27. Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Seven
I feel like shit, and it isn’t just because of my hangover. I was tossing and turning all night, racking my brain for an answer to an impossible set of questions.
When did Alden’s feelings change? And why does it scare me so bad to hear how he feels about me? I wanted to deny it for as long as I could, but after last night, how could I? I’ve seen it in how he acts, how he moves, how he breathes. I know that’s bordering on insane, saying that I’ve seen the difference in how he breathes, but it’s true. He breathes like I’m his only source of oxygen, keeping him alive. And that scares the shit out of me.
If I don’t acknowledge Alden’s feelings for me, then I can guarantee that I won’t get hurt in all this. There’s no chance for fallout, a broken heart, or months of agony when everything ends. Because whatever he is feeling, it can’t last. Like I told Alden, it’s not a question of if all this will blow up in our faces, it’s only a question of when.
Braxton is already suspicious of us, and so is Charlotte. And my friends aren’t far from figuring it out. There are so many other factors that we have to consider rather than just our feelings.
There are two halves of me. One is telling me I’m making a mistake by storming out on Alden like I did. The other half reminds me of who he’s always been. People don’t change overnight. No matter how much they claim it. Alden might feel something for me, but it doesn’t matter. I’ve seen people renege on their word. I’ve seen them use those feelings to warrant treating me like I’m nothing. Time and time again.
The fight between my heart and my head, of what I know is best for me and what I crave, is constant. And I can’t choose the right answer.
What happens when he doesn’t want to wait around for me to catch up? What if I’m too afraid to admit everything out loud? What if I miss my chance? He’ll move on. He’ll leave. And I’ll be where I am now, kicking myself for not being more fearless.
A month ago, this was all so much simpler. We had rules. We had lines that we didn’t cross. And now it’s all blurry. It doesn’t feel like much time has passed, but it also feels like a lifetime has gone by. Alden used to be a cocky, insufferable asshole. Someone I couldn’t even picture sleeping with, let alone feeling something toward. And I know there’s something inside me that feels something for him. But I don’t know how to tap into it, how to access it without also accessing all the fear that comes along with letting someone in.
I can’t stop picturing Alden’s face last night. I’ve never seen someone so crushed before. But I know exactly how he felt. It’s how I’ve felt my whole life when I was let down by the one person who was supposed to always be there for me.
As much as I try to prove the opposite, I know Harriet affects everything I do. She affects who I am down to my core. Uncredited, of course. I thought that by distancing myself from the people I care about and preventing them from genuinely seeing me, there could be an outcome different from what I’ve known my whole life. If I stopped using my heart so much, I’d eventually learn the lesson and become stronger. Yet, I feel worse off than ever before.
Because I’m not happy. I’m not unaffected. And I shattered my heart and Alden’s in one fell swoop. I broke him without even meaning to. I lost myself while trying so hard not to become anything like Harriet. But I became exactly like her last night. When I threw Alden’s feelings back at him like they were knives to be hurled, I realized how similar we actually were.
It’s always felt like everyone could tell. They could see the damaged part of me that Harriet broke, tell that I am as see-through as I feel, tell how pathetic and lacking I am. And I thought that despite how hard I tried, every relationship or friendship or one-night stand could see through me.
That was the only reason I agreed to sleep with Alden. Because I had a sense that even if he could see how broken I was, he was, too. The broken find each other. But it didn’t matter. Maybe it never did. I promised myself it wouldn’t get messy, that I’d get out before anything resembling a mess could happen, but that was just wishful thinking. It happened regardless because there are feelings involved. On both sides.
“More coffee?” the waitress asks.
“Thank you.” I lift my mug.
After sneaking back into my apartment in the middle of the night, I headed out just a few hours later, hoping to avoid Harriet. I need to clear my mind. Even though I’ve been dodging her, I’m still not ready to ask her to leave. I plan to crash somewhere else while I work up the nerve. After I left Alden last night, it was too late to call Kevin or Laryssa and ask to stay with them, so I just went home.
Taking a quick look at Kevin, I wonder if he mentioned my meltdown to Laryssa. Or how I asked him to walk me to The Cerulean. The only reason I assume that he hadn’t is because I didn’t wake up to any unhinged voice memos this morning. But we only just got here; maybe Laryssa is just biding her time.
“How was your night?” Laryssa asks us. “Anything interesting happen?”
My eyes widen. “Why would you think anything happened? Nothing happened.”
Laryssa takes a sip of coffee. “It was just a question.”
“Yeah, nothing happened,” Kevin adds.
Laryssa perks up. Why did he have to open his mouth? She looks at me like she knows I’m holding something back.
“Really? Because I got some very intriguing texts last night.”
What is she talking about?
“Texts?”
She pulls out her phone. “Yeah, weird ones, too.” I prepare for a shitstorm before Laryssa starts reading, “How does a microwave work? Who is Bill? Do watermelons have a smell?” Kevin and I exchange a look. “You’re so bizarre when you drink.” Laryssa laughs.
We chuckle with her. “I must’ve thought you were Google or something.”
Kevin has a wary look, and I know what’s coming next. “I can’t do this anymore, Monroe. You know how I am with secrets.”
I shake my head, silently pleading with him not to expose me. I don’t know how Laryssa will take the news that I’ve been hooking up with someone with both despise—a guest, no less—this whole time. But I’m also so tired of keeping this a secret. I’m spent. And I can’t take lying to my friends anymore.
She eyes Kevin and then me. “Secrets? What’s he talking about, Mon?”
“I’m uh—” I try, but I can’t find the words.
“Monroe is sleeping with Alden Van Doren,” Kevin blurts out. He claps his hands over his mouth, and his eyes are wide with shock.
My head smacks the table, and I groan as I attempt to hide from Laryssa and the oncoming rant I’m expecting. But I’m met with silence. When I lift my head to take a peek, Laryssa isn’t moving.
“Laryssa? Are you okay?” Kevin asks, nudging her. She grabs her mug and takes a casual sip. But there’s an eerie smile on her face.
Before I can say anything else, our waitress comes by to take our orders, painfully unaware of the strain between us. Kevin and I order quickly, and when she’s out of earshot, we go back to studying Laryssa, as if she is going to explode at any minute.
“I think you broke her,” I say.
Kevin glares at me.
“Was that supposed to be a joke? Because it wasn’t funny,” Laryssa finally says. “Tell me he was joking, Monroe.”
I pull my bottom lip between my teeth. “He wasn’t.” If it’s time to come clean, I don’t want to hold back.
Laryssa sighs and plays with a packet of sugar on the table. “I only have one question.” She pauses, looking up at me. “Why? Why him?”
“I don’t know.”
“I’m not all that surprised, though; it was bound to happen.”
My mouth hangs open, and I’m ready to go on the offence, but nothing comes out. I wasn’t expecting this kind of reaction. “It was bound to happen? What the hell does that mean?”
The look she pins me with conveys a lot more than what she’s saying. “Oh, come on. You know as well as I do that hate is just your default when you don’t know which box to put someone in.” She stirs her coffee. “And you’ve never been able to put him in the right box.”
“You’re wrong. I knew which box to put him in since day one.”
Laryssa shakes her head, ripping open another packet of sugar and dumping it in her coffee. “Maybe. But we both know that hasn’t always been the case.”
Kevin looks between us. “Uh, did I miss something? What does that mean?”
Dammit. If there was ever a time for my friends to be less observant, why couldn’t it have been now?
“It means she hasn’t always hated him. And I’m pretty sure I remember something about how you wanted him to lick every inch of your body.” She laughs into her mug.
Kevin gawks at me. “How did I not know about this?”
“It was before you started working at the resort,” I clarify. “And in my defence, I only thought that before I found out how much of an asshole Alden was.”
Laryssa hums. “An asshole you’re sleeping with.”
“Why do you hate him so much?” Kevin asks.
“I don’t hate him. I just…”
Laryssa jumps in. “You better tell him the story, Mon. Since you’re fessing up and all.”
“You’re evil, you know that?”
“Yeah, but you love me anyway.”
My smile fades when I recall Alden and I’s first meeting almost five years ago.
“There’s not much to tell.” I shrug. “He started coming to The Cerulean a few years ago. I thought we hit it off, and I made the mistake of thinking he was genuinely interested in me.”
“So, what happened?” Kevin presses.
“Nothing. I was wrong about him. Turns out he was just like every other entitled douche we get at the resort.” Both Kevin and Laryssa’s eyes are on me, begging me to get to the meat of the story. “I overheard him talking about me. It’s stupid now, but it stuck, you know? I heard him telling someone I was trash, nothing but dressed-up garbage that he could distract himself with before going back to his perfect life.”
“He really said that?” Kevin asks. And I nod. “But that doesn’t make any sense. Why would you go to him last night, then? You were devastated, Mon, and you went to him . Doesn’t that mean something?”
Kevin’s words disorient me. “I don’t—I don’t know.” I swallow a brick lodged in my throat.
“I think you do know,” Laryssa pipes up, a softer look in her eyes.
I glance between my friends, frustrated with myself and them. “Don’t be coy.”
She folds her hands in front of her. “Fine. If I’m going off my very limited information, I’d say you have feelings for the man, Monroe. Maybe you even lo—”
“Don’t say it.” I nearly shout.
I’m glad our food hasn’t arrived yet because I’m not sure I’d be able to keep it down. A rock the size of a small planet sinks to the bottom of my stomach and makes it unbearable to even think. My hands sweat as I think about the possibility that Laryssa could be right about this.
“You’re wrong.”
Kevin’s face falls, and Laryssa rolls her eyes. “Just because you’re in denial doesn’t mean we’re wrong.”
A part of me wonders if they’re right. I can’t find an excuse good enough to explain why I went to him last night. I just did. Maybe I knew I could be vulnerable with him, that I would be safe. But is there really enough between us to call it love? Or is it just lust? My coffee is cold when I take a sip, and I shiver. I need to put an end to this discussion before it blows up my whole life.
“No. We’re using each other. That’s all it is. Mutual satisfaction. He needed someone, and I was there. There’s nothing more. He’ll go back to New York, and I’ll stay here. End of story. Now, can we please stop talking about this?”
Laryssa sighs and crosses her arms. “Was that whole speech for our benefit or yours?”
Kevin knocks into Laryssa’s shoulder. “We’ll drop it.”
“I’ll drop it after I say this. You forget that I know you, maybe more than you think I do. And I know that this no-strings bullshit was probably your idea because you think that it’s all you deserve.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” I warn. But she doesn’t listen, and my heart pounds dangerously hard as she carries on.
“But you deserve more than that. Just because Harriet has never been there for you doesn’t mean nobody else will. I understand your need to shield yourself. Believe me, I do. But what if you miss out on something really great because you were too stubborn to let someone in?”
A piercing sting begins behind my eyes, and I can’t stop a tear from escaping. I wipe it away, but I know Laryssa saw.
“What happened to you hating Alden?”
Laryssa’s eyes stay on me. “If you can find something redeemable in him, maybe I can, too. You hid the fact that you’re sleeping with him from us because you’re afraid to admit how much you care about him. It isn’t a big leap.”
After she says her piece, Laryssa and Kevin carry on the conversation while I sit and brood over her analysis. Is she right? Or is she reaching? I know I’m afraid to see where things can go with Alden. Maybe I didn’t want to tell anyone about us for that very reason. Laryssa has a way of unearthing everything I try to keep hidden and things I didn’t even know I was feeling. But it’s better to keep my expectations of him and what we could be low because I don’t want to be disappointed. It comes from years of being let down.
There’s a slight possibility that I’m not being fair to him—to us—but ever since I heard him that day at the resort, I’ve been cautious of him. The walls I built to keep him out are starting to crumble. And each time he reveals who he really is—like when he took me to New York, was there for me, and genuinely wanted to understand what was bothering me—it feels as if he knows me better than I know myself. And it makes everything clearer.
I don’t hate Alden. Maybe I never did. Maybe my hate was just a path to where I am now. But my friends don’t need to know that they might be right.