27. Cassie
CASSIE
“You never did tell me what your type was.”
Tor glances up from the plate of eggs, sausage, and pineapple slices I made him for breakfast. “You sure? I feel like I did.”
I shake my head. “Nope. I specifically asked because I wanted to know, and then you didn’t answer me.”
He smirks. “Is it driving you crazy?”
“A little.”
“Why? You’re my type.”
“But why? Tell me what qualities you look for in a woman. This is a standard question. I should have known this before we even started having sex. This is an early dating question.”
“To make sure you’re compatible. We already know we are.”
“Tor. Oh my god. Just tell me what your type is.”
His smirk grows, and he shakes his head, enjoying tormenting me for some reason. “I don’t have a lengthy checklist of what I look for in a woman. Someone loyal and loving with a good heart, but other than that, I’m pretty flexible.”
“You don’t have a physical type?”
“Brunettes,” he says, but I shoot him a look. I think he’s only saying it because I have dark hair.
“You’re impossible,” I tell him, shaking my head as I stab some scrambled eggs.
“Why are you so hung up on this?”
“I’m not hung up on it. I’m just curious. You and I obviously got thrown together in a weird way. I guess I just want to know… if I’m someone you would have picked.”
He cocks an eyebrow as he takes a drink of his orange juice. “Trust me,” he says, setting the glass down on the table. “I picked you.”
Before I can pester him further, I’m surprised by a knock on the apartment door.
Tor stands, holding up a hand. “Stay here,” he tells me. “I think that’s my mom.”
My eyes widen. “Your mom’s at my apartment?”
“She’s not coming in. She’s just dropping something off. I told her to bring it here since I’m not at the lake house.”
The knowledge of her proximity is enough to make me nervous.
I keep my back to the door in case she steps inside so we don’t make awkward eye contact. I don’t know what to do with myself.
I know Tor wants me to meet her eventually, and I know it’s important to him that we get along, so I don’t want to get off on the wrong foot, but I also really, really don’t want to face her. I haven’t even had a chance to prepare myself.
The door opens, and I hold my breath for what comes next.
“Hi, honey,” she says, and my stomach drops.
“Hey, Mom.” I hear movement, then he says, “Thanks. I don’t have time to go to the house to get ready, so…”
“Is she coming—?”
“No,” he says, and it’s clear by his tone he doesn’t want to talk about it. “But I’ll see you in a bit, okay? Thanks for dropping this off.”
“Of course.” She hesitates, then says, “I’ll see you soon.”
Another bit of movement, then the door closes.
My heart is beating out of my chest. I turn in my seat, and Tor comes into view, holding a garment bag.
“What’s that?”
“My suit.” When I don’t immediately register understanding, he says, “For the funeral.”
“Oh. Oh yeah. That makes sense.”
“I don’t have time to go home, so I thought I’d change here.”
“Right,” I say, trying to catch my racing heart. I didn’t think I would see him in his funeral outfit, but I don’t even know what time the funeral is. “Um, are you finishing breakfast, or…?”
“Yeah. Just let me hang this up first.”
“Does she know I’m here?” I call as he walks into my bathroom. “Was I the ‘she’ specifically, or does she just know you’re with a girl?”
His lips tug up faintly as he comes back to the kitchen area. “They know we’re together, Cassie. She was asking about you.”
That makes me anxious, but I don’t know why. Surely, she didn’t want me there.
I’m not hungry anymore, but my plate was almost empty anyway, so I take a few more bites while Tor finishes eating, then I clear the table.
He heads to the bathroom so he can change into his funeral attire, and when he comes back out, my breath catches at the sight of him.
I’ve seen the twins at homecoming and prom, so I knew he’d look exceptionally handsome in a suit, but this one is black on black—the suit and the shirt underneath, even the tie is black. It lends a darker air to him.
It suits him.
It may be in poor taste to tell him he should wear this in the bedroom later, so I don’t mention it. Instead, I do the supportive girlfriend thing and straighten the knot in his tie.
“Do you need anything from me today?” I ask, looking at his tie instead of his face. “I’m not sure how to navigate this.”
“There is definitely not an established way to navigate this,” he says.
“I’m probably gonna be tied up for the rest of the day.
Obviously, we have family in from out of town, so once the funeral is over, I’ll likely be visiting with people.
I might even stay at the house tonight. We’ll see how my mom is doing. ”
“I wish I could turn invisible. Then maybe I could go with you. Only you’d know I was there, so I could hang out with you, but no one else.”
He smiles, leaning in to give me a kiss. “I appreciate it.”
___
Since I have the rest of the day to myself, I decide to unpack.
That does not take me all day, so I find myself sitting on the couch, trying to focus on a book I plucked off my newly fuller shelves.
It’s impossible.
I’ve managed to avoid checking social media as much as possible, knowing that I would end up seeing stuff I probably don’t want to see, but knowing my boyfriend is at his brother’s funeral without me—and with a bunch of people who hate me—has me tempted to open it.
I resist the urge and decide to run to the store instead.
Tor bought me so much of what I needed for my new apartment, but between then and now, I started a list of small things I didn’t think of during that trip. I don’t have a ton of money, but I can buy a few of the things I still need.
As I’m driving through town, I run into what I’m forced to acknowledge was probably the real reason I wanted to come out.
I wanted to see the turnout.
And boy, is there a turnout.
I’ve never seen the funeral home so busy.
The parking lot can’t accommodate so many people, so they’re filling the dentist’s office across the street.
The funeral home sits at the corner of Main Street and Chestnut, and both streets have cars parked along the sides of the road as far as I can see.
A massive truck is parked on the lawn in front of the funeral home with a homemade banner reading, “We’ll never forget you.
” A bunch of cars have “I am 87” or “Fly high 87” painted on the back windshields and side windows.
Nearby businesses that usually don’t have full parking lots, so I’m sure there’s overflow parking there, too.
I sigh, looking away as I drive past.
I knew it would be like that. It’s no surprise that, in death, he’s treated as a hometown hero rather than what he really was.
It’s just still disappointing.
If it were my funeral, there’d be far fewer people—and far more snide comments made about me.
My curiosity compelled me to check, but now I know, so I try to put it out of my mind. I stop at the store to pick up a few things, then head back to my apartment so I don’t risk running into anyone.
___
The rest of my night is pretty calm.
I don’t hear from Tor, but I didn’t expect to. I know he had family stuff all day.
Still, I find myself missing him a little.
When I go to bed alone, I try not to think about it, but I wish he was lying in bed next to me.
When I wake up alone, I’m a little disappointed that he didn’t show up in the middle of the night.
It’s early enough in this relationship that it occurs to me that might be a little alarming. The way I miss Tor when he’s away from me seems more intense today than yesterday, and I wonder if it will be even more intense tomorrow.
I didn’t feel that way when I was dating Russell. Sure, I liked spending time with him and thought about him when he wasn’t around, but it didn’t feel like this. It wasn’t even close.
With Tor, it almost feels like a need. I don’t want him with me. I need him with me, and that’s… unsettling.
I work a short shift at the chicken shack today, just a quick 11-3 to help out with lunch. Shaley doesn’t get there until four, so I miss her altogether, unfortunately.
It’s Friday night, though, and that means the dreaded vigil at the football field.
I’m tempted to come back to work just so I can be around the only people in town who seem to be on my side, but I know Friday nights tend to be busy, so they won’t have time to visit. I wish Denise had scheduled me to work tonight.
I don’t torture myself driving by the high school tonight to see the turnout.
Instead, I microwave a bag of popcorn and watch a movie.
When it’s over, I pull out my laptop and do a little research on Boston.
I didn’t ask Tor which school he’s going to, and there are too many in that city to be sure, so I don’t know which area I should be looking at.
Mainly, I think I’m just looking to see if there’s anything for me in the city, anything that would attract me if it wasn’t where Tor was going.
I take a nice hot shower, then I organize the laundry I’ll need to do tomorrow. Finally, I curl up and read a little, determined not to think about what’s happening on the football field.
____
My ambitions were too lofty, it turns out.
I fail mission “don’t think about it” after a single chapter that takes far too long to get through because my mind keeps drifting where it shouldn’t.
At this point, I tell myself it’s better to just look.
I set my book aside and grab my phone. There’s only one thing I really need to see, and that’s how Tor is handling this. My feelings are mixed. I care for him now, so I don’t want him to be in pain, but I also expect I’ll feel some type of way if he seems too sad.
“This is a no-win situation,” I tell myself as I look up his username, anyway.
I should probably start following him, but obviously not right now. He’ll know I’m creeping on his profile.
When I find it, I see Tor hasn’t posted anything anyway.
Yesterday, presumably after the funeral, he posted a black-and-white picture of himself and his brother at the lake house one summer, when they were a couple of years younger.
Maybe the first summer they spent there alone.
In the picture, Tim laughs at something while Tor smiles.
It’s a good picture.
My lips tug down slightly, a heaviness weighing on me, but I don’t try to name it.
I check the caption, but he didn’t leave one. No hashtags either, just thousands of supportive heart responses and hundreds of comments.
I don’t read any of them. Instead, I navigate over to the tagged pictures column to see if maybe someone tagged him in a picture tonight.
The first picture I see makes my nose wrinkle up.
Nina posted it. She’s on the football field, her long dark hair pulled up in a low, messy bun, wearing Tim’s jersey.
The shot is from behind, so WALTERS 87 is the main focus, but she’s not alone in the picture.
She’s standing on tiptoe with her arms wrapped around Tim’s neck, holding him close.
His arms are wrapped around her waist, her body pulled against his.
My processing of the picture halts suddenly when I realize that doesn’t make sense. She’s wearing one of those heinous blue armbands. And she’s not alone. People in the background are wearing them, too.
In person, I can tell the twins apart, but still images are harder. My initial thought was that it was her and Tim embracing because it had to be.
But it can’t be.
The armbands weren’t a thing when Tim was alive.
Which means that’s not Tim Walters.
It’s Tor Walters whose arms are locked around Nina’s waist.