bites, she wipes her hands on a napkin and leans back against the couch. “You know, I don’t hate this.”
I grab another slice, keeping my tone casual even though my stomach drops. “Were you expecting to hate this?”
“I mean… I didn’t expect to be here. Hanging out with you. Eating pizza. As if the last four years didn’t happen. I had a very detailed plan to only talk to you for a max of thirty minutes.” She shrugs. “I was definitely anxious when I got your text.”
She takes a drink, staring at the beer label like it might feed her the right words. “I mean, we barely talked over the last four years, Rhett. Maybe not at all this last year. And then out of the blue, you’re here.”
I tilt my head in agreement, setting my slice down. The crust feels like too much to chew.
“Yeah. That part’s on me.”
Rachel looks over. Her face is unreadable, but she doesn’t disagree.
“I didn’t know how to talk to you,” I admit. “Not in a way that wouldn’t make everything worse.”
She pulls her bottom lip between her teeth. “I didn’t know how to handle it either. But it felt like you just disappeared on me. I was abandoned all over again.”
The guilt lands sharply in my chest. As someone who has felt that level of abandonment, I can’t believe I made her feel that way.
It is the exact reason why a guy like me doesn’t deserve a woman like her.
I force myself to look away. I don’t need her to feel guilty for being honest with me. I want her to always be honest with me.
“I tried to reach out. More times than I can count. I’d pull up your name, start typing a text, and I even thought about calling. But nothing ever felt like it was good enough. It always felt like too little, too late. I knew I already lost my place in your life.”
She stares down at her beer, peeling at the label until half of it’s gone. She takes another sip. “Yeah. I guess we both let it go quiet.”
“I didn’t want to,” I say quickly. “I just dug myself into a hole, and I couldn’t figure out how to climb back out.
But none of that was your fault, Sunny. I had to leave.
There were things I had to do because we lost Josh.
” I force myself to meet her eyes. “You didn’t do anything wrong. This mess? It’s mine.”
We sit in silence for a couple of minutes. But this silence doesn’t feel like the others. It doesn’t feel like avoidance. It feels like wiggle room. Maybe room for something to grow back. God, I just want her to give me another chance to be her friend.
“Look, we don’t have to talk about it,” she says at last, her voice cautious.
“It was a hard time for both of us.” She sounds like she wants to continue, but I let the conversation die because I’m not ready to revisit all the reasons I left.
I can’t be truthful with her right now, and I’m not willing to lose the little ground I made up for tonight.
“I’m sorry, Rhett.”
She glances down at my mouth. Just for a second. It’s fast, and maybe she doesn’t even realize she’s doing it, but it moves a current through my chest.
“Me too, Sunny,” I say, the words catching in my throat. “Me too.”
I let my hand rest on her thigh, light enough that she could brush me off without effort. But she doesn’t. Instead, she leaves it there while she reaches for another slice.
I break the moment by removing my hand and lifting an open box as I stand. “Where should I put the books?”
Rachel scans the shelves. “Top one. You always put the unread ones out of reach.”
I let out a laugh. “Still judging me for owning The Odyssey, huh?”
“Only because I know you never made it past page three.”
I grin, setting the box down. “Guilty. But at least I tried. Now it’s just for show.”
“Still trying to convince women you can read?”
“I can read, Sunny. Don’t need to convince anyone.” I toss it lightly, though something in my chest knots when she looks at me like that.
“What’s the last book you read?” she pushes.
“Okay, I haven’t read a book per se in a while, but I read articles all the time.”
“Sure, ya do.” She walks past, her arm brushing mine, and kneels beside another box. “Honestly, you have way less junk than I expected,” she says, pulling it open.
“I cleared a lot out when I moved. Fresh start and all. I didn’t see the point in dragging old, meaningless stuff to this place. Everything in this place either means something to me or serves a purpose.”
She glances up, eyes catching mine. “Yeah. I get that.”
I shift toward the window, watching dusk bleed orange into lavender. “I know the house is small. But it’s just enough space for me… and maybe one of those women who are impressed I own books.”
Her laugh spills out quickly, catching her off guard. “Careful. That almost sounds like commitment.”
I glance back over my shoulder, watching the way the fading light hits her cheekbones. “I kid,” I say, half smiling. “I’m not looking for anyone.”
Not looking, because she’s the only person I see when I picture what this place could feel like with someone else in it.
“For as long as I’ve known you, you really haven’t dated anyone.”
“Come on, Rach, I’ve dated,” I toss back as I move the last book out of the box.
“Whatever you say, Hayes. I’ve never seen you with a woman besides a couple dates. And as we both know, that’s like four dates over the span of a decade.”
“It’s like you’re trying to hurt me, Rach. I have been gone for a couple of years, remember? Maybe it’s more than four.” I joke back at her, and she quickly rolls her eyes.
I’ve dated. Tried to, at least. But it always circles back to the same truth.
No matter who I’m with, I keep seeing her in them.
I would be looking at them but imagining her laugh or her smile.
Even sleeping with them didn’t help. At first, I thought it would help lose the connection to her.
But it never erased the way my mind always drifted to her.
No one has ever made it feel natural, inevitable even, to be myself. I can’t outrun her. I can’t replace her, no matter how many times I try.
Rachel leans forward, resting her elbows on her knees as she peers into another box. I watch her as she reaches for her beer. Her fingers wrap around the neck of the bottle, and I can’t help but stare at the way her lips press against the rim.
I clear my throat. “Thanks for the help today.”
“Thanks for letting me. I didn’t know how much I needed this.”
“Me either.” I study her profile in the fading gold light: the curve of her cheek, the loose strand of hair slipping over her eye. My fingers itch to tuck it back, but I stay still.
Then her phone buzzes against the table, shattering the quiet.
She glances at the screen, and I catch the faint furrow in her brow, the tight pull of her mouth. The change is immediate, and it’s one I know too well. She is bracing for a hit.
She hesitates, then answers. “Hey.”
Her voice comes out smooth, practiced. It’s higher and sweeter than it was a moment ago. What the hell is that? Why is she pretending to sound different?
She takes a few steps away, phone pressed tight to her ear, and I lean forward, every sense on alert.
“I told you, Ben. I was grabbing food with coworkers.” I watch the lie slip out of her mouth. “Yeah, just a quick bite after our shift wrapped.”
Of course, it’s Ben. I let myself forget she’s tied to that asshat, and now she is lying to him about where she is.
Her fingers clamp tighter around the phone.
“Yeah. We’re just getting food. I’ll be home soon.”
Her tone sharpens, clipped at the edges. The mask is slipping, no matter how hard she tries to hold it in place.
“I didn’t think I needed to check in with you every hour,” she adds. Her free hand presses to her forehead.
Hang up, Rach. Don’t give him another second.
“No, I didn’t think it’d be this late,” she says, flat now. “I’ll be home soon.”
A long pause stretches. She stands frozen. His voice is yanking her back by invisible strings.
Then, finally, she snaps—“I said I’ll be home soon.”
She cuts the call without a goodbye. Her shoulders are rigid. I watch as she tries to pull herself together.
I rise slowly, careful not to startle her. “Everything alright, Sunny?” The words sound hollow the second they leave me. We both know the answer.
It’s a dumb question. Of course, it’s not alright. But I can’t just come out and say what the hell was that without throwing gasoline on a fire she is clearly trying to put out.
She turns fast, her smile already in place, rehearsed, but it’s all wrong. It doesn’t reach her eyes. She doesn’t have to pretend with me, so I don’t know why she is trying to.
“Yeah. It’s fine.”
She is lying. To him. To me. To herself.
“You sure?” I keep my voice steady. “That didn’t sound fine.”
She waves me off and grabs her bag, trying to erase herself from the room. “It’s nothing. He gets weird sometimes. I shouldn’t have stayed this long anyway.”
I’m not sure weird is the word I’d use. He talks to her like she is a kid breaking curfew. She isn’t an object he owns. It crawls under my skin so fast I almost see red. This is my fault. I let things get to this point.
If I lose my cool, she’ll slam the door shut again. Lock it. Deadbolt it. I can’t risk that, not after all the progress we made tonight.
“You don’t have to hide from me, Sunny,” I say, softer than I feel. “Not when you’re upset. Tell me what’s wrong. Let me help.”
“I’m okay, Rhett,” she cuts in gently. Her hand freezes on her purse, but she doesn’t look at me. She shakes her head barely, then mutters, “I should probably head out.”
I stop myself from reaching for her. Every part of me wants to pull her back. I want to bark out ‘Don’t go, stay, talk to me.’ But that would scare her off. I know it would.
She slips into her jacket, movements stiff, and I catch the tremor in her hands. She’s not leaving because she wants to. She’s leaving because she thinks she has to.
“Thanks for the pizza. And the beers. And the boxes,” she says quietly.
I nod. “Anytime. Thanks for meeting up with me to hear me out and helping me unpack all this stuff.”
She heads for the door. When she reaches it, she pauses and I catch the flicker in her step, thinking she might turn back. Maybe she’ll let me in.
But she doesn’t.
“Night, Rhett.”
She grabs the door and swings it shut. The sound echoes in the quiet room. My shoulders slump. I let out a slow breath, letting the tension drain.
I wasn’t here for her when she needed me. I left her, and she held up her whole world by herself—Margo, her parents, everything—while no one held her.
My one job was to protect her. But I was a coward and walked away. I left room for a man like Ben to step in and take what never should’ve been his in the first place.
I deserve every ounce of the anger burning through me.
I should have never left. It wasn’t worth it.
The Sunny I knew never let someone speak to her that way.
She pushed back, laughed loudly; she took up space.
She felt her emotions. Somewhere, somehow, that fire dimmed along the way, and I’m determined to bring it back.