36. Reed
“Willa.”
She finally looked up from the copy of What to Expect When You’re Expecting she had been reading during every spare moment. Reed tilted his empty glass toward her.
“Don’t you have class tomorrow?” she asked as she reached for the bourbon bottle behind the bar.
“Yep.”
She eyed him up and down, her hand wrapped around the bottle that remained planted on the bar.
“First class isn’t until the afternoon,” he explained in response to her disapproval. She picked up the bottle and put a very small pour in his glass, his third of the night. “Thank you.”
She watched him take a sip as she screwed the cap on then glanced up at the television screen that had held his attention all night. He’d spent every night so far this week in the nearly empty bar with a pregnant lady who was neither his wife nor his girlfriend, putting a hurtin’ on a bottle of Wild Turkey and mindlessly watching television until it was closing time. Tonight’s programming choice was the Weather Channel which was about as sad as it got. There was only QVC left after this, and if it got to that point, he might as well just hide out at home.
She settled back into the chair she kept behind the bar for herself these days. “You okay?”
He took another sip, his face contorting as the burn traveled through his chest. She hummed a judgmental sound then glanced down at the cell phone that had been setting out on the bar in front of him every night, untouched.
“How’s Maya doing?”
He shrugged his shoulders then returned his attention to the television, feigning interest in reports on snowfall in the Mid-Atlantic states.
“No wonder you feel like shit then,” she said. “I hate it when Dev and me aren’t on the same page.”
He tore his eyes away from the television and stared with exasperation. She threw it right back at him. “I’m trying to give her space,” he explained finally.
“You sure that’s what she wants?” She pointedly stared at his cell phone again.
He followed her gaze down and placed his hand over the phone, then picked it up and dropped it in his front pocket before going back to his drink and television. In his periphery, he caught her shaking her head at him before cracking her book open again.
* * *
Reed felt a warm hand clap against his back. He turned to find his older brother, dressed in plain clothes, sliding into the bar stool next to him. He checked his watch which read 10:33 p.m. “What are you doing out so late?”
Emmett reached for Reed’s glass and lifted it to see a small amount of brown liquid. He swirled it then threw it back in one sip and slid the empty glass towards Willa and out of his reach. “I was in the neighborhood, so I decided to drop in.”
Reed looked to Willa who had her nose stuck in her book. “Did you call him?”
“Nope,” she said without looking up which he knew meant yes.
“Willa, I’m not drunk.”
“Okay,” she said, still not making eye contact.
“I don’t need a designated driver. I walked here,” Reed insisted.
“Mmm hmm,” she hummed.
“I’ve been comin’ here quite a bit lately,” Emmett offered. “Isn’t that right, Willa?”
“Yep. Can’t get rid of you Stanton boys to save my life.”
Emmett folded his hands on the bar and leaned in closer. Reed stared ahead and committed even harder to watching the television, as if he was really interested in one of those late-night, as-seen-on-TV- commercials for some sort of vegetable dicer. The last thing he needed tonight was Willa and Emmett teaming up for an intervention. How would it change anything about his situation? He was here. She was not and never would be. The end. He just needed time and space and maybe a little bit of whiskey to accept that and move on with his life.
“So what brings you here tonight?” Emmett asked.
Reed shrugged. “Didn’t want to be alone.”
“I can relate to that. The weeks I don’t have the girls are pretty rough.”
Reed’s beat up heart took another punch. He hated hearing that his brother was hurting when he’d been too self-involved to notice or check-in over the past few weeks. He tore his eyes away from the television and looked at Emmett. “You can always call me.”
“And you can always call me,” he said in that antagonistic way only a big brother could.
Reed threw his hands up. “Fair enough.”
He leaned back in his chair and caught Willa bringing her book to her face, probably to cover a smile or laugh at his expense. He was loved and certainly not alone, and he appreciated that more than he was letting on right now. If he didn’t care so deeply for his friends and family, he’d be searching for jobs up north and making moves to be closer to Maya after graduation. But he made a commitment to stay and help make this town a better place with and for all of them. He couldn’t give that up for his own selfish reasons.
“How did you know Cammie was the one? Back when you decided to get married?”
Emmet seemed caught off guard by the question. His brows raised, then furrowed in one seamless motion. “That’s a hard question to answer…looking back, I don’t think I did. I loved her, and I still do very much, but I’m not sure I was ever truly in love with her.”
Willa looked up from her book with alarm. Her quick movement left the pages flapping as the cover closed. She set the book aside and moved to refill her glass with ginger ale, trying to look like she hadn’t been shamelessly eavesdropping on their conversation.
“And I know she’d say the same,” Emmett said with a small laugh. “We were just going through the motions and doing what everyone else our age was doing. Pairing off, getting married, buying houses, having babies…I always thought you kind of sensed that things were off between us. And maybe that had something to do with your decision to go to law school and call things off with Joanna.”
If he had noticed, it was completely subconscious. Reed remembered spending lots of time at their house in the few months after his break-up and before school started. Eating dinner with them, babysitting the girls while they went out on what he assumed were dates, and meeting up with them at the park on Sunday afternoons. Not once did he sense something was amiss. For him, their home was always a happy place.
“No, I never did.”
“Even when I was the only one who didn’t give you a hard time about that breakup?” Emmett asked.
“For the record,” Willa started from behind the bar where she was now fully involved in this conversation, “we didn’t not support you. We were just shocked. You and Jo were together for so long and I thought it was a forever thing.”
“But I think that goes to show that outward appearances never tell the full story of what’s goin’ on behind closed doors. And in your head and heart,” Emmett said, again, in that wise way only a big brother could. “Is this about Maya?”
Reed nodded.
“I only got to meet her briefly, but I could tell you liked her. She seemed really nice.”
“She’s awesome,” Willa added, looking directly at Reed. “We love Maya.”
He perked up hearing someone else say her name and recognizing just how special she was. That was his Maya. “Yeah, she’s everything, honestly. Every single thing about her is perfect to me, and I can’t come to terms with the thought that we can’t be together somehow.”
“I don’t think you should ignore that feeling,” Emmet said.
“The problem is, she’s not coming back home. And I can’t just leave all of this behind to follow her. Especially not you and the girls, not now.”
“The girls and I will be fine. I assume you’d come back and visit unlike their Uncle Nate, right?”
“Of course I’d come home to see them. And Baby Reddy, too,” Reed said with a nod to Willa. She smiled and rubbed her hand over the barely there bump under her apron.
Emmett placed his hand on Reed’s shoulder. “Take it from this old man, now is the time in your life to be selfish and figure out exactly what and who makes you happy. You’ve already started that journey and now’s not the time to stop.”
Reed mouthed thank you to his older brother. The sound of sniffling pulled his attention to Willa, one hand still on her belly and the other wiping away a tear that was falling down her cheek.
“Why are you cryin’?” Reed asked.
“Because I love you Stanton boys and I want you both to be happy…and hormones. So many hormones, y’all.”
Reed got up from his seat and went around the bar to give Willa a hug and a clean napkin to dry the rest of her tears. He was the luckiest man in the world to have friends and family like these two.
* * *
“Reed?”
The breath he’d been holding while waiting for her to pick up came out as a white puff. He pressed the phone closer to his ear as he balled his other fist and shoved it into his jacket pocket to keep his fingers from freezing as he walked home from the bar.
“Hey.”
“Is everything okay? It’s one in the morning.”
“Yeah, everything’s fine,” he promised. “I just wanted to talk to you…say hi.”
The line went silent and his heartbeat drummed all the way up in his ears as he waited for her response on the other end.
“Maya? You there?” he asked after what seemed like forever.
“Yeah.” She breathed out before sniffling quietly. “It’s just really good to hear your voice again.”
The break in her voice stopped him in his tracks in the middle of Main Street. He brought his fingers up to pinch the bridge of his nose and dam the tears that had started to form in the corners of his eyes. It felt so good to hear her voice, like a salve to a wound, but it didn’t take long before he felt that wound rip right open again as he was reminded of everything he missed about her.
“I’m sorry, Maya, I shouldn’t have called, I just thought—”
“If it wasn’t you, it would have been me. You don’t know how many times I’ve almost called.”
“How are you doing?”
“This is hard, Reed.”
“It is. I know it is.” He wished he could reach through the phone and hold her right now, for both of their sakes.
“How are you holding up?”
“Same.”
She paused again. He swore he heard the wheels in her mind working from hundreds of miles away. “Are we doing this right?” she asked.
He wanted to tell her that he would start looking for jobs up north tomorrow. That she didn’t need to compromise to have the career she had worked so hard for and him by her side if that’s what she wanted. But the last thing he wanted to do was get her hopes up for something he wasn’t even sure was possible, so he would keep that to himself for now.
“I don’t know…but I still think you owe it to yourself to finish what you started. I know that’s not wrong.”
She went silent again. This is what they had decided together. They’d take some time to let their relationship cool, and more importantly, focus on job interviews and graduation. It was the rational thing to do, but his head and his heart were at odds, and it seemed that hers were, too.
“But I’m here,” he said after a moment. “I just want you to know that. I’m always thinking about you.”
“I know. And so am I.”
“You get back to sleep now. I’m sorry I woke you.”
“Good night, Reed.”
“Good night, Maya.”
He held the phone to his ear, waiting for her to disconnect. Muffled sounds and light breathing lingered on the other end for a few more moments before the phone went silent for good. He shoved his phone in his back pocket and slowed to a stop as he brought both hands up over his face then dragged them downward until they ran off his cheeks and fell to his sides. He took in a deep breath and looked up at the sky for a moment before he started the lonely walk home again.