29. Beck
Beck
Why did I just tell Brooke I love her after our first kiss?
Because I’m an idiot, but also because I do love her, and I can’t deny it, and my dumb friends are right.
The moment those words left my mouth, a peace settled deep within my chest. Something true and good and beautiful sprang to life in my heart.
Brooke doesn’t say anything, and it’s awkward. I start to back away, dropping my hands from the small of her back, when she opens her mouth, then closes it again.
“I … You?” She closes her eyes. “You love me?” She cracks one eye open like she’s trying to make sure I don’t disappear.
I bend and place a kiss on the corner of her closed eye, on the scar that reminds me of a paintbrush. “Yes,” I say, my voice catching. “I do.”
“But you told me…” she starts, trailing off again. “You told me to be patient with you.”
“I know I did. I was just too stubborn to admit what I was feeling.”
“Because of Addie?” she asks.
Addie’s name makes me angry, I don’t want anything to do with Addie anymore. Never again.
“No,” I say, but I know that’s a lie. “A little,” I amend. “Mostly, you scare me. I tried to wall myself off, and yet, even with all my defenses, you still managed to get through.”
“I wasn’t trying…” she starts, but I lightly kiss her lips to stop her.
“I know you weren’t. And that’s what I noticed. You don’t have to try for me to notice you. You don’t have to do anything other than be you for me to want to be around you. And I don’t like people much, so that makes you really special.”
“Yeah, but that doesn’t mean you love me.”
“Brooke?” Her pretty blue eyes captivate me. I lower my mouth to hers and kiss her again, deeper this time. “I think I’d be the one who knows when I love someone.”
“But—but…” she sputters as I hold her closer.
“Brooke, please trust me.” I whisper the plea against her hair. “I love you.” I link her hand in mine and walk toward June’s porch swing, holding it steady as Brooke settles on it.
I drop onto the seat next to Brooke and place my arm around her shoulders, pulling her closer to me.
Brooke leans into me, and I savor the feel of her under my arm, the rightness about this.
“But why are you telling me now ?” she presses. The fact that she hasn’t said she loves me back has me retreating inward.
What if she doesn’t find me worthy? What if she rejects me too?
I don’t think I could handle that.
I meet her eyes with my own serious gaze. “Because I saw something with your friends today that made me think about my future.”
“Future…” Brooke says. This woman will not make things easy for me.
“A wife, a family, kids, and all the things I thought I didn’t want, especially after … everything.”
“But you do want those things?”
“I want that life with the right person. I’d rather have none of it if I had to have it with the wrong person. I was so close to being wrong before, but I’ve been praying, and this feels right.”
“Beck, I—”
My phone begins buzzing. It’s my day off, but I must have forgotten to turn off the alarm reminding me to get ready for work.
I fish it out of my pocket to turn it off, but see that it’s Ben calling.
That’s weird—Ben never calls. He always texts first. I’m immediately worried for my friend, so I motion to Brooke that I need to take this call.
I accept the call and launch into doctor mode. “Ben, is everything ok?”
“Beck?” a distinctly feminine voice says. “I’m so glad I finally got through to you.”
“Addie?” I question, turning to look at Brooke because I don’t understand what’s happening right now. But Brooke hops off the swing and stands just to my side as she shakes her head and tears form in her eyes.
“I knew it had to do with her ,” Brooke whispers before she turns the doorknob and slams the front door of June’s house.
“Addie.” I grind her name out through my clenched teeth. “I don’t want to talk to you.”
“I think you do, Beck,” she condescends. “I think you really do.”
“I think I really don’t,” I snap.
She heaves a sigh through the phone. “Listen, Beck. I’m sorry, ok? I wish you could forgive and forget. We were good together.”
I snort.
“We were really good together,” she continues. “It’s just the wedding stuff—it was all too much, and the idea of only ever being with you … well, I had to find out if there was more to the world.”
Addie knows how to drive a knife into my heart and twist it. Everything about her apology is about her. I see her so clearly now; it’s like scales have fallen from my eyes. I don’t want a future with her in it.
“And now that I’ve explored the world and met other people and saw you with that new girl, it just made me think that we had a good thing, and why would we give it up?”
“You saw me with that new girl?” I question. “Brooke? The woman who was with me when I was at Long Point? That’s why you’re calling? That’s what made you think you should try to get back together with me?” I bark out an incredulous laugh. “How did you convince Ben to let you use his phone?”
“I didn’t convince him, I just took it while he was in the shower,” she responds. “And come on, Beck. Do you really think her body is better than mine?”
Addie’s jealousy is on full display even through the phone, and I can’t think of anything more unattractive. My lips curl up in a snarl of disgust. This woman needs to get out of my life. I can’t believe I was about to marry her.
“Yes. I do think Brooke is more attractive than you. Don’t call me again. I don’t want to talk to you.”
I hang up the phone and look around the porch for Brooke. Instead of Brooke, I find June leaning on her knee scooter by the front door. June’s mouth is set in a thin line, and her eyebrows are drawn up, making sharp carats.
“Young man,” she scolds, and it is decidedly not her regular good-natured humor. “You are a fool.”
I’m used to being insulted by June, but not when she clearly means it.
I hold my hands out in confusion. “Uh—” I eloquently state.
“No. None of that. You can either be a man, or not. But this waffling ”—she spits the word at me with the vehemence of a cobra—”will not be something you subject my Brooke to.”
“Waff…” I start, but am interrupted by pure fury.
“No.” June wags her finger at me while she shakes her head.
“I heard enough to know that you are either a stupider specimen of man than most, or you have no regard for people like Brooke. Brooke is kind and honest. She has big dreams, she wants love, and you waltz right on in and dangle the promise of love like a worm on a hook, but when that woman calls, you answer. Quite frankly, Brooke is entirely too smart to be with the likes of you.”
People do not call doctors stupid, but June doesn’t care what people think, what people say.
She tells it exactly like she sees it, and I do too.
Brusque is a word that’s been used to describe me a time or two, but it’s different when someone else is being brusque with you.
Regardless of the social connotations, bluntness can be effective in making someone realize their idiocy.
“June,” I say as a weight comes crashing down on my shoulders. I really am stupid. I told Brooke I loved her and then answered the phone. I didn’t know it was Addie on the other line, but I still made something else a priority right after declaring love. “I … I’m an idiot.”
June shakes her head in agreement.
“Can you help me fix it?”
“No can do, sir. That’s all on you.” She wheels her scooter back a smidge. “But you better fix it because you and Brooke are meant for each other.”
She tosses the words out on the porch before she slams the door, and I’m left staring at the forest-green wood with gold square accents, unsure of how to make everything up to Brooke. But I’m going to try.