Chapter 49
Mama and Daddy got their first official divorce last month. I should have been prepared, but it always hurts when somebody leaves for good.
Daddy had been drinking a lot, and Mama and I held an intervention with Uncle Benji to convince Daddy to go to rehab.
This is his second try—he went once when I was a baby, but it didn’t stick.
This one didn’t either. He quit after just two weeks at Hills for Health and was back home and running The Cowherd like always.
And like always, Mama woke me up and brought me to the bar with her so together we could get him out to the car and drag his drunk ass home.
Mama claims her eyes are getting worse now that she’s a mother of four, and she can’t be bothered to read on her own anymore.
She says I will be her eyes and her voice from now on.
And her ears—she sends me to snoop on Daddy at The Cowherd at least twice a week.
She wants to know before anyone else who he’s seeing so she won’t be caught off-guard when some big mouth like Billie Wells stops her on the street and says that she heard Benjamin Henwood is seeing a hot young blond chick.
I read Emma to her, and as much as I loved it, having Mama hovering over my shoulder and exclaiming over every single paragraph got tiresome.
So when I got the chicken pox, the best part was I got to read Northanger Abbey by myself because Mama can’t stand to be around the ill.
Or the downtrodden. She’s too downtrodden herself to have much patience for others in that state.
I was in bed reading when Logan brought my homework by.
He sat on the bed with me, leaned back, and put his arms behind his head.
Even though he didn’t say it, I knew he didn’t want to stay around his house and watch his daddy and uncle have yet another fight about the farm while his mother snuck into the pantry to drink her wine.
Logan took my book out of my hands and closed it. He said I needed real human company instead of fictional characters.
“Real life isn’t like a book, Mace. You can’t control people the way an author can control the characters in her stories.”
“You think I don’t know that? Look at my parents—I can’t get them to do anything I want.”
Logan fumbled with the book in his hand and suddenly asked me if I’d be well enough to go to Dave’s party next Friday night.
“I really want you to come,” he whispered before he ran out.
My chicken pox cleared up, and Dave’s parents were out of town, so Ginny and I walked over together.
We played spin the bottle for the first time. When Logan spun, he got Amy Alder—three times. He never spun me once. Afterward, he pulled my ponytail and asked me if I wished it had been me. I stuck my tongue out at him and walked away.
But the following week, Dave had another party, except this time we didn’t have a bottle, so we used a stick, shut our eyes, and pointed in a direction.
This made it seem a little more contrived—I mean, all of us knew where everybody was sitting, so they could certainly point in a general direction.
Logan pointed the stick at me. My legs went weak, and my heart raced because I didn’t know how to kiss, and I didn’t know what he’d try to do. He and Amy had definitely used their tongues.
When we reached each other in the center of the circle, we were both on our hands and knees, and everyone was clapping. I was so embarrassed I felt as hot as the sun must. But Logan seemed cool as ever, and he just leaned in and kissed me—his lips to mine. No tongue, though. And then, it was over.
“Y’all are chickens!” Dave called out. “What’s wrong with y’all?”
Logan was already backpedaling to his seat. But I grabbed him afterward, and while everyone was walking ahead, I asked him why.
“Why what?” he asked me.
“Why no tongue?”
“Did you want that?” He looked surprised.
I furrowed my eyebrows. “What does that matter? The tongue was what we’re supposed to do.”
He reached over and brushed a stray hair off my face. “You seemed nervous. Were you?”
“It’s kind of a stupid game,” I said. “Everyone watches you.”
“I agree.”
“But you and Amy…”
“I couldn’t give a rat’s ass about Amy Alder,” he said.
“Oh.” I stared at him, trying to decipher his unreadable face.
“Look,” he said. “Anytime you want to kiss me in private, I’m there. Your call.”
I slam the diary shut just as Logan’s familiar Chevy truck pulls into the auto shop from the back alley.
“Hey!” I call out to him before he sees who it is.
Logan squints in his rearview mirror, checking the facts before he has to respond.
He’s been doing more of that these days.
Ever since he got back from his painting trip.
Really, I should call it his engagement trip.
I doubt he got much painting done with all of his gallivanting up to New York City and buying a diamond to woo Gigi.
“Hey.”
Logan jumps out of the truck and walks over to me. His restlessness is palpable as I watch him consciously suck in a breath like he’s trying to stay calm.
He glances down at the diary in my hands. “You writing?”
I shove the diary into my purse. “No.”
And here we are being awkward again.
I go for a joke. “How are you feeling going up against Ginny and Dave in the contest? I personally think you’re gonna lose the Darcy title to Dave in a landslide.”
Logan’s eyes crinkle in amusement. “I didn’t realize you cared so much about the contest.”
The shadow behind his eyes tells me he’s hiding something, but I can’t figure him out. I’ve always been able to read Logan, and having no clue what’s going on with him these days is disconcerting. My face burns from more than the sun beating down on it.
But this is the moment I came here for, and I can’t keep putting it off.
“I just…here.” I reach into my purse and pull out the divorce papers.
Logan stares at me as he takes the papers out of my hand. He looks down at them and goes to flip through the pages, but I say, “All signed. Don’t worry.”
He swallows hard and raises his head until our eyes lock. His look so…sad.
But all he says is, “Great. Thanks, Macey. I’ll file them right away.”
“Good.” I hesitate and then take off my ruby ring and hand it to him. “And this is for you as well.”
Logan looks down at the ring sitting in his open hand. “This is yours.” He tries to push it back to me. “It was a gift.”
But I bat his hand away. “You gave me your bull ring back. And I can’t keep this. Not anymore.”
His jaw tightens. “Why not?”
“It’s just not right.” I fight back the emotion. “And you know it, too. I married you with that ring on my finger, and I”—I bite my lip and then blurt out—“you know as well as I do what the ring means, Logan. What it stands for.”
He shifts uncomfortably from one foot to the other and puts his hands in his pockets. The ring disappears with them, and I almost cry out at the idea of never seeing it again.
He mutters something about no longer being in the mood to see Reid, and then he turns on his heel and opens his truck door. He steps into the cab and shuts the door behind him.
I watch his actions like it’s a slow motion movie—that truck we’ve gotten “stuck” in so many times, that back seat I lost my virginity in…
I sigh and touch my hand to my chest. I’m sweaty all of a sudden. I look up to see Logan staring at me out of his open window. I look back at him for a long moment, remembering every single time we’ve ever made love. And I know he’s remembering, too.
But then, he peels into reverse, backs out of the parking lot, and he’s gone.