Chapter 22
Jamison
“Can I talk to you for a minute?” June took hold of Sadie’s elbow and didn’t wait for a response before pulling her toward the water.
The waitstaff were cleaning up the tent, folding the chairs and clearing off the table.
Derrik had wandered off for the night-club with a group of Mike and June’s friends that had made the trip for their wedding.
It had gotten significantly quieter after they left.
Our sets of parents had called it a night.
Mom and Uncle Bill lingered in their goodbye’s to me and Mike, both of them clearly needing to talk about Dad.
Remembering him throughout the night had left me feeling both comforted and at the edge of my emotions.
It would be a relief to go to my room and hold Sadie.
Let the beat of her heart be the rhythm to quiet the thunderous noises in my mind.
Keeping up the pretense that we were nearly strangers and not at the beginning stages of a relationship was a challenge.
One I failed at in the moments I was sure we wouldn’t be noticed.
I overheard Sadie say, “I’m sorry I was late—” and June’s interruption, “I could not give a shit right now,” as they rushed past me and out of the tent.
At my side, Mike considered me out of the corner of his eye.
“What’s going on?” I asked.
He sighed. “You tell me.”
Shit. I didn’t know how they knew, but they did.
I had very few options. After a brief assessment of them, I decided on honesty. “It’s not as bad as it looks.”
“Jesus, Gene, my sister-in-law.” The corners of his mouth turned down and his upper lip curled. “It looks pretty fucking bad.”
His disgust was too heavy to bear, and my head wanted to fall, but my pride wouldn’t allow it. Even so, heat crawled up my neck as I stood to my full height. “It’s not like that.”
He snatched up a wooden chair and folded it with more force than was necessary before grabbing another.
“Even if everything is casual between you two and you have an understanding, is it going to stay that way in the future? When this gets messy are you two going to be cool for birthdays and baby showers?”
“Why would you assume it’s going to go to shit?” I demanded, but he couldn’t hear me from his high horse.
Moving with quick agitated gestures, he piled one chair on top of another.
It wasn’t technically his job but the resort employees gave him a wide berth, understanding that he needed to do anything but look at me.
“I warned you about the guy she was seeing and how he strung her along. She puts on a brave face, but what she really wants is something real, and we both know she’s not going to get that from you. ”
“You don’t know what’s going on.” My hands fisted at my sides resisting the urge to shove him in the shoulder—some leftover impulse from our childhood. It had been a long time since one of our arguments had come to blows, but he was pushing his luck. “We have met before.”
He set a stack of chairs on the trolley with a bit too much force. Crossing his arms over his chest, he scowled in my direction. “Then why didn’t you say something?”
“She didn’t want to.”
He rolled his eyes so hard, his entire head rocked. “So, you hooked up with her before.”
“It really isn’t your business.”
“Generally, I would agree”—with a finger pointed toward my chest, he took a step closer—”except you’re bringing your bullshit into my wedding.”
I rocked back on my heels, not knowing what to say to that. There was no denying that he had a point, but Sadie and I weren’t the ones making a big deal of everything.
“I know I give you hard time about your casual hookups, but I don’t actually care about it.” Flicking the top button of his shirt open, he pulled the collar away from his neck as if he was suddenly suffocating. “Until this time.”
A couple of the waitstaff lingered by the opening of the tent, eavesdropping on the two arguments happening, ours inside and the sister’s about ten feet from the entrance. For the most part, I couldn’t hear much of what was being said on the beach just a word here or there.
“You can loosen up. It’s going to be fine.” I meant for it to come out more confident, more comforting, but as usual there was a shittiness to my tone, and I just sounded like an asshole.
“You’re right,” he sneered, “it’s probably love.”
My mouth flattened, and I narrowed my eyes, holding his gaze.
He glared back initially until understanding began to dawn on his face—a slow widening of his eyes, the muscles around his mouth loosened. “Bullshit.”
It was my turn to fix him with a disgusted look. “What the fuck, Mike?”
He gestured in my direction. “You?”
The space between our noses closed to less than a foot as I leaned forward, but he didn’t back down.
Heaving out a deep breath, I paced a few feet away.
Normally, he was the more level-headed between the two of us—the peacekeeper—but obviously it had to be me to keep a tight grasp on my temper this time.
Letting the anger loose made too much room for hurt to take root in my chest.
“Yes, me.” I ran a hand through my hair, gripping the back of my neck.
“You cannot keep making her think that.”
“What does that mean?”
Studying me, he shook his head. “You know how you always intend to be clear about being casual and all that?”
I nodded, a sickening feeling twisting my guts. “Yeah.”
“I don’t know if you were as clear as you meant to be.”
For some reason, I thought back to seeing Sadie in the lobby a few days ago, and the confusing rage she’d felt toward me. My stomach dropped, even as I denied there could be truth to what he had said.
All of my thoughts came to a screeching halt as confusion took over.
But before I could ask what the hell that was supposed to mean, June’s agitated voice carried through the tent opening. “I cannot believe you’re doing this!”
Mike closed his eyes, his shoulders dropped, and we both moved out onto the beach.
June had paced a path into the sand. While Sadie was twisting her toes deeper and deeper as if she were trying to bury herself.
“When does this pattern end? I even told you that he was just like Fuckboy Lawyer”—June cut herself off, slapping a hand to her mouth—”it’s him, isn’t it?”
Chewing her lower lip, Sadie didn’t answer.
“Ohmygod! No! He’s an environmental lawyer in and out of Chicago, and he’s all tall and brown eyed and exactly your fucking type. No. Sadie, tell me he’s not . . . ”
She squeezed her eyes tight hanging her head.
“Gene is Fuckboy Lawyer?!” June exclaimed.
I turned to Mike. “What’s Fuckboy Lawyer?”
He rubbed his fingers across his eyebrow. “You.”
My chest tightened as I struggled with the feeling that I was the last to know something. Something vitally important. “What do you mean?”
“You’re the guy. The one that’s been messing her up. Breaking her heart, stringing her along.”
“No, that’s not right. There was another guy.”
For the first time since the night began something like sympathy softened his features. “It was you.”
My mouth went dry as the blood drained from my face.
Images of Sadie flashed in my mind, her scowl at seeing me, the tears in her eyes before disappearing into her room after our dance lesson, her wringing her fingers as she brought up wanting something meaningful.
Every time her eyes burned a little too bright as she looked up at me making me feel like my chest wasn’t big enough to contain the tenderness building there.
Every time I left her bed to retreat from that feeling.
Every time I consoled myself that she couldn’t feel anything real for me because I had been clear and upfront from the very beginning—ignoring how my own reactions to her had grown unclear.
She’d picked up on all of it.
And when she’d built up the courage to ask for more.
And I believed that she couldn’t be searching for anything meaningful with me, because I would only let her down. I couldn’t fulfill her needs.
As the layers of my ignorance peeled away, it was clear that I’d been right all along.
I wasn’t enough.