Chapter 33 Sebastian
Sebastian
I threw myself back into the pillow with a frustrated sigh.
The words from the other night played on my mind on repeat.
It didn’t even seem like a fight. A disagreement was all it was.
But after spending the last two days without her, I had to concede that we’d had our first fight, and it wasn’t looking good for me.
I rolled over, trying to get even a few minutes of sleep before the sun rose, which in July was only about an hour away.
I must have nodded off at some point, the sound of my phone ringing jolting me awake. I frantically grabbed for it on my nightstand, ripping the charging cord out when I pulled it to me.
Not Lydia calling. It was Luke.
I answered it, my voice hoarse from being woken up. “Are you calling to yell at me?”
After everything, it turned out Luke was right. I wasn’t any good for Lydia. If he was calling to lay into me, I would let him.
“Open the door. I’ve got breakfast.”
He disconnected the call before I could say anything. At least if he was going to give me shit about my fight with Lydia, I was getting food out of the deal. Silver linings.
I stalked out to the front room in nothing but a pair of sweatpants I picked up off the floor. I opened the door to Luke standing on my front steps with a Downtown Diner to-go bag in hand. I hadn’t realized how hungry I was until the smell of the food hit me. My stomach growled.
“Hey,” I muttered, turning back to go to the kitchen to start a pot of coffee, scratching at my chest like a caveman. Luke followed me, closing the door behind him.
“Did I wake you up? It’s after 8:00 a.m.,” Luke said.
“I didn’t get to sleep until sometime after 4:00.” I looked back at him over my shoulder as I scooped the coffee grinds into the filter. Luke put the bag of food on the table and grabbed two forks from my drawer. “Have you talked to her yet?”
He nodded once. “I went by Reid’s last night. She’s still there. She didn’t really say much though. Thought I’d get the story from you.”
“What’s for breakfast?” I asked, changing the subject.
“Breakfast burritos. Eggs don’t generally travel well, so Sheila figured this was safer.”
I pulled two mugs from the cabinet and poured us each a cup of steaming hot coffee before the carafe had finished filling. It was scalding hot and too strong, but I didn’t care. I didn’t care about anything.
I dug into my burrito while Luke shoveled home fries into his mouth. We ate in comfortable silence for a few minutes. Had Lydia already had breakfast? Maybe I would save half of this for her in case she came back this morning.
“How’s Colt?” I asked. It had been a few days since I’d seen him. At three weeks old, he was still so small, but really damn cute.
Luke grinned like the proud father he was. “He’s great. Getting bigger every day. He’s definitely going to be a redhead like his mama.”
“Poor kid,” I joked with a laugh. Luke chuckled too. His smile slowly faded, and he ate the last bit of his burrito.
“So, you want to talk about it?” Luke asked.
“I don’t know, man.” I pushed myself back into the wooden dining room chair.
“We had a fight, I guess. She wanted to post something on my accounts that I didn’t agree with.
It was barely a fight. But next thing I know, she’s telling me I’m just like her fucking ex and walking out the door. Haven’t heard from her since.”
“Have you tried to reach out to her?”
I leveled a hard stare at him.
“Stupid question, okay.” He lifted his hands in front of him in surrender.
“I’ve called and texted. I don’t want to overdo it.
She already thinks I’m like that jackass; I don’t want to feed into it.
But I can’t just sit back and not try either.
” I drummed my fingers on the table, debating whether to say the next part or not.
“I may have driven by Reid’s house… a couple of times. ”
“Has she answered you at all?” Luke got up and took our biodegradable containers to the trash, putting the forks in the sink while he was up.
“Not once.”
“Okay.” He turned and leaned against the kitchen counter, crossing his arms over his chest. And here we go. I braced myself for the lecture that was about to come. “What exactly did you say to her?”
I told him about how Lydia wanted to post my recent financial success, specifically how I took SD Ink from near bankruptcy to thriving.
Luke’s arms dropped by his side. “Was it really that bad? Closing up entirely?” he whispered.
“Luke, I got a foreclosure notice on this house because I was so far in the hole. I couldn’t even buy you a round of beer—my account was negative.”
“I knew you were struggling, man, but if I had known how bad it was, I would have helped. We all would have.”
“That’s the point though. I didn’t want you to know.
Or Wyatt, Reid, or Wes. All three of them are running successful businesses.
Wyatt’s had to turn customers away. Reid’s getting more and more major renovation projects—he’s killing it.
Wes takes on multiple cases at a time. And you’re out there, saving the town from literal murderers.
I didn’t want any of you to know that I couldn’t keep a simple tattoo shop open.
I overextended my credit and found myself in a hole that I couldn’t get out of.
It was fucking humiliating. And Lydia wanted to post it on the internet for the world to see? I flipped.”
Luke watched me. He opened his mouth, then closed it without saying anything. When he scrubbed his hand over his jaw, I knew he had something on his mind.
“I didn’t lay a finger on her, so don’t even ask,” I told him.
“I know that,” he said without hesitation.
The weight on my chest lifted incrementally.
After being compared to her abusive ex, I was afraid he would think the worst. But Luke knew me better than almost anyone else.
He knew that I would never hurt her, but still, it made me glad to hear him say that.
“What, then?” I asked more harshly than I intended. “You want to say something.”
“It’s just, that doesn’t seem like a major fight. What am I missing?”
“I agree. It was an argument,” I huffed. “I told her she was crazy if she thought it was a good idea to post that, and I would never admit that it was ever that bad, even though it was.”
Luke tilted his head like a dog who just heard his favorite word, except instead of excitement, it was confusion on his face. “You told her she was crazy?”
“Not like that. I just meant…” I trailed off. Didn’t I though? Tell her she was crazy. “Fuck.”
“Okay. We can fix this. Call her again.”
Hope bloomed in my chest. I grabbed my phone and brought up my recent calls list. Lydia’s name was right at the top, just below Luke’s call from this morning. I hit Send and waited. It rang twice before being sent to voicemail.
“I’m going to go by Reid’s. She’ll have to talk to me if I show up in person.”
Luke agreed that it was the best move. He slapped me on the shoulder before he left, telling me to call him after I had a chance to talk to her. I showered quickly and threw on whatever was on my floor.
The drive to Reid and Claire’s house was hot and sticky, the July weather increasing the humidity in our already salty ocean air. I pulled into their driveway, parking behind Claire’s car, and got out. The door opened before I made it up the steps, Claire’s tall, willowy frame blocking the doorway.
“Morning, Claire. Is Lydia here?” I asked, even though I knew she was. Her car was parked right next to Claire’s in the driveway.
“She is.”
“Can I come in?” I asked slowly. “I’d like to talk to her.”
“No, Sebastian. You cannot.” She crinkled her nose like she didn’t like this. Leaning into me, she whispered, “She doesn’t want to talk to you. She keeps saying that she should have known better.” She shrugged. “Give her some time, okay?”
“It’s been two days, Claire. Come on. Can you just let me in? If I could talk to her, we could work this out.”
“No can do. Sorry.”
“Fuck. Fine. Just tell her I was here, please. Tell her to answer my calls or texts, anything. Please.” My voice sounded as desperate as I felt.
“I will. I promise.”
“Thanks, Claire.” I got back in my car and headed over to the shop. I was a little earlier than I needed to be, but I couldn’t go home. Not to stare at the empty spot on the couch where Lydia should be or her favorite coffee mug sitting in the cabinet waiting for her.
I needed to fix this, but I didn’t know how.
If I came on too strong, demanding she talk to me and not respecting her wishes, I would be exactly the person she was claiming I was.
But doing nothing but waiting for her to realize that wasn’t the case was eating me alive.
What if she thought I wasn’t willing to fight for her?
For us? Wouldn’t that be worse or at least just as bad?
I spent the majority of my day in a haze. I knew I talked and engaged with my clients. I knew I smiled and laughed, making sure they were comfortable in my chair. But in reality, it felt like a charade as I just tried to get through the day.
“Is everything alright?” Mallory asked after the last scheduled client of the day left. Closing time wasn’t for another hour, but I had booked a four-hour session to end the day, and the client had to tap out after three. That was fine with me. I was happy to close up a little early anyway.
“Yeah. Sorry if I’ve been a grouch today,” I said.
“Oh, you haven’t been grouchy. You just seem, I don’t know… sad, I guess.”
Great.
“You can take off early, Mallory. I’m going to close up and then head out myself.”
Luke offered to go out with me tonight after work to grab a drink. I told him that I was fine, that he should stay home with his lady and newborn son, but he insisted. Secretly, I was pretty glad for it.
I texted him that I was heading to Harpoon’s, and he met me there a few minutes later.
The place was crowded and rowdy. Tourists had infiltrated the town in the past few weeks, and it looked like many of them had found their way to Harpoon’s. Luckily, I spotted two chairs at the bar, and we snagged them before anyone else could.
Ronnie nodded at our arrival on her way past. In the mayhem, she somehow managed to pour us each our regulars, a Jameson neat for Luke and a tall draft IPA for me.
“Thanks, beautiful,” I said. It didn’t mean anything to either of us when I talked like that. I had been calling Ronnie “beautiful” since I started coming here. She usually dropped one impressive eyebrow in mock skepticism. It was kind of our thing.
Tonight, she stopped what she was doing, turning back to me. “What’s wrong?”
“He and Lydia broke up,” Luke supplied.
My entire body immediately revolted at that idea. “We’re having a fight,” I countered.
“She won’t talk to you,” Luke added.
“She won’t talk to you either.” We were starting to sound like third graders. I could hear it as it came out of my mouth, but I couldn’t stop it.
He looked at Ronnie and shrugged with a nod. “That’s true.”
“Well, good luck with that.” She raised her brows at me, turning back to Luke. “And I hear congratulations are in order. Where are the pics? I want to see this kid.”
Luke broke out his phone, and Ronnie made the line of customers wait while she and Luke cooed at photos of Colton. Even in my miserable state, I got it. He was a cute kid.
“What are you going to do next?” Luke asked after Ronnie had walked away to deal with the growingly impatient crowd.
“I have no idea, man. I can’t believe you’re not jumping down my throat for hurting her like you said I would,” I told him.
“I know you didn’t mean to. Lydia’s guard is up after last time. I think she blames herself for getting into that situation or for staying after she started to see the red flags. She doesn’t want to make the same mistake, and she’s overcorrecting with you,” Luke said.
“Well, wasn’t that fucking insightful.” My lips tipped up in a quick smirk.
“Besides, I can’t kick a man while he’s down,” he added, clapping me on the back as he took a swig of his drink.
I buried my head in my hands. I thought I had almost lost everything before.
My business, my house, my pride… now I knew how stupid that was.
Because it wasn’t until I lost Lydia that I realized how trivial all the rest was.
They were just things. I could find another job, another roof over my head.
I couldn’t find another Lydia Wilder. Not in a million years.