Chapter 27
Kevin
“I was going to tell you,” Lauren said. “I swear I was going to—”
“When? Before dinner or after?”
She wiped at her face, tried to talk, lost it, then tried again.
“It shouldn’t have happened.”
“Wednesday.”
“Yes.”
“It’s Sunday.”
She didn’t say anything.
“Four days.”
She took one step toward me and stopped when I didn’t move.
“Kevin, I was going to tell you. I just…”
“You waited four days and cooked dinner.”
“We were drunk, and I fucked it up.”
She looked more scared of me staying flat than she would have if I’d started yelling.
“Every time I tried to say it, I froze.”
The casserole dish sat on the counter. Welcome home.
She’d made dinner because she didn’t know what else to do. I hated myself for even thinking it.
I set the grocery bag down beside the casserole and looked at both.
“Jackson and I talked about it yesterday, and we decided we’d tell you together when—”
“You and Jackson decided that for me.”
“So Thursday you weren’t going to tell me. Friday you weren’t going to tell me. Saturday you weren’t going to tell me. You only decided yesterday.”
She flinched.
“Kevin, please—”
Tears ran down her face. She was standing there in my shirt, the one I gave her because she said she liked sleeping in it, and she was crying.
He got her alone after hours. Got to touch her first. Now he got to be the story.
I stood in my own kitchen and felt like I was on the outside anyway.
Paid the mortgage and still walked in feeling late.
“At least tell me who told—”
“Tommy Morrison. In the parking lot at the grocery store. Smiling like Christmas came early.”
Tommy was still in my head, grinning, while she stood there crying.
“I know what it was,” she said. “I know how bad it is.”
Thinking about his hands on her made my stomach turn over.
I wanted out of the room. I couldn’t stop looking at her.
She’d let him in. That was what I couldn’t stop seeing.
She’d twisted her hair up with the pencil she always stole from my desk.
Now the whole town probably had the same picture.
I could still feel that parking lot on me.
I felt stupid right down to my shoes.
“Four days,” I said again, my voice low and flat this time. “I was gone five days, and you couldn’t make it four.”
I walked out of the kitchen and down the hall into the bedroom. Closed the door behind me.
Sat on the bed and reached for one shoe. My hand just stopped.
Still had one shoe on. Suitcase by the dresser. Couldn’t make myself touch either one.
My hands were shaking.
All I could see was her in my shirt and him with his hands on her. If it was anyone else, I’d just be hurt, but Jackson made it feel messy and hurtful.
My shirt on her body, dinner on the stove, and that whole drive home thinking about telling her I loved her.
I sat there on the bed with one shoe still on, staring at the bedroom door.
Lauren
I woke up a little after three, and Kevin wasn’t in bed.
I lay there listening for the couch.
Nothing.
I threw the covers off and got up. The hardwood bit into my bare feet hard enough that my toes curled. Every step down the hall sounded too loud.
He was on the couch with his feet hanging off the arm because the couch was too short for him. Throw blanket up to his chest. One hand fisted under it. His breathing stayed steady. Too steady. Counted out like he was doing it on purpose.
I stopped in the doorway. His eyes didn’t move under his lids. His chest kept rising and falling in that same even rhythm.
My throat went tight. I wanted to say something. Nothing I could think of would make any of this less awful.
He didn’t move. Just kept breathing like that.
I went back to the bedroom, but I couldn’t get back in that bed. I grabbed the notepad and pen off my nightstand and went to the kitchen. Sat at the table and tried to write something that didn’t look like bullshit on the page.
First try went in the trash. Second one too. The pen slipped in my fingers and left a blue streak along the side of my hand. Eventually, I got three sentences I could stand to leave behind.
I’m sorry. I know that doesn’t fix anything, but I need you to know I’m sorry. Please talk to me.
I folded it and put it next to the coffee maker where he’d see it first thing.
Then I sat back down and put my head on my arms, listening for the couch. Hoping he’d quit pretending and come talk to me. The kitchen chair was hard and miserable, and I didn’t care.
I fell asleep at some point. When I woke up, the couch was creaking. Footsteps came toward the kitchen.
I lifted my head too fast. My neck hurt like hell from the angle. I rubbed at my eyes and didn’t say anything. Just watched him.
He walked into the kitchen and saw the folded note first. Picked it up, crushed it in his fist without opening it, and dropped it in the trash.
The paper landed on yesterday’s coffee grounds. I went stiff, all my weight shifting forward over my feet.
He took my blue mug out of the cabinet like none of that just happened.
Measured cream into it, no sugar, exactly how I liked it.
The spoon hit the mug once. He set it down too carefully.
Stirred it while I sat there barely breathing.
Then he put the mug on the table and walked out without looking at me once.
The bathroom door shut.
I stared at the mug with steam lifting off it. The trash can sat right there in the corner with my note crumpled on top. He still knew me down to the cream and still wouldn’t give me a single word.
I got up and grabbed the mug. The ceramic burned my palms, but I held on.
The bathroom door opened, and he walked past the kitchen doorway without looking in.
I put the mug down and followed him to the bedroom. He was pulling on his scrubs, moving around the room with his eyes on everything but me. Shirt. Wallet. Keys. Shoes.
“Kevin.”
He pulled his shirt over his head and grabbed his shoes off the floor.
“Kevin, please.”
“I have to get to the clinic.” His voice gave me nothing.
“Can we talk tonight? After you’re home?”
“Sure.” He tied his shoes, grabbed his wallet off the dresser, and stood with his keys already in his hand.
“What time will you be back?”
“Don’t know.”
He walked to the door, and I moved in front of him. Blocked the doorway. The hallway was barely three feet wide, and I stood right in the middle of it.
“Kevin, please. Just talk to me for one second.”
He looked at me for the first time since he came home yesterday.
I didn’t even know what I wanted him to say. I just needed him to look at me like I was still there.
Then he turned sideways and slipped past me without touching me.
I turned around. He walked away down the hall, grabbed his jacket off the hook, and opened the front door.
I would’ve taken mean over nothing.
The door closed behind him.
I stood there listening to his truck start. The engine turned over, and he backed out of the driveway. I stayed there until I couldn’t hear it anymore.
I walked back to the kitchen. My coffee sat there, half full and probably still warm.
I dragged the trash can over and dug through it until I found the note. Smoothed it back out. The paper was stained with coffee grounds and smelled like old food. I read what I’d written and wanted to rip it up smaller this time.
I crushed it back up and shoved it under the grounds.
Kevin
I couldn’t unclench my teeth.
The clock glowed red.
11:47.
She was doing inventory. Tuesday inventory ran late sometimes. Jackson closed at eleven, and counting took time. This was normal.
But they were alone in that bar after closing, and I kept seeing Wednesday night anyway.
I squeezed my eyes shut. It didn’t help. Still saw them. His mouth on hers. His hands where mine go. Her making those sounds she makes for me.
Except Wednesday she made them for him.
My heart kept racing, slowing down, then kicking up again. I stayed on my back even though it sucked, every muscle locked tight. I couldn’t have relaxed if I tried.
Her side of the bed was still empty. She should be here.
I stared at the ceiling. Tried counting backward from one hundred. Made it to seventy-three before I was seeing them again.
The clock said 12:03.
She was counting bottles. Writing numbers on the clipboard. Jackson was in the kitchen cleaning while she counted bar stock. They weren’t even in the same room.
I kept seeing his hand at her waist when he squeezed past her behind the bar.
My stomach wouldn’t settle. I hated lying here like this. Hated how much I still cared. I’d spent all week acting fine, and now I was awake at midnight, waiting.
12:31.
My phone lit up on the nightstand. Bright in the dark.
It wasn’t her.
It was Jackson.
I grabbed the phone. Read the text.
Lauren’s helping with inventory, running late. Wanted to let you know.
I read it again.
Which was worse, her not texting me or Jackson being the one who did?
I put the phone down and stared at the ceiling again.
Jackson knew I was lying here waiting.
She let him be the one to tell me.
I tried to ease my jaw, and the tension stayed there anyway.
She was with him right now. Alone in that bar.
I turned onto my side. The empty half of the bed felt even bigger.
The clock said 12:47.
I got up and went to the window. I knew her car wouldn’t be there, but I checked anyway.
I got back in bed.
Past midnight. She was still at the bar with Jackson, and I kept seeing them together.
His hands on her. Her kissing him back. Imagining the sounds she makes when she’s coming.
Sounds I’ve never heard before. She made them for Jackson Wednesday night, and I couldn’t stop picturing it happening again right now.
1:06.
I knew this was stupid. She was doing inventory. Jackson texted to tell me she was running late, which meant nothing was happening, because if something was happening, he wouldn’t text me. This was normal. Tuesday inventory. I was spiraling over nothing.
But Wednesday was nothing until it was something.
I hated myself for lying here. For needing her this much. I spent all week proving I didn’t care, and now I was breaking at midnight on a Tuesday.
I wasn’t fine. I was so fucking far from fine.
1:28.
Her car door slammed outside.
My heart jumped. I closed my eyes and kept my breathing even, holding my mouth shut on purpose.
The lock beeped, and her keys scraped in the door.
Footsteps came down the hall, slow and heavy.
She stopped outside the bedroom door.
The door opened.
She carried the smell in with her: Old Forester, burger, his cologne.
She stood in the doorway. I kept my eyes closed and my breathing even.
“You’re still up?”
Fuck.
I opened my eyes. “Couldn’t sleep.”
She went to her side of the bed and started getting undressed. I stared at the wall until my eyes ached.
I knew I should just let it go.
I couldn’t.
“How was inventory?”
She stopped moving.
Then she kept taking off her shirt. “Took forever. The Daniels order was completely wrong. Had to recount the whole back room.”
She started giving me details too fast.
She got in on her side. I stayed on mine. The middle stayed empty.
“Inventory took forever,” she said again.
“Okay,” I said quietly.
She rolled onto her side facing away from me. Her breathing evened out in minutes. She fell asleep that fast.
Maybe she was getting used to this. Us not talking. The space between us getting wider.
I lay there staring at that strip of mattress between us and didn’t move.