Chapter 20 #2
“Why don’t I go and get your bath started, then get some pajamas on while your mom helps grandma?” I asked him as we got up from the table and carried our dishes to the sink. With the way he yawned, I doubted he would make it halfway through the movie.
As I helped Luke get dressed, he asked me something that almost dropped me to my knees.
“Why aren’t you and Mom together?” His voice was barely above a whisper as he struggled to get his arms in the sleeves of his shirt.
“That’s complicated, bud,” I told him as I helped him with his shirt.
“What’s complicated?”
“It’s a tough situation,” I tried to explain in a way he’d understand.
“Do you love my mom?” I had to look away so he wouldn’t see the shocked expression and the pain in my eyes at the mere mention of loving Carolina.
I turned back to him after I schooled my features.
“It’s not that simple,” I told him.
“Why? My friends' moms and dads are together. I just don’t understand why mine can’t be,” he said with a pout.
“Just because me and your mom aren’t together doesn’t mean we love you any less,” I explained.
“Adults make everything so difficult,” he said with a huff before he stomped away from me and headed downstairs.
I took a moment to collect myself before I followed.
Carolina had the movie set up in the den. She sat on the far end of the sectional with the remote in her hand, ready to hit play. Luke curled up beside her to share the soft blanket.
“Sit on the other side of me, Dad,” he said as he patted the spot beside him.
I complied and pushed the button on the side of the cushion, the recliner popped out and I propped my feet up, throwing my arm over the back of the couch.
Carolina pressed play on the movie. Luke began to sing along as the movie began.
No matter how many times I watched this movie with him, I loved seeing his excitement as the movie played like he was watching it for the first time all over again.
Just like I predicted, one moment Luke recited the movie word for word, and the next he curled up beside me, softly snoring before the halfway point.
“He played hard today,” I said as Carolina looked over at Luke and hit the button on the remote to stop the movie.
“Yeah, I was worried he’d ask lots of questions I couldn’t explain, but he took staying here in stride,” she said as she tucked her hair behind her ear and looked up at me.
I wanted to bring up the kiss.
I wanted to know where her head was.
But I didn’t ask. I couldn’t.
“You look tired,” I said instead. Her eyes looked worn and worried and completely exhausted.
“It was a long day,” she said with a yawn, causing me to yawn as well.
“Can I ask you something?” she said as she looked down at her hands and picked at her nails.
“You just did,” I said as I tried to lighten the mood.
She smiled, but it was fake. She was worried about something, and I tensed, scared that she’d gotten another threatening message.
“Are you happy, Leo?” she whispered without looking up at me.
If I were standing I’d have taken a couple steps back. I wasn’t expecting her to ask me that.
“Yeah, I am,” I said in a confused voice.
“What I mean is, are you happy with your life?”
“Where is this comin’ from?” I asked as I wished Luke weren’t sitting between us so that I could turn her head to make her look at me.
She shrugged but remained silent.
I hated that my mind went to the thought of coming home one day to find her and Luke gone. The thought only stayed in my mind for a brief second, but the feeling that came from it stayed long after it had left. My chest hurt at the thought of not having Luke in my life.
“Carolina,” I said after a beat of her not responding.
She looked over at me, as turmoil filled her eyes.
“Where is this comin’ from?” I repeated. The need to know the answer consumed me.
“Last night,” she began.
I swallowed hard. I’d wanted her to bring up our kiss, but now that she had I wished I never thought of it because I didn’t know how she felt.
“I just need to know if you’re happy in life. That I didn’t mess you up too badly,” she admitted as she looked down at her hands again as if she couldn’t handle hearing my response.
“Hey, look at me,” I demanded in a whisper.
She looked up at me, and her expression was a kick in the gut. She looked so scared of my answer.
“Why do you think you messed me up?”
“Because you said that you completely changed after I left and you had to pretend to be something you’re not. I hate that I made you that way,” she confessed.
For a long time after she’d left, all I wanted was her to return and apologize. I’d have forgiven her and we’d have been happy. Not that she’d said she was sorry, but I felt it in my soul that she was about to, and I wasn’t sure I needed those words anymore.
“Honestly?” I asked.
She gave an unsure nod.
“The truth is you leavin’ did change me.
I missed you so much that I didn’t know how to handle a life without you in it.
But I hated how people treated me almost more than I hated that you’d left.
I needed people to just see me and not my broken heart.
I made those choices. Not you. I made them because you left.
Because I couldn’t face the feelings I had.
It was easier to pretend,” I explained, and she gave another nod as she looked over at me.
Luke stirred beside us, and we both looked down at him as he curled the blanket around him and settled into the couch.
“Maybe we should get him up to bed,” she suggested, and I hated that we were about to leave another conversation unfinished.
I picked Luke up, and Carolina followed me as I walked up the stairs to my old bedroom.
Once he was settled on the bed, I covered him up and made sure his blanket was tucked right beside his face before I gave him a kiss goodnight. I moved out of the way, and Carolina leaned over and stared down at him for a few moments before she did the same.
I walked alongside her to the bedroom door. I let her exit the room first before I followed her out, closing the door softly behind me. She walked down the hallway a few steps before she stopped in front of Ainsleigh’s old bedroom. She turned to face me as she shuffled her feet.
She looked up at me, longing in her eyes. I stepped forward.
One step.
Two steps.
Three steps, and I stood right in front of her. She looked up at me and pulled her bottom lip into her mouth and worried it with her teeth.
“Leo,” she whispered with a plea underneath.
“Carolina,” I whispered back as I stared into her chocolate eyes.
“I’m sorry,” she said as she blinked back tears.
“For?” I asked, unsure of what she meant.
“I lied to you that day, Leo,” she replied.
My heart began to race at the memory of the day my world upended.
I swallowed hard, unsure how to respond.
“What do you mean?” I managed to choke out almost too scared to know the answer.
What could she have possibly lied to me about?
I searched her eyes as I waited for her answer, hoping that I’d find it in the chocolate depths that looked up at me.
Only all I saw was the longing look in her eyes. The look that told me whatever she was about to reveal would likely change my world all over again.
“I lied about not loving you the way you loved me. I lied because I knew that was the only way to get you to let me go. I never stopped loving you, Leo, not for one second,” she said as she brought her hand up.
I thought she was about to touch me, only she reached for whatever the chain around her neck held and gripped it tight within her grasp.
I wanted to know what lay beneath the cotton scrub shirt she’d worn.
I brought my hand up to where she gripped her shirt, but her grip tightened and caused me to pause.
Words were caught in my throat at her confession.
She gave me one more longing look before she turned and opened the door. Too stunned to move for a moment, I stood there, but just as I stepped forward about to enter my sister's old room, the door shut, separating me from Carolina. I broke out of the trance her words had put me under.
I heard her head hit the door on the other side, and I turned and put my back to the door, resting my head against the hardened wood.
The only thought that I’d managed to repeat in my mind was What did her confession mean, and what was I goin’ to do now that it sat unsettled between us?