Chapter 39
39
Bryce - 32 years old
I usually enjoy nights like these. Birdie is starting to have sleepovers at her best friend Jacinta’s place. Ever since Nick waltzed back into our lives, every time she’s away, the three of us are able to have nights where we can enjoy ourselves as adults. Tonight, however…I’m not looking forward to anything. Not a single fucking thing. My mind is elsewhere. On a certain woman with a sleek bob haircut. By the way Lily and Nick are glancing at each other like they have a secret up their sleeve, my intuition is telling me I’m about to be served an intervention on a platter.
“Spit it out,” I say to them, unable to sit in awkward silence and engage in weird small talk any longer.
“What do you mean?” Lily asks, as if she’s not trying to fish more information out of me. I would buy it, but her eyes give her away.
“Whatever it is the two of you want to say to me about Haruki popping by last night, say it. Stop staring at each other and waiting for the other one to start.”
“I can’t believe you’re fucking married, man,” Nick says as he takes a bite from his falafel. “Congrats and sorry it didn’t work out, I guess.”
“There we go,” I say, before turning my head to my sister. “Lil, you got anything to add?”
Unlike Nick, who’s taking this conversation more light-heartedly, Lily just looks at me, observing me, trying to figure me out. Maybe she’s replaying old memories. Who the fuck knows. She finally breaks her silence. “Have you talked to her since last night?”
“Nope.”
“I didn’t know you were still married,” she says. “You told me it was over years ago. After your trip to Elsham Cove.”
Nick shifts so that he’s facing me. “When did you go to Elsham Cove?”
Before I can get a word in, Lily does it for me, and I don’t miss the way Nick’s body stiffens at her answer. “Five years ago. Bryce went back to visit Arthur in Elsham Cove. He left Berlin happy and came back all fucking broody. Then he told me that not only was he married, but it was all over already. He also told me he cut off contact with Cameron.” Instead of focusing on his girlfriend, now Nick is stealing glances at me. The gears in his brain must be turning. “Look, Bryce, I don’t know what happened during that trip exactly, but whatever it is, can you undo it? You’re clearly still hung up on her.”
“I’m not hung up on her, Lil.” I roll my eyes. “I was young, and we shouldn’t have gotten married in the first place.” Lie. Lie . Lie. You wouldn’t have done what you did if you were really over her, Bryce.
Now it’s her who rolls her eyes. “Then why haven’t you been in a relationship worth mentioning since Haruki?”
“Not everyone has to end up with the one that got away, alright? Not everyone is like the both of you.” The words feel wrong leaving my mouth, like I’m betraying myself. But it’s the truth. Haruki and I…we can’t be salvaged. Maybe . I fucked up at every turn. Maybe not.
“Then riddle me this,” she says, not giving up. “If you’re not still hung up on her, why the hell are you guys still married?”
“I never signed the divorce papers.” It feels freeing to finally admit the truth about what a pathetic, psychotic idiot I am. “I told Arthur and he went batshit, telling his lawyer to put outrageous stipulations. Haruki’s dad retaliated and it went on for three years. After that…” I pause, taking inventory of the two of them with their mouths hanging open. “I don’t know. I never signed the papers.”
Nick
You still up?
Yeah.
Nick
Can I go to your place?
The guy was clearly texting me from the hallway, because not even five seconds after he sent the last text, he was already knocking on my door. I chuckle to myself before standing up, leaving my couch and walking over to let him in, bracing myself for whatever he’s about to say. He’s figured it out.
“Where is Lily?” I ask, staring into the hazel eyes that are filled with determination.
“Asleep.”
“Do you want one?” I lift the tumbler filled with scotch upward.
He shakes his head. “I, uh, I’m sober now, remember? But you go ahead.”
I tilt my head to the side. Now that I think about it, I really haven’t seen him drink anything since he moved here three months ago. I always chalked it up to him being respectful of Lily and not drinking in front of her since she’s a teetotaler now.
“For how long?”
“I overdid it when I came to Berlin last year for my interview.” His lips tug upward as he rests his hand on the nape of his neck. “That was a wild trip. I needed some liquid courage for a lot of the conversations that took place that week.”
“I remember.” I smile at him.
“But before that, I was actually kind of California sober.” Nick is drawing out his words, trying to gauge my reaction. I play dumb as I take a sip of my drink and look him straight in the eye. “When my mom got diagnosed with ALS, I didn’t take it too well. One thing led to another and before I knew what to make of it, I woke up in a hospital room one day.”
“I see,” I say, still acting like I’m clueless about all of this. “Does Lily know about this?”
“Yep. I told her the second I landed back in Radinger after my trip the first time around. I wanted to tell her on the last night, but Birdie ran away. I didn’t want to restart me and her with a secret that fucking big looming over us.”
I give him a nod, unsure of what I’m supposed to say next.
“The question is, Bryce, does she know you know?”
“Don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Why aren’t you friends with Cameron anymore?” Nick asks the question with a knowing look.
“You know why.” I’m not sure he can hear my answer. My voice is so low, even I can’t hear myself clearly.
“What does that have to do with your weird-as-fuck marriage? Lily’s story might not have been yours to tell, but this one sure is. I’m all ears, man, so give me your best shot.”
The scotch is definitely helping, but mostly it’s the years of not giving anybody the full picture, only offering glimpses of what I think they deserve to hear. I’m so fucking tired of everything. Of keeping everything to myself. So, in the here and now, in my apartment, I start pouring my heart out to Nicholas Johnson, sharing with him my life story as if he’s about to write a goddamn biography about me. I start with the day Haruki and I met, all the way through the last night I ever set foot on US soil, not missing his jaw clenching when he realized how I brought Logan into our lives.
When I have nothing left to say and the alcohol courage is gone, I make my way to my kitchen island to pour another one, my eyes still on Nick, making sure he doesn’t die of a heart attack or sock me in the eye. I’d deserve it.
He opens my fridge and takes out a bottle of Coke. “Dude, stop guilt-tripping yourself for Lily and me. And what the hell, Bryce? I’m not sure which one runs deeper—your hero complex or woe-is-me attitude.” He chuckles as he shakes his head. “You got issues. Loads of them.”
“I’m not guilt-tripping myself, you asshole. I do feel bad for what happened to Lily. To you.”
“And you have more than made up for it, Bryce. You might not be a stepfather, but you became the father who stepped up for Birdie,” Nick says unironically . And when he says things like that, it makes my professional self petrified that this is the guy who’s representing our company as the team lead for our E-sports innovation department. But there is a reason that Nick works as a software developer and not in sales.
“You’re not angry with me?” I ask, swallowing down my fear for next month’s meeting when Nick will have to present our new product to the board.
Nick takes a sip of his Coke and sits on one of the stools circling the kitchen island. “Look, Lily and I were so shit at communicating back then—she knows this, I know this—we wouldn’t have made it past high school at the rate we were going. And Logan…” Nick’s expression changes once that name leaves his lips. If eyes are the windows to a person’s soul, I’d say he’s having a war inside himself. “Logan is just Logan, Bryce. The dude was an asshole. You introduced him to Cameron. You introduced me to Cameron. So what? If anyone was the bad apple, it would have been me and Logan, not you. No one forced us to do anything we didn’t want to,” he says with a shrug.
My body feels lighter hearing what Nick has to say.
He must realize that I am too stunned to even speak, so Nick slaps my shoulder before standing up. “I have to get back to Lily. I fucking miss her already.” His ridiculous comment causes us both to smirk with an additional head shake on my end. He opens the front door, but not before saying something that will, for sure, make me lose sleep tonight. “I’m saying this to you because I think of you as my brother. You can fucking deny it all you want, but I know you got me the job at XIORI, Bryce. The HR lady told me you told her to check me out. You’ve been spending all these years trying to make it up to me and Lily, but the only person you should be trying to make it up to is your goddamn wife. Get out of your own fucking head. Stop with the I’m not good for her so I’m going to let her go and keep my distance crap. If you still want her, work for it.” Before he goes to the hallway, Nick turns to me one last time and cracks a smile. “Consider this talk my repayment. We’re even, Bryce. If it’s forgiveness you fucking need, water under the bridge and all that.”