Chapter 27
TWENTY SEVEN
“NO, HELEN, I swear I’m fine,” I insist into the phone, pacing the length of Matthew’s quiet guest room.
I catch my reflection in the full-length mirror. Still pale. Still drowning in this ridiculously large tracksuit. But upright.
Mostly.
“Ay, Ames, pero you never take a day off!” Helen’s voice crackles with concern. “It’s that dinner with James, isn’t it? He’s the reason. Estúpido!”
I stop pacing and sink onto the edge of the bed. “The dinner wasn’t great, no…” The understatement feels massive.
“I knew it!!” Helen shouts.
I roll my eyes.
“Tell me at least it’s finally over,” she pleads, her tone softening with hope.
Over?
If only it were that simple.
“Well…” I hesitate, pinching the bridge of my nose. “As over as it can be. Soon hopefully. Very soon.”
“Soon? Qué soon? Ames, what does that mean?” Her concern sharpens again. “Where are you anyway?”
I drop my head back, staring up at the unfamiliar ceiling, exhaustion pressing down again. “Can we please talk about this later? I really, really don’t want to think about James today.” I squeeze my eyes shut.
Just saying his name makes my stomach flip.
“Okay, okay, mija,” she says, softening slightly. “No James today. Fine. So, what are you doing then? Resting? Hiding from him?”
“Resting.” I seize on the word. “Yes. Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Just resting.” The lie feels flimsy, but it’s all I have.
“Pero James is there,” she says, her disgust evident. “How can you rest with him stomping around? Stop by the café. I’ll give you the keys to my place. You can rest there. Peace and quiet. Nobody will bother you.”
Her immediate offer, her unquestioning generosity, makes my throat tighten. “You’re so kind, Helen, honestly,” I say, my voice thick. “But don’t worry. James isn’t home.” The lie slips out easier this time, bolstered by grim certainty.
If I had to bet my last dollar on anything right now, it’d be that.
“He’s not home?” Helen sounds instantly suspicious. “It’s Saturday morning. Why the hell isn’t he at home?”
I drop back fully onto the soft duvet, throwing an arm over my eyes in exasperation. “Helen, please. How should I know? Enough questions for now. I just… I really need to go. I’ll see you tomorrow, okay?” My voice trembles slightly with weariness.
Silence stretches on the line. “You sure you’re okay, Ames?” she asks finally, her tone still skeptical, but a little resigned.
“Yes, yes. I promise.” I try to inject some lightness into my tone. “Just need to unplug today. Seriously. Everything’s fine. I’ll see you tomorrow, bright and early?” I hold my breath, hoping this is enough.
Another pause, then a sigh crackles through the line. “Bueno, mija. Don’t worry about anything here. Lou’s already on petition duty and I’ll hold the fort. You rest. But you call me if you need anything, entiendes?”
“Thank you, Helen, really.” Relief, heavy and sweet, rushes through me. “Bye.”
The line clicks dead. I drop the phone onto the duvet; it feels heavy as a brick. I keep my arm draped over my eyes.
Blessed darkness…
The sudden silence of the guest room presses in, amplifying the lingering buzz of Helen’s worried energy in my ears.
“And this is exactly why I was saying no Maddy’s Place today.”
I jolt upright, arm falling away, my chest tightening with a sudden, chaotic pounding.
Matthew leans against the doorframe. His expression is serious, his gaze steady. There’s no accusation in his tone, just a quiet statement of fact. He heard the stress, the evasion, the sheer effort it took for me to sound okay.
I stare at him, speechless. Heat floods my face. My mind scrambles, searching for a defense, an explanation, anything, but finds only blank panic. His eyes flick to the flush high on my cheekbones, noting the slight tremor in my hands.
The tension around his eyes melts away, and his shoulders drop just a fraction. “Do you have everything you need to get ready?” he asks, voice gentle.
The shift to normalcy makes my posture relax. I glance down at the rumpled tracksuit, then toward the chair in the corner where my purse lies over my dress. My hair feels like a bird’s nest despite my earlier attempt to tame it.
“Umm…” I clear my throat, grateful for the neutral topic. “I could really use a brush.”
Matthew nods. “Top drawer of the vanity in the bathroom.” He gestures towards the adjoining door. “Fully stocked in there. You’ll even find a blow-dryer.” A shadow crosses his face as he says it.
My chest tightens with a pang of shared sadness, remembering his confession about his mother who never got to use this room.
He meets my eyes again, and a wry, almost self-deprecating smile touches his lips. “And by the way,” he adds softly. “I was kidding about the five minutes. Take your time. Shower if you want. Come down whenever you’re ready. No rush.”
With one last nod, he steps back into the hallway. I watch the door click softly into place, the space where he stood now empty.
I let out a long breath.
My gaze drifts towards the bathroom door, then to my dress.
Shower. Clothes. Brush.
It sounds simple, but the effort feels monumental.
Still, he’s waiting downstairs.
Pushing myself off the bed requires more willpower than I possess. In the well-stocked bathroom, I find the brush exactly where he said it would be. The shower, blessedly hot, washes away the lingering grime of Hydra and the tremors in my bones. The steam eases the pounding in my head.
Toweling off, I avoid the mirror. The olive-green sweater dress on the chair sends a sharp pang through me. It’s the armor I wore for a battle I lost spectacularly.
But it’s all I have.
Pulling it on feels strange. Different from the anonymous comfort of the tracksuit. This dress is me, back in my skin. Flawed and fragile, but here.
A few ruthless strokes with the brush tame the worst of the tangles, and I scrape my hair back into a simple ponytail, less severe than last night’s knot.
A final glance in the mirror shows I’m still pale. The bruises of sleeplessness lie dark beneath my eyes, but at least I look clean.
Taking a deep breath, one hand smoothing down the dress, I leave the quiet of the guest room and head towards the stairs. The descent feels less treacherous this time. My footsteps are quieter on the wood, my hand barely needing the banister.
Reaching the bottom, I glance toward the living area.
It’s a comfortable space with deep couches and walls lined with books.
Matthew is there, settled one a powder-grey sofa, long legs stretched out, ankle crossed over his knee.
He’s bent over his phone, thumb scrolling absently. He looks relaxed. At home.
I hesitate, feeling like an intruder all over again.
A faint creak in the floorboards gives me away. He looks up. His scrolling thumb stills. The simplicity of it, him looking at me, waiting, sends a sudden flutter through my stomach. A warmth that makes me feel seen.
He takes me in, his gaze gentle. Pocketing his phone, he rises in one fluid motion. “Ready?”
I nod, managing a small, genuine smile. “Ready.”
The engine hums quietly as Matthew navigates down the tree-lined street.
Sunlight streams through the windshield, warming my face, but the chill deep inside me lingers.
I keep my eyes on the passing houses, breathing in the clean leather of the interior mixed with the faint, fresh scent of soap clinging to Matthew.
I steal a glance at his profile. The slight furrow between his brows, the focus in his eyes, the way his hand rests easily on the wheel.
“So…” He breaks the quiet, keeping his attention on the road. “All good at the café?”
He definitely heard.
I continue looking out the window, feigning interest in a passing cyclist. “Yes,” I say, aiming for breezy. “All good. Helen’s got it covered.”
He merges into traffic. “Sounded a little tense.”
My fingers find the strap of my purse, tracing the worn leather edge. “Oh, you know Helen.” I attempt a light laugh that doesn’t quite land. “She can get overprotective. And overly curious.”
“Curious about you and James, I assume.” Matthew glances at me briefly. “I heard you mention him.”
“Yeah, she doesn’t like James.” My confession is a brittle thing.
“Who does?”
Two simple words. But they trigger my defensiveness.
First Helen, now Matthew.
It’s startling, the ease with which they seem to dismiss James. Dismiss us. As if ending an engagement, dismantling a future I poured years into, is as simple as deciding you don’t like an outfit anymore.
It was an engagement.
The ring I wore. The vows we almost took.
A shared life mapped out, right down to the loan agreement tied to our relationship status.
They just see the monster he became and the relief of the ending. They don’t see the ghost of the man I thought I was marrying. The weight of the life I thought we were building.
My throat tightens.
I turn my head, my gaze landing on his profile. “Well, me, apparently,” I say, the words quiet but heavy. “But I didn’t just like him. I loved him enough to say yes to marrying him.”
A muscle jumps in Matthew’s jaw, and his grip tightens on the steering wheel. “None of this is your fault, Amy.”
“No? Then why do I feel like I should’ve seen through James’s act the way Helen did from the start?”
“Because Helen wasn’t the one in love with him,” he states simply, cutting through my self-blame.
“Love… it doesn’t let you see clearly.” His eyes remain fixed on the road, voice remote.
“It makes you see what you need to see. What you think you need to see.” He lets out a short breath.
“But then, you get to a point where you can’t ignore the truth anymore. If you’re lucky.”
“Are you suggesting I’m lucky?”
“I’m saying people accept things they shouldn’t when feelings are involved. Make excuses. Overlook flaws. That’s love for you.” He shrugs.
“That’s a very tragic way of looking at love.”
“Love is tragic.”
My heart slams against my chest.