Chapter 56
Chapter Fifty-Six
Hadley
I don’t know what I expected. That she’d come through the door with horns and giant fangs? Maybe green skin to showcase the monster she is?
Honor should look different now. Not like her, still in her black dress from burying her grandma.
Easton holds the door open, but she doesn’t step in right away.
Her hair is still pinned up, but her eyes are red from crying.
And I hate the feeling that still makes me want to help her through this.
Like the friendship between us is still there.
It should have been shattered into a million pieces.
She steps into the condo, and I instinctively draw back.
Easton closes the door behind her and steps back, giving us the room. I’m grateful for that and furious at the same time because I don’t know what to do with this much of a chasm between my best friend and me.
Neither of us says anything.
Honor’s eyes fill, and she presses her lips together the way she does when she’s trying not to cry. The same expression I’ve seen thousands of times. When she would tell stories about her mom leaving or how overwhelmed she felt when her grandma first got sick.
Don’t, I think. I cannot feel bad for her.
“Why?” My voice comes out steadier than I feel.
She glances at her feet. “That’s a hard question to answer.”
“Why don’t you guys sit?” Easton says. “I’ll get some waters.”
We both move to the family room, and I watch her look around the space. All of Tanner’s things are strewn around, but I don’t see any emotion cross her face.
Is she dead inside? She left her kid here, and this is where he’s growing up without her.
“Is he here?” she asks.
Easton comes over and hands us both a water before sitting on the arm of the couch.
“He’s with friends,” he answers, which I’m grateful for.
“Honor.” The word is a demand for her to explain how she could betray me like this, how she could betray her son.
She looks at Easton. “How did you figure it out?”
Is that really her question right now?
“Your tattoo… and I just felt like I knew you, but then I overheard two women saying something about a baby.”
She nods and sucks in her bottom lip. “Where do you want me to start?”
Anger boils in my blood because I feel like she’s dodging the reason this all went down.
“From the beginning. You knew I’d been with Easton…”
“I did,” she admits. “But I thought he was just a fuck boy.” She glances at Easton. “No offense.”
“It’s okay, I was.” He looks at me. “Then. Not now.”
I nod, knowing what he’s saying. He doesn’t need to reassure me.
“I don’t even know how to explain it. Jealousy?
Loneliness? Depression over what my life turned out to be like?
You’d always breeze into town and tell me all about the amazing things you’d done while you were away.
The people you met, the beaches so white, the water so blue. The food so good, the sex so amazing.”
Easton raises his eyebrows at me, and I tilt my head like now is not the time.
“I wanted that life. I wanted to see the world, but I wasn’t going to leave the woman who gave up her life to raise me to fend for herself.
I felt so stuck, then I’d feel guilty for thinking that way.
You had come over and told me about…” Honor looks at Easton.
“You. And would tell me all these things about him. How nice a guy he was, how much fun he was, where he hung out, what he did in bed.”
Again, Easton glances in my direction, eyebrows raised.
“How you always felt like you were in the moment with him. No stress about anything and then… Erik broke up with me, I lost my job for missing too much time, my grandma was in the hospital after a fall, and I was just scrolling on my phone. A picture of Easton came up and I thought, ‘Wouldn’t it be nice to live Hadley’s life for just one night? ’”
My stomach sinks.
“So, I got dressed up, and I went to the club you told me he’d invited you to a bunch of times before.
I swindled my way into the VIP lounge with some other guy who paid attention to me in the booth next to yours.
And… well…” Her eyes lift and meet mine.
At least I see some guilt there. “It happened.”
“Did we use something?” Easton asks.
I huff. “Clearly…”
She nods. “We did. At least you had a condom, and I saw the wrapper on the floor after, so I assume so. But then I was late.”
I want to keep hammering her with questions, but I let her continue to tell the story.
Honor says to Easton, “I thought about telling you, but then I thought you probably wouldn’t believe me.
I’d have to prove myself and do a paternity test. My grandma was in and out of the hospital, and I had this new job that was already not happy with my time away.
I was embarrassed because you were really drunk and I didn’t think you would remember me.
And then if I told you, I’d have to tell Hadley, and I felt so guilty for what I’d done.
I thought I could do it. Raise him on my own. ”
“So you were never going to tell me?” Easton asks.
She nods.
He blows out a breath and goes to the kitchen. I say nothing, giving him the space he needs to come to terms with the fact that he might never have known Tanner had she not left him.
“Why did you leave Tanner?” I ask.
More tears fall down her cheeks, but she glances at Easton, who’s returning with a beer.
“I couldn’t do it. It was so much work, and I was drowning.
My grandma said that the best thing that ever happened to her was raising me.
Here I thought I was always this nuisance and the person who stopped her from living her life when my mom left me with her.
For the first time, I understood what my mom must have felt.
I almost wanted to thank her for knowing she couldn’t take care of me because my grandma gave me such a loving, safe home. ” She looks at Easton.
“When I left him—” Honor’s voice fractures.
“Grandma had just returned from rehab. I had no money, couldn’t keep a job because I was always leaving for her appointments, I had no one.
” She presses her fingers to her eyes. “I knew Easton could give him a life that I couldn’t.
You have the money for nannies, and he’ll never want for anything with you. ”
Easton takes a long pull from his beer, side-eyeing me. “You’re his biological mom. He’ll probably want to know you in the future.”
It amazes me how he’s able to keep it all so compartmentalized while I’m still processing the fact that the baby who calls me Mama is actually my best friend’s son.
“After I came back, why didn’t you say anything?” I ask.
She nods as though she expected that question.
“I didn’t know what to do. I thought you two were just fuck buddies who hooked up if you both happened to be in town.
That day at the bookstore when you said you were going to ask Easton to marry you, I didn’t know what to say.
I hadn’t told you about Tanner, and up until then I was trying to move on.
It all happened so fast. The proposal, the wedding, the three of you becoming this family…
I didn’t know how to tell you or what to say.
I didn’t even know how I felt about it all.
I had just given him up and knew I made the right decision.
That he was in better hands here, but you stepping in wasn’t part of my plan.
Like I said, I thought between you two there were no feelings when I left him. ”
I think about Tanner in his high chair, throwing pancake pieces. Tanner with his hands on Easton’s face, running along the scruff. Tanner saying Mama and looking at me as though he was asking a question he already knew the answer to.
But I hate that I can see it from Honor’s side. She went through her entire pregnancy without telling me. A huge milestone I knew nothing about.
“You should have told me.” My voice comes out as a whisper.
“I know.” She scrubs at the tears on her face.
“Honor, I told you things I hadn’t said out loud to anyone.” My voice cracks now, and I don’t try to stop it. “I trusted you with all of it. And you sat there, knowing, and—”
“I know.” Her voice breaks too. “I know, and I’m so sorry.
I was scared, and I kept thinking there would be a right time and there wasn’t, and then the longer it went, the worse it got, and I—” She hugs her body, rocking for a moment.
“But I saw it. The two of you so in love and Tanner so loved and cared for… I just started to feel like he was where he should be. That of course you’d make a great mom, because you’ve been my person since we were in the third grade.
If I couldn’t take care of him, I’d want you to do it. ”
She slowly rises off the couch and walks over, hesitantly sitting next to me.
“I know you might not understand it, and I don’t expect you to, but he’s meant to be yours. I’ve come to truly believe that over these months. I’ve never seen you all in person together, but in the pictures, it’s there, the love.” I hear the sincerity in her words. She grabs my hands.
Easton walks out of the room, giving us some privacy, but still within earshot.
“I’m so sorry, Hadley. I never meant for all of this to happen, but I’m proud of you.”
I scoff. “For?”
She looks around the room. “You’ve made roots.”
“Honor, he’s yours.”
She shakes her head. “No, he’s not. And after all of our conversations and coffee visits, I came to a conclusion. He’s yours, and I think we both know that.”
We sit there and hold hands, staring at each other.
“I can help you. We can make this work somehow.” I’m unsure how we’ll manage it, but we can try. For Tanner, I’d do anything. I don’t want him to someday look for her or wonder why she didn’t want him.
“That’s what you don’t understand. I’m free now.
” She squeezes my hands. “I don’t want to be a mother.
I don’t want eighteen more years of being tied to someone, being responsible for their well-being.
I don’t expect you to understand… I love him, I do, but I love him enough to let him go.
” Her tears have stopped while mine continue to stream.
“I was at peace when I left him with Easton, but now I’m even more at peace knowing that he has you. ”
My shoulders drop. “Honor.”
She shakes her head. “We’re all winning here.”
I blow out a breath, and our eyes remain on one another’s.
I’m still angry. I still can’t believe she did this, but oddly, in this moment, what I feel is gratitude.
“Thank you.” I sit up and wrap my arms around her. “Thank you for all of this.”
And I mean it, because as messed up as it is, her sleeping with Easton is what made this life possible for me.