Chapter 20 #2
“Possessiveness isn’t love.” Beau looks at his plate as he polishes off the peach and goat cheese salad. He’s about to finish my painstakingly prepared dinner in under five minutes.
“She is refusing to sign divorce papers,” I argue.
“Because she wants control.”
I’m surprised that he’s answered so many questions, even though his responses are evasive. “You kept your wedding ring.”
He chews and considers me. I sense he’s contemplating how much he’s willing to share.
“When I got married, I expected it to be forever. The ring was a symbol of that hope.”
I should drop it, but there’s something in his expression that begs me to ask more. There’s the barest hint of an invitation. “What changed your mind?”
He sets his fork on his clean plate and takes a long sip of wine. When he answers, he looks over my shoulder. “I found out I didn’t know her all that well.”
That sounds familiar. I thought I knew everything about my dad, but it turns out I didn’t know him all that well either. “Did she lie to you?”
“Something like that.” He finishes his glass and pours another. For all his sanctimony about the height of my emotional walls, he’s not exactly laying out the welcome mat.
I think of how desperate Beau was to show Bianca he’d moved on by pretending we were together.
I didn’t know what his goal was then, but now I understand.
I had to see Matty and his new girlfriend at Cherry’s wedding.
I brought along a hot guy from work and had him pretend he was obsessed with me—and I was so grateful for that kindness.
It numbed the pain a bit. I wonder if Beau’s desperation was the same as mine.
Did Bianca cheat on him? Was she as careless with his heart as Matty was with mine?
It’s unfathomable that someone would be self-destructive enough to cheat on this gorgeous, thoughtful man.
Bianca is a doctor—could she really be stupid enough to betray him, hurt him, and risk losing him forever?
If she did, I hope she’s feeling that loss now.
“So I did the right thing, then?” I ask.
“Interrogating me is never the right thing, Ophelia.” But he smiles and flashes me a hint of dimple.
“I did the right thing when I was your emotional-support fake girlfriend. I’d feel like an asshole pretending to be your hot side piece if you were the jerk in the breakup.”
“Again, Bianca and I are over, so you’re not the side piece.”
“But you’re admitting I’m hot?” I tap his foot under the table.
I’m teasing, but his eyes dart to my lips, to my neck, before he looks away and blinks to erase the image like an Etch A Sketch.
It’s as much of a yes as he’ll confess. I’m going to need to rewire my flirt instinct to keep us on solid ground.
I remember Beau’s censure: You have two speeds: fight or flirt.
I need to find a new default for him if I want to protect this relationship.
“Why didn’t I hear through the grapevine that you broke up?
” I pull us back on topic. His face is impassive as he stares at me, swirling his wine in his glass.
“I mean, Dad told me about every milestone as if I were the future author of your biography. The chain of communication was from you to Lani to Dad to me. In addition to all your laudable accomplishments, I heard about your appendicitis while traveling in Europe and that you sprained your ankle hiking Machu Picchu.”
“I feel violated,” he says, swallowing another sip of wine.
“As did I. I assure you it was unsolicited. But why didn’t I hear about you and Bianca?”
He shrugs, looking over my shoulder again.
“Beauregard,” I coax.
“I didn’t tell my parents until a few weeks ago.
When I was there ...” He trails off. It’s why he was in San Diego when Dad died, I presume.
“I wanted to tell them in person. And I didn’t want to be home when Bianca came to clean me out.
She’d been stopping by randomly for months, picking up a lamp at a time. ”
I let out a long hiss. “But how long ago did you split up?”
“Over a year ago.”
I choke on a bite. “How did you keep it from Lani? Even Cherry knew.”
“How the hell did Cherry know?” he snaps.
“I think she picked up on the hints on Instagram. She noticed you were absent in Bianca’s recent posts. We all followed her—she’s almost Insta-famous, you know.”
He sighs. “Well, my parents aren’t on social media. And they weren’t close with Bianca. She couldn’t get away much. I went to San Diego for the holidays this year and explained she was on call. It wasn’t a lie. Just not the full truth.”
For a year, he managed to withhold it from Lani Augustin, who knows everything about everyone, especially her only son.
Lani knew the trouble we’d cause before we could dream it up.
I see you spying that cookie dough. I’ll know if either of you steals a bite.
Or later, I know about the plans for Colton’s party.
Don’t you two do anything you’re not ready for.
Two days after Beau told me he’d had his first wet dream, she left a book on human development on his nightstand.
Beau wasn’t open with his parents the way I was with Dad.
The more Lani pushed, the less he shared.
But hiding a separation? How? Why? Was he in denial?
Did he want Bianca back? Was he hoping they’d work it out?
I can’t imagine Beau forgiving a betrayal like that.
But I don’t know for certain that she cheated.
Perhaps I’m filling in the blanks based on my own wounds.
Beau sighs and stands, clearing our plates and striding into the kitchen.
“Why’d you hide it?”
“I didn’t want to hear about Mom’s hairdresser’s son’s marriage that was saved through counseling, or worse, I didn’t want Mom trying to fix me up with someone new. I didn’t want her to become invested in us staying together or—”
“In breaking up for good,” I guess.
I follow Beau into the kitchen with the salad bowl and the wine, and he stands over the trash bin and scrapes the plates clean. He sets them on the counter and leans against the lip of the sink.
“I needed some time to process everything before sharing it.”
That’s fair. If Beau hadn’t walked in during the moment of impact, I might have hidden my truth bomb, too. “This is why your mom said we needed each other? We were both going through it.”
He nods. “Yeah.”
“I wish you would have shared more. Our friendship doesn’t have to be so one-sided.”
Beau looks out the window above the sink as the smoke-soaked sun descends through the bloodied sky. “It doesn’t feel one-sided anymore.”
I swallow a swell of emotion—gratitude that he sees the effort I’m making, sadness that it took loss to finally bring us together again, and fear that I may not know how to walk the tightrope of this new dynamic.
“Go relax,” Beau says. “You cooked. I’ll clean. Go find a trashy paperback. Or play solitaire. Or start a puzzle.”
“And stop asking personal questions?” I guess.
“Precisely.” His smile disarms me.
I relent and abandon the line of questioning. He’s working through it, obviously. But I’m not done with him entirely. I love this cabin in the woods and Beau’s cautious friendship. The night seems loaded with possibilities if I can stop noticing how hot he looks fresh from the shower.
“You wash, I’ll dry,” I say as I find a towel in a drawer by the sink.
I watch the way his arms move and flex as he scrubs the plates under the running water: forearm, shoulder, bicep, back. Who knew washing dishes was a full-body workout?
Beau hands me the dishes and pots one at a time, barely glancing in my direction.
He’s head down, lost to his thoughts—likely dissecting the private details he didn’t want to share with me—and I try not to feel left out.
I know what it’s like to avoid emotional analysis, but for me, it’s too much to even ask myself the tough questions.
Beau is so introspective, he probably analyzes his pain from every angle, scrutinizing what went wrong until he’s written a virtual dissertation.
Or until he’s written a book.
I place the salad bowl on the counter with a clang. “Beau, this project is about your divorce, isn’t it?”
Beau flicks the water off and wipes his hands on a towel. “Phe,” he says, his voice soft and pleading, and it may as well be a yes.
So Bianca betrayed him, and he wants to uncover how and why people keep secrets.
It makes sense, I suppose. A professor would want to understand.
Beau would need to understand, because there’s little about the world he doesn’t.
Meanwhile, I find life so confounding that only my mother returning from the dead has shocked me.
We finish the rest of the cleanup in silence.
Beau systematically puts everything away and stacks and aligns the dishes like he once did with his building blocks.
He scrubs the counters and straightens the toaster, the coffee maker, and the spice racks in his wake.
I watch—quietly—as he sterilizes the kitchen as if we might perform emergency surgery on the countertops later.
“Do you want to play cards or a board game?” I ask, ready to move us toward safer territory. I hope he’ll talk to me about it eventually, but I’ve pushed him enough tonight.
Beau scans the kitchen, and he must be satisfied with his handiwork because he strides over to where I’m standing and cocks a hip against the counter. He’s so close that I can smell the familiar scent of home clinging to his clothes.
“The only game I’m interested in is the quiet game,” he says.
There’s no reason to interpret his words as suggestive, but I can’t help but think of all the ways he could make me speechless—with his mouth, his hands, his skin.
And by the look on his face, the blaze behind his dark eyes, and the slight uptick in the pace of his breathing, he may be imagining the same thing.
I should have mercy on us, because we’ve each veered too close to emotional arteries, and I’m at risk of blurring want with reality.
We promised not to lie to each other, but that’s not the same as baring our souls and unloading our secrets.
So I should retreat to the loft and let Beau decompress in the bedroom, where I can’t beg for his touch or his truths.
But I don’t want to be alone with my thoughts—not when they’ve been uncorked by his questions and confessions.
“I don’t know how to play that game.” I lift my chin to capture his gaze.
Beau’s jaw is tight, and his eyes skitter over me, dipping to my lips for a fraction of a second. I imagine him pressing his mouth to mine to teach me, swallowing my words with his tongue—but that’s not a fantasy I should follow.
Beau seems to sway toward me, and I grip the counter to hold myself in place, my knuckles white with restraint.
But when I think he might lean in and test my resolve, he turns abruptly, stepping out of the kitchen and down the hall.
Relief—or maybe disappointment—washes over me as he walks away.
I poke my head around the corner, expecting to see him disappear into his bedroom.
Instead, he hunts through the bookcase in the living room.
“Here,” he says, extending a paperback out to me.
It’s not a surprise that his discipline is more developed than mine, but I suspect his desire is not as potent. Either way, I should be grateful that I have a partner in Operation Abstinence.
Beau grabs his own hardcover from the coffee table and sinks onto the love seat.
I slide onto the other side, take the paperback, and adjust the throw pillows until I’m comfortable.
I open the book. The cover is frayed, with dog-eared corners and yellowed pages.
But I let myself go where it leads, enjoying Beau’s company even as we sit in silence, in solitude together.
He doesn’t even protest when I stretch out and drape my feet across his lap. Instead, he brings one hand to my instep and squeezes.
The quiet game isn’t so bad.