Chapter Five #2
"You'll have more fun with me," Vance said, confiscating the pint of ice cream before I could take it back upstairs. I managed to hang on to my coffee and finished drinking it after I got out of the shower.
I wanted to spend the day in my pajamas, but if Vance was taking me out for brunch somewhere they served mimosas, I was going to put a little effort into my appearance.
I put my wet hair up, starting with two long braids and winding them around into a loosely structured bun. I'd put on makeup and pick out something decent to wear, but I was not about to spend forty minutes blow drying my hair.
All the makeup in the world couldn't hide the signs of crying, at least not the makeup I had at my disposal, but I did the best I could with eyedrops and cucumber gel.
I thought about wearing a dress. Brunch always felt dressy to me. But I didn't want to. Showering and putting on makeup were enough of a concession. Every dumped woman has a right to wallow in ice cream and movies and occasional bouts of tears.
If I was getting dragged out of the house, I was doing it in my most comfortable clothes. Though I wasn't going to wear my jammies. And after taking a good look at the set I'd just stripped off, maybe it was time to do a little shopping.
I'm not going to say that Brayden being a cheating dickhead was my fault, but it's possible I could've tried a little harder in the lingerie department. Then again, it would have been wasted on him. Pulling on my favorite pair of jeans and my favorite t-shirt, I headed for the stairs.
Vance met me at the front door, my purse in hand. "Come on, let's go. Charlie is going to meet us there."
I followed him out the door, stopping only to lock it behind me. Vance didn't say much on the way to the restaurant. I'd expected him to either grill me on the details or jump right into insulting Brayden, but he did neither.
He opened the car door for me and then took my hand in his as we drove down my driveway. The simple kindness brought tears to my eyes. He was a good friend. I should've remembered that. I wasn't alone without Brayden. I had Vance. I had Charlie. And other friends besides them.
I hadn't needed to hang on to my crappy boyfriend. Still, I felt lost. I'd been the other half of a couple for so long. Even though I knew I was better off on my own, Brayden had dumped me and moved out so quickly I couldn't quite get my head around the idea of being single.
Vance parked in front of the restaurant and led me past the hostess station to a table on the terrace, where Charlie was already waiting for us with a mimosa in front of my empty seat.
"I shouldn't say this, considering the present company, but drink," she said, pushing the champagne glass toward me.
I did. I'd said I didn't want to drink, and that I didn't want any mimosas, but the second I saw that tall chilled glass, smelled the fresh orange juice and the dry tang of champagne, I realized I'd been wrong.
I did want a mimosa. I wanted several mimosas. And French toast. With hash browns. And bacon.
I drained half my glass in one long sip.
"Do you know what you want to order?" Charlie asked, tucking her sleek auburn hair behind her ear. She wore a sharp black suit, perfectly tailored, with a plum colored blouse and a matching scarf.
Charlie was beautiful, but she didn't seem to know it. I thought about her question. I'd been here before, and I was pretty sure about the French toast, hash browns, and bacon.
"I do, why?" I asked.
"Because I want to hear about what happened with that rat bastard and why you didn't call me," she said.
"Oh, okay."
"Tell," Vance commanded. Charlie looked at him.
"You don't know either?" she asked.
"I was waiting for you," he explained.
I let out a sigh. "He's been cheating on me for the last year.
" I drained the rest of my mimosa and pushed the glass to the edge of the table so the waitress knew to refill it when she came back.
"With the daughter of the surgeon who owns the practice where he was interning and is now employed.
Now that he's officially a junior member of the practice, he dumped me to move in with her. "
"What a fucking asshole," Vance said.
"Are you serious?" Charlie asked. Charlie was a sweetheart, but she was tough as hell in her own way. She looked pissed. "Which practice is it?"
I shook my head. "No, Charlie, no. He's a huge jerk, but we’re not going to do anything."
"Why not?" Vance asked. "He deserves some retribution. He's been taking advantage of you, now you find out he's been cheating on you, and you're just going to let him walk away?"
I was. I tried to explain. "I'm not going to do anything because if I do something, he's going to think it's because I'm so brokenhearted I can't live without him. I'm not going to give him the satisfaction."
"I can see that," Charlie said. "Still, I don't like letting him get away with this."
"He left his golf clubs," I offered. "I'm pretty sure he hasn't figured that out yet, and he's going to come back for them."
"What did you do?" Vance asked.
"I thought about throwing them away, but they're worth a lot of money and it seems like a waste. Did you know it was garbage day this morning? It turns out my garbage man is a golfer. Now he has a really nice set of custom-made golf clubs. He was very appreciative."
"I bet he was," Vance said, laughing. "Did he leave anything else? Anything we can light on fire?"
"No." I hit him lightly on the shoulder with my menu. "No," I said more seriously. "He was very thorough. I think he'd been quietly moving his stuff out for a while because when he left, he only had a duffel bag, but there's nothing of his in the house, and we'd been living together for two years."
As I said the words, tears flooded my eyes again. Two years. We’d lived together for two years and had been dating for four.
What had I been thinking?
How could I have stuck with him for so long, this man who could just walk out on me, cheat on me?
Why had I put up with him?
And what did it say about me that I was so upset he'd left?