Chapter 23
“ A re you actually happy with this guy?”
After a mostly sleepless night, Lainey had to slog through breakfast with her brother, where he threw down the gauntlet as she prepped the eggs.
Was she happy with Dexter? It shouldn’t be a loaded question but it was, because of their murky future. Did the future affect the now? Should it?
“Yes.”
“He doesn’t seem like your type,” Murphy said, regarding her with closer scrutiny than she would have liked. Normally she would have begged for the type of attention he was now bestowing on her, but not this morning. Not after she lay next to a silent Dexter for hours, pretending to sleep as he pretended to sleep, each feigning ignorance of the silent space between them.
I told you about Ian from the very beginning, she had said, unable to bear the look of hurt and betrayal on his face. It made her feel guilty, despite the fact that she didn’t believe she had done anything wrong. She’d been up front, she’d told him there was someone else, even told him her humiliating part of the whole Ian ordeal. Why did he look so gutted when he already knew the truth?
It was theoretical then, was all he said, which left her wondering even more. What did that mean? Why wasn’t it theoretical now? Because he knew Ian? Or because he knew her?
After that, conversation fell to zero. They lay in awkward silence, pretending to sleep for the rest of the night. At least she was pretending. Never having slept near him before, he might truly have been a silent sleeper. Like everything lately, the night hadn’t gone as she thought it would and definitely not how she planned. At a minimum she wanted to nudge under his arm like a needy puppy and beg for affection. At a maximum she… Well, it was best not to go down that road. Better, probably, that the road had ended before it could be explored.
“Why isn’t he my type?” Lainey asked, natural little sister defensiveness heavy in her words.
“He’s so…”
Lainey scowled at Murphy, waiting for his pronouncement. What could he possibly say that was bad about Dexter? That he was boring? He wasn’t, not really, not when you got to know him. Rather he was responsible and conscientious, and she liked that about him. Dexter would never be that guy who stayed up until four AM to play video games with strangers on the internet. He would never leave his child and move to Florida for the sake of alligators. He would never quit his job to make chocolate, and she liked him for that, appreciated his unyielding steadiness. Dexter was a rock. He’s my rock, she thought before quickly pushing it away.
“He’s so settled,” Murphy said.
“What’s wrong with that?” Lainey asked.
“Nothing. I like that. I’m surprised you like that. I’ve had nightmares about the kind of guy you’d end up with. It usually ended with a chest full of tattoos and a credit score in the teens. But this guy…he’s solid. I think I actually approve.” He held up his coffee mug toward her in a little toast.
“Me, too,” she said softly, smiling, even though a big part of her heart was filled with yearning and a little bit of terror. Things had been going so well lately. Were they ruined forever? What would happen after the party?
“I always thought you had a thing for Ian,” Murphy said.
“I did,” Lainey confessed, sinking hard into her chair. “Ian never had a thing for me.”
Murphy stared hard at her, frowning. She wasn’t offended by the frown, it was his go-to expression and, inexplicably, made people love him. Lainey was overtly warm and friendly, a diehard people pleaser, and people ran from her like she had cooties; Murphy was standoffish and irascible, always did what suited him best, and people tossed themselves at his feet like he was The Pope. It was one of many lifetime contradictions she would never understand.
“I think he did,” Murphy declared. “I think he always had a thing for you, too. He just wasn’t ready to settle down. You know how Ian is. He’s scared of the big things in life, likes to keep his options open and stay free. I think he thought… someday …about you. That was part of the reason I stayed here last night, to give him some time and space to think. It hit him pretty hard, finding out like this. Why didn’t you warn him?”
She had no way to respond to that without telling Murphy the entire humiliating ordeal. And if she told him how she had confessed her love to Ian and almost immediately married Dexter, there would be more questions than answers. He might wonder if what was between her and Dexter was real, and should he? Was it? How did she feel, knowing Ian might actually have feelings for her?
“It’s been a whirlwind,” Lainey said, which was true. “Why did you think Ian had a thing for me?”
Murphy shrugged. “The way he talked about you, sort of soft. And he always wanted to see what you were up to, always asked you to tag along.”
“That drove you crazy,” she guessed.
He rolled his eyes. “No guy wants his little sister there to mess up his game.”
“Some guys do,” she said.
Murphy let out a breath and set down his coffee. “Lainey, just because I don’t love you like you want me to doesn’t mean I don’t. Don’t do this thing where you try to fit everyone into your box and then judge them because they won’t.”
“You do the same thing,” she said, tossing her hands wide in aggravation. “You want me to be so settled, so mundane, so blah, to never cry, never hug you, never tell you I love you. But I’m not a robot, Murphy. I’m a little person with big emotions, and that’s okay.” That was the first time she had ever said those words to herself, and also the first time she felt them. And she knew exactly why she had said them and now felt them, because of Dexter. It takes all kinds, he had told her. Dexter was okay with her over-the-top passionate persona. Her brother should be, too.
“I know,” Murphy groused. “But you wear your heart on your sleeve, kid. It worries me. I don’t like to see you get hurt so much and, Lainey, you always get hurt.” There was concern and more than a little worry in his look as he studied her.
“Dexter’s a good guy,” she said, the best thing she could come up with. In the beginning, a few weeks ago, she would have laughed off Murphy’s concerns because of course she wouldn’t be hurt. How could she be hurt by someone she didn’t even care about? But now she did care, she cared a tsunami amount, and what now?
“Don’t screw this up,” Murphy said, pointing a finger at her. “Promise me.”
“I…” she paused and took a breath, pushing through the quaver in her voice. “I’ll try.”
Murphy gave a nod before draining his coffee and setting it on the table with a smack. “Bring on the eggs.”
“And chocolate,” Lainey added cheerfully, darting to her feet to retrieve breakfast.
“And chocolate,” Murphy begrudgingly added, smiling a little when she beamed.
L ater that day Murphy left to fly back to Florida. He had been in town for four days and she was his last stop. She tried not to be hurt by that because he was right, she couldn’t make him love her the way she wanted to be loved. If she wanted to be in his life, she had to meet him where he was and accept the sort of love he was willing to give. In her imagination, she was number one, would be his first and only stop when he was in town. In Murphy’s mind she was a checkmark on his long agenda of people to visit, but at least she was on the list. She would take it for what it was and not allow herself to have hurt feelings. Or maybe only a tiny amount of hurt feelings. But she did realize that Murphy didn’t mean his actions to be hurtful, it was merely the way his thoughts and emotions worked, vastly different from hers, but not necessarily wrong.
She worked, throwing herself into the current project that needed to be finished. After all the dipping yesterday, that amounted to packaging and delivering her latest batch of treats. She was thankful she didn’t have to have another day of chocolate mess in her kitchen, mostly because she wanted it to be clean and tidy when Dexter arrived home. Maybe the physical lack of clutter would lead to some emotional spring cleaning. At some point they needed to have a conversation. Lainey wasn’t averse to talking about difficult things. The problem was that Dexter played things too close to his chest. She wanted to know where he stood before she put herself out there. What she wanted, she realized, was a grand gesture. But that wasn’t Dexter’s way. Should she do what she did with Murphy and accept him as he was—reserved and subdued—or should she hold out hope that he would miraculously ride in on a white horse and sweep her off her feet?
If she was honest, that was what she wanted. For once in her life she wanted someone to go the extra mile for her, to be big and dramatic and over the top in a display of grand passion. Not every day, not for the rest of her life, but once. Was that too much to ask? Was it settling to let go of that, or was it being a reasonable grownup?
She had similar questions about her job. She could admit now that she hadn’t been prepared to quit her job and start a new career. She had been too hasty, too quixotic. Like my dad. Her savings were gone, and now what? How deep a hole should she dig while waiting on a miracle?
No one is coming to rescue you, she realized. That was disappointing, but also somewhat empowering to admit because it meant she still had hope of recovery. She was in a hole, but she wasn’t buried. There was still time to dig herself out of the mess she had created. Thanks to Dexter, she wasn’t in debt—yet. But she would be soon, if she didn’t do something.
She closed her eyes. I can be a grownup. I can make hard decisions, using my brain instead of my heart. I can do what’s best instead of what feels good. The little pep talk worked. When it was finished, she opened her eyes and reached for her phone, pressing the button for Mr. Weaver, the candy man.
Two hours later, she had accepted a new part time job that would bring a much needed cash infusion. She also cleaned her house and washed all her laundry. For the moment she had no projects to work on, so she picked up a book and read until she heard Dexter’s car in the drive. She placed the book on the couch and sat on her hands, waiting. Lainey had a lot to tell him. Would he realize her attempts to get herself in check were an attempt to make herself a presentable prospect? I am not a mess, she told herself. I’m not a damsel in need of a rescue anymore. I’m an equal partner, a healthy and whole woman. A wife.
She bit her lip and stared at the door, heart thumping as she waited for it to open.
It didn’t, though. Her phone beeped with a text. She read it with more than a little dread.
I’m zonked. Going to stay in tonight and catch up on some things/rest.
She blinked at her phone, certain she must have read it wrong. Dexter wasn’t coming? Dexter was dodging her? After she’d spent the whole day reordering her life, cleaning up the dregs of her previous emotional implosions?
Okay, she replied, because what else could she say? Clearly there would be no grand gesture, and maybe that was fine. Real life didn’t always work the way you planned. Sometimes, more often than not really, you had to settle for average. Lainey could do average. She was accepting an average level of care from her brother. She could do the same with Dexter. Unless he didn’t even want average. Maybe this was his way of telling her he wanted nothing at all.
On the other side of their shared wall, she heard him reach for his frying pan and begin preparing his sad bachelor meal of a lone hamburger. Lainey felt confused and disheartened, but no more so than before this all began. Maybe everything would go back to the way it had been before, each of them sticking to their own apartment, everything separate and alone. So very alone.
Or was that the way he wanted it because she was too much? Don’t screw this up, Lainey. Her own brother had said that to her because he knew her tendency. She would always and forever be too much. Dexter had taken longer than some to realize, but now apparently he was catching on. Lainey wasn’t worth the trouble. And now she didn’t have her dream job as consolation. In fact she had nothing so she grabbed her book and went upstairs. It was better to stop thinking and feeling. Maybe that was how other people survived the unending monotony of everyday life, working jobs they hated, navigating difficult relationships that left them unfulfilled. Maybe they turned off their emotions and used every distraction available to blunt their pain. Lainey had tried to embrace life fully, to live in the moment and feel all the joy and pain of it. But that wasn’t to be, she could see that now.
So instead of crying herself to sleep, like she normally might have, she read until her eyes drooped then turned on the television, watching reruns of one of her favorite shows until she finally drifted unaware into slumber.