10. My Definition
MY DEFINITION
“Raven is such an interesting last name. If you don’t mind me asking, where is your dad from?”
Fisher bristled as he walked up behind Drie—who, to her credit, didn’t even flinch at the thoughtless question.
“It’s not my father’s name,” she answered.
“Raven is actually my adoptive grandmother’s maiden name.
And it’s just your standard Old English surname.
A little rare, but nothing particularly special.
Considering I don’t share any blood with my grandmother, though, I can’t claim that heritage for myself.
And I can’t say I know, or care to know, anything about my birth father’s origins either. ”
Fisher paused to enjoy the uncomfortable, regretful look on the man’s face who sat in his sticky diner seat, eating his favorite breakfast of chocolate chip waffles.
The only thing keeping him from wishing he’d choke on them was the knowledge that Drie would go all superwoman and give the asshole mouth-to-mouth.
“Right,” the guy mumbled, rubbing the back of his neck. “Well, so much for that segue, but the heritage fair is in town next week, and I was wondering—”
“Drie!” Fisher called out—anything to make the nightmare playing out before his eyes end.
He hurried forward, slipping into the booth at her side, and threw an arm along the backside of the bench.
Not touching, but close enough. He noticed that she’d stiffened at his voice, but she had yet to react to his presence, remaining preternaturally still at his side.
Fisher looked down at the top of her head, stubbornly tilted away and steadfastly refusing to acknowledge him, and asked, “Can we talk for a minute?”
Her lips tightened dangerously, but the home-wrecker on the other side of the table beat her to the punch. “Uh, hey, man. She was talking to me.”
Fisher cut him a side eye before directing his next question, once again, toward Drie. “Who’s your friend?”
“Maverick. Or Mav,” the friend interrupted, again, jerking a chin at Fisher.
A memory flared from the night before the breakup, her words ringing through his mind.
“Maverick doesn’t really talk all that much, if I’m being honest. He just keeps his head down and does the work.
” Fisher scowled as he watched Maverick’s eyes return to Drie, annoyed but undeterred. “Now, about that fair—”
“Drie boycotts fairs,” Fisher announced, silently rejoicing that the lie had finally broken through the ice shield she’d constructed, her blue eyes scorching him in his seat.
He held her eyes, challenging her to disagree.
He bent forward, casting his voice like he was offering some sage guidance. “She opposes the animal cruelty.”
“You’re thinking of a circus,” Maverick deadpanned. “But regardless, it’s an art fair—history reenactments, costumes, crafts, vendors.” Damn. “No animals,” he emphasized. “And who are you exactly?”
“Fisher.”
“Ah.” Maverick hummed, recognition flaring and fading into a mixture of wariness and condescension.
Fisher glanced back at Drie, who also appeared decidedly unamused, her mouth pinched to the left and eyes squinted.
So she’s told this guy about our relationship.
Alarm bells were ringing faintly in the back of his mind.
Logically, Fisher knew he’d been making the wrong choices since the moment he had walked into the diner.
However, he hadn’t anticipated how visceral his reaction would be to the very real sight of her moving on.
Finding her had not been easy. He had no way of knowing if she even got his messages or calls, as she never responded to them, and she’d definitely blocked him on social media, so he drove to her apartment building and took up residence on the steps, settling in for a wait.
However, it hadn’t been half an hour before he spotted her walking down the sidewalk toward her favorite diner, side by side with a man more than twice her size.
A fucking lumberjack of a giant, with a fitted grey tee stretched tight across his broad shoulders and a full beard lining his jaw.
Sitting across from the guy was no less intimidating than seeing him from afar. Fisher wasn’t a small guy, but Maverick wasn’t even in the same ballpark. In for a penny, in for a pound, he thought with a mental shrug.
“Pretty sure our calendars are slammed that weekend.”
“I was only asking her, and I didn’t mention a day.” He smirked. “Besides, it’s a three-week event, including weekdays.”
“Well, shit.” Fisher leaned back on the bench, scratching his cheek.
Drie sighed and chose that moment to speak up. “The fair sounds fun, Mav. I’d love to go.” She turned to a slack-jawed Fisher. “And if you wouldn’t mind, we need to get ba—”
“No.”
“No?” She cocked her head, voice ominous.
“No, you can’t go to the fair with him,” he continued, panic slithering through his veins. “I’ll take you.”
Drie poked a shaking finger violently into his chest, no doubt leaving a bruise. “I don’t know who the hell you think you are, Fisher Bree, but you have no right to an opinion on my choices, much less the right to make them for me. You made the choice to end us, so deal with it.”
He waved a furious hand in Maverick’s direction. “This guy just wants to sleep with you, Drie.”
“And? So did you!”
“I did not! Well, I did, but it was secondary. You know what I mean.”
“Right,” she mocked. “Because you want to be my friend. Well, as you can see, I’m making new friends. And let me tell you something, Fisher, friends don’t cockblock friends.”
“I don’t want to be your fucking friend!” he announced, his voice rising. “That’s why I wanted to talk. ’Cause I’m an iceberg, and you’re a bird, and I love you!”
Drie reeled back, momentarily stunned. She blinked up at him, her eyes clear and disarmed just enough for a flash of hope to swell, only to be deflated just as quickly when the shock melted away into icy fury.
Her right eye twitched sporadically as she turned her attention back to a bemused Maverick, who was mouthing “iceberg” to himself with a thoughtful scrunch to his brow, and apologized.
“I’m so sorry, but I’m going to need to deal with this.
Text me later, and we’ll figure out the fair details—if you still want to go. ”
Then, without another word, she shoved Fisher out of the bench, dragging him through the front door and around the building.
Drie kept him goose-stepping until she slammed to a sudden stop at the graffiti-covered dumpsters marking the employee entrance.
She rounded on him there, planting her feet with fists on her hips.
Somewhere beneath the layers of guilt and regret, his subconscious acknowledged how ridiculously adorable she was in her anger, and the awareness made his fingers itch to hold her.
“What the hell was that, Fisher?” She exploded. “You didn’t have the right to come in there, to be rude to Mav, to speak for me, to say any of that shit.”
“I know, and I am sorry. Genuinely. I feel like I’ve been going crazy without you.
I know it’s not an excuse. There’s no excuse for what I’ve done.
It’s just an explanation, which is one of the many things I owe you.
I haven’t been thinking straight for weeks.
Since the night I lost my mind and then lost you.
That alone should’ve told me enough, but I didn’t figure it out until I drove back home this morning and Connor explained it to me. ”
“You’re not making any sense. Connor explained what to you?” Drie asked, letting her curiosity get the better of her.
He smiled down at her. How did I miss this before?
It was like coming home, standing there before her.
She’d never carved out pieces of who he was, as he’d once imagined, but she’d become a part of him.
The voice of reason in his mind, the breath of hope in his lungs, the sense of direction driving him forward.
All the best parts of him were irrevocably intertwined with her.
Fisher had lost himself in her absence, but he understood now what it was, guiding him back to her.
Not addiction, not obsession, and certainly not fucking friendship.
“Love,” he answered.
Drie scoffed, turning to walk away. He sidestepped into her path, taking the full weight of the glare she settled on him.
“I know how it sounds, but I’m serious. We never got a chance to meet each other’s families.
But mine is mental. Love was loud and crazy and physical.
Not like domestic-violence physical, but they were expressive to the extreme, and yelling was the default for any problem.
They always said that couples who fought it out stayed together.
So I dated Rena for, like, six years through high school, thinking it was just a matter of never giving up.
And I’m just now learning how much that fucked me up, because apparently, we had a super toxic relationship that I thought was normal up until about three hours ago.
Because she is a firecracker, and I’m an iceberg, and those are bad opposites.
But you’re a raven, and ravens are good opposites because they cohabitate with the icebergs.
And that doesn’t make sense to you.” Fisher shook his head, knowing with one look at Drie’s face how severely he was butchering his opportunity.
He stepped forward, grabbing her hands lightly and ducking his head to speak eye-to-eye.
“The important thing to understand is that I thought I didn’t have feelings, because being with you brought me peace, and in my experience, love has never been peaceful.
Love was supposed to be anxious and painful.
It was supposed to be really low lows followed by super high highs.
But now, I’m learning that some people—like my parents or Rena—actually enjoy that drama, but it’s just not my style.
It never was.” He sighed. “It took losing you for me to see that love can mean different things to different people. We can choose our own definitions, and Drie, you are my definition. I’m so sorry, more sorry than you can imagine, that hurting you is what it took for me to wake up from my stupidity. ”
She was already shaking her head, her face closing off in the same way it had the night he ended things.
“You’re only saying all of this because you miss having me around.”
“Of course I miss having you around. You are the best thing I ever had. I miss everything about you.”
“No,” she said. “I mean that you have a small circle, and losing a friend makes a mark. You miss having a companion in the evenings. A listening ear. A convenient fuck,” she added with a note of bitterness, then continued when he moved to interrupt.
“I’m not saying you don’t miss me as a person, and you may even have realized that you loved me in that capacity, but in love?
No.” She pulled her hands free and took a step back, letting her arms fall to her sides.
“Somebody who is in love doesn’t end things the way you did.
They don’t pull the crap you pulled afterward.
When you love somebody, you consider their needs.
I don’t want indecision. It may be dumb in your eyes, but I’ve told you already, I want true love. ”
“It’s not dumb at all. I was wrong, Drie. But I’m telling you, I am certain, down to my bones, that you’re the one for me,” Fisher finished fiercely.
She looked away, back toward the busy street and the cars flying up the nearby overpass ramp. “I don’t believe you,” she whispered, her voice betraying her own sorrow, yet firm in such a manner that brooked no argument.
“I know.” He stopped himself from stepping forward, hesitant in this vulnerable moment, yet aching to brush a loose curl behind her ear. “But I’ll prove it to you.”