Chapter 5
Cade
Here’s the thing about realizing you’re a colossal dick.
It doesn’t just hit you once. It hits you in waves.
You’ll be doing something completely normal — making coffee, getting into your car, existing — and then a new layer of it arrives.
A new way in which you were terrible that you hadn’t fully processed yet.
And then you have to sit with that one too.
The wave that was hitting me hardest right now was this one: Maple had already been abandoned by everyone who was supposed to stay.
Her father. Her mother. The entire life she should have had.
She had rebuilt herself from nothing, alone, with a four-year-old on her hip, and the one thing she had been protecting herself against her entire adult life was exactly what I had confirmed for her that night.
That’s all you are to me. Don’t get too comfortable.
I hadn’t said those exact words. I hadn’t had to.
What kind of man does that?
A colossal dick is who.
The first time I saw her standing in front of me at the bachelor party salsa lesson, my brain had done something it had never once done before, which was stop working entirely.
She was gorgeous. I want to be accurate about this because gorgeous is a word people throw around too easily.
Maple was the kind of beautiful that hit you before you had time to prepare for it.
Her body, her smile, the way she moved — I had been around beautiful women my entire adult life and none of them had ever made me lose the thread of a sentence mid-word.
I asked her out because I wanted to sleep with her. I will be honest about that. That was the complete reason, one hundred percent, no other motivation.
And then we went on that first date and it turned into something I had not budgeted for.
She had put everything on the table in the first hour.
No warmup, no careful impression management, just — here it is.
The father who drank and hit. The debts.
The night her sorry excuse of a father tried to sell her virginity to a debt collector.
The night she ran with River on her hip and sixty-two dollars and no plan except away.
She told me about her years as a pole dancer in Vegas and how that was the one thing that was the biggest blessing in her life.
It gave her back her confidence and helped her to slowly shape the life she wanted.
By the time she told me about the move to Chestnut Ridge and building the studio from nothing, I was already half way in love with her. I just didn’t know it then.
She told me all of it the way you tell someone directions. Matter-of-fact. No self-pity. No performance of strength. Just: this is what happened, this is what I did, here we are.
I had never once in my life met anyone like her.
The horror of what she’d been through would have broken most people.
It hadn’t broken Maple. She went through fire, and came out gold.
When she talked about River acting up, about the fear of losing him to the wrong crowd, I wanted to reach across the table and take her hand.
I wanted to say: I’m here. I’ll help. You’re not doing this alone.
I hadn’t said any of that. Instead I had noted it quietly, tucked it away, and at the same time felt the familiar whisper in the back of my head without even knowing it was there: she’d never be accepted.
In my mother’s world. In my father’s expectations.
In the Sonnenberg name and everything that came with it.
I had gone to my parent’s house from that date smiling in a way I couldn’t control. Mom had seen me the moment I walked in and asked what I was so happy about. I had waved her off. But I was lighter than I’d felt in years, just from three hours of sitting across from Maple Brooks.
Then my father had come in and they’d started talking about the quarterly projections and the next charity gala and who was being seated where, and I slid back into my life like water finding its level. And at the back of my mind, the whisper: she would never fit here.
What kind of man doesn’t question that?
What kind of man feels what I felt and then files it under not practical and keeps going?
You know the kind.
When Maple invited me, I mean, when she accepted my clumsy request to attend River’s first game, I was extremely nervous.
Genuinely, actually nervous in a way I hadn’t been since I was a kid.
Which was absurd because I was thirty-nine years old and had run eight-figure negotiations without breaking a sweat, and I was nervous about a fourteen-year-old’s opinion of me.
But I needed River to like me. I understood now why that had mattered so much. It wasn’t just about Maple. It was because River was real to me. The kid I’d heard about on our first date, the kid for whom Maple had upended her entire life — I had wanted to know him. I had wanted him to know me.
After the game, River had given me the teenage attitude. Arms crossed, phone out, the full defensive package. I talked soccer at him methodically, question after question, because it was the only door I could see and I was going to knock on it until something happened.
And something happened at the pizza place.
River slid into the booth across from me, phone already out, not looking at me.
I said: “Back four or back three?”
Nothing.
“Against a high press,” I said. “Back four or back three?”
The phone lowered. Just slightly. “Back three. Obviously.”
“Why obviously?”
And that was it. Twenty minutes later the phone was face-down on the table and River was using the saltshaker to demonstrate a defensive line collapse while I moved the pepper grinder to show the press.
He scored a point. He grinned.
I thought: I know this kid.
I had never had a sibling. I had wanted one my entire childhood. I had wanted a brother specifically, someone to do stupid things with and argue with and stand next to. I had not found that until I sat across from a fourteen-year-old in a pizza place talking about corner kicks.
And Maple’s face. I looked up from the conversation at some point and saw her face across the table, and she had been watching us with an expression I had never seen on her before.
Not happy exactly. More like: relieved. Like a weight she’d been carrying alone had been shared, just slightly, just enough.
I let that down.
I let all of it down with one drunken, cowardly conversation.
Because here was the truth I had been sitting with for two weeks: every word I had said that night was what I was already thinking my mother would say if I got serious about Maple.
My mother’s voice, my father’s expectations, the Sonnenberg family rulebook that I had been absorbing since childhood, coming out of my mouth because Kyle had asked me what I was already subconsciously scared of admitting to myself, and the whiskey made the distance between what my parents would say and what I said disappear entirely.
A Sonnenberg doesn’t marry a pole dancer.
And I had said it out loud, to Kyle, laughing, while Maple stood on the other side of a door.
My phone rang. It was Kyle.
I stared at it for a second. Then I picked up.
“Hey.” Kyle said. “Are you still terrible?”
“I’m fine.”
“I’m really sorry about that night, Cade.” Kyle said for the hundredth time since I had fucked up. “As I said Kyle, it was not about you. What I said— I was entirely responsible for it. One hundred percent.” I said.
“I still feel I was responsible somehow, Cade. I shouldn’t have taken you upstairs that night.”
“It’s fine. Anyway, how did the first call with the investors go?” I asked.
“Better than I could hope.” Cade said. “Why don’t we meet for lunch and talk more about it? It will also take your mind off things. Sapphire has also been worried about you. I’d ask her to join.”
“I can’t. I have to go to the town council.” That was a big part of Phase Two, but I wasn’t ready to spill all the details about it yet.”
A pause. “The town council. Why?”
“I’m making a donation to the Fall Festival fund. And I want to speak with the events director about something.”
Another pause. Longer this time. “Cade. What are you doing?”
“Something I should have done a long time ago.”
“This is about Maple.”
“Yes.”
Kyle was quiet for a moment. When he spoke again, his voice had shifted slightly. “You really love her that much?”
“I need her, Kyle.” I said it simply, because it was simple. “I need her and I need River in my life. I’m going to make this right in whatever way I have to.”
“Okay.” He said it slowly, like he was processing. “Okay, man. I’ve never seen you like this about anyone. Not once. You know that, right?”
“I know.”
“And your parents—“
“If they can’t handle my choices,” I said, “I don’t owe them an explanation beyond that.”
Kyle was quiet again. “Alright then. Good luck with winning her back, man.”
I pulled into the town hall parking lot, and had one foot out of the car when someone hugged me from the side.
I spun around.
Sapphire was dressed like she was going somewhere significantly more interesting than a town hall. She beamed at me.
“Surprise!”
I looked around the parking lot, then back at her. “What are you doing here?”
“I was supposed to meet you and Kyle for lunch, but then Kyle said you weren’t coming and that you’d be here, so I thought I’d come say hi.” She tilted her head. “You look terrible.”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re not fine. I’m really sorry about what happened with Maple. Kyle told me.”
“Thanks Sapphire.” I said and started walking towards the entrance. She fell into step beside me.
“Are you going to see Sue Robbins? I’m going there too.” She breathed out as she quickened her steps to keep up to my speed.
“No, I’m going to meet the Events Volunteer Coordinator. I think her name is Jasmine Simmons.”
Sapphire stopped in her tracks and I stopped involuntarily too. “Wait a second,” she said. “Is this about Maple? Are you trying to get yourself into her dance class somehow?”
That was some smart deduction. I glanced at her. “Yes.” I said.
“Why?”
“What do you mean, why?”
“I mean—“ She spread her hands. “Come on, Cade. I know everything about what happened that night. I know the words you spoke about Maple were mean. But, what you said was not entirely wrong.”
“Which way do you not see that as wrong, Sapphire?”
“Look, Cade. I understand you’re feeling guilty that she heard you.
Maybe even sad because you miss her. But the truth is, your parents would never accept her.
She really doesn’t belong in your lifestyle, in your family.
What you said came out from deep within.
And you know it was the truth.” I was filled with rage, but didn’t want to create a scene in front of the town council and ruin the only plan I had to place myself back into Maple’s life.
“I’ve known you my entire life, Cade.” Sapphire continued, mistaking my silence for acknowledgement. “You’ve never chased anyone. Not once, in the entire time I’ve known you. You don’t do this.”
“I do now.” I said with clenched teeth.
“But why her?” She shook her head. “You’ve been connected to some incredible women. Women who fit your life—“
“Because I’ve never connected with anyone the way I connected with her.” I kept walking. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I have an appointment.”
Sapphire stepped in front of me. She was about to say something when I looked past her at someone approaching the entrance from the other side. . I literally pushed Sapphire aside to get a better look.
Maple. She had a folder of papers tucked under her arm.
Her hair was down the way she wore it when she wasn’t teaching.
She was moving fast. Then she spotted me and stopped.
She looked at me, then looked at Sapphire standing next to me.
Then she looked at the gap between us, which was not nearly as large as it should have been given the circumstances.
She started moving again. Faster.
“Maple—“ I started toward her. “Maple, wait—“
Sapphire followed. Of course she did.
Maple stopped at the top of the steps, one hand on the door, and looked at me. “Are you following me?”
“No — I had an appointment—“
“He’s not following you,” Sapphire said, appearing at my shoulder. “Maybe you’re following him. Maybe you realized you walked away from a very good catch and now you’re desperate to have him back.”
“Sapphire!” My voice came out sharp and flat and completely done. “Do NOT say another word.”
She blinked at me.
“Not ONE word.”
I turned to Maple. She was watching this with a tiredness around her eyes.
I physically resisted the urge to hug her.
“I will not hear one word against her. Not from you, not from anyone.” Sapphire went very still.
Maple looked at me. “I’m not interested in this drama.
Looks like you two are having a great time out here. Have fun.” She pushed open the door.
“Maple—“
“What about everything you said about her?” Sapphire said behind me, and I heard her but I was already moving toward Maple. “None of it was wrong—“
I caught up to Maple’s fast steps. “We’re not together,” I said to Maple. Quickly. Clearly. “Me and Sapphire. We are not together and we have not been together.”
Sapphire laughed. Not a nice laugh. “No, we’re not together now. But we were. Weren’t we, Cade?”
She looked at Maple.
“I was a great fuck too. Ask him.”
Maple looked at me for one long second.
“Whatever,” she said. And she went inside.
I stood on the town hall steps and stared at the door she’d disappeared through.
Sapphire was still there. I could feel her next to me.
“She’s not right for you,” she said. Quieter now.
Almost gentle. “I did what I did because I care about you. You know that.” I turned and looked at her. “Get lost, Sapphire.” I said.
I walked into the town hall.
Jasmine Simmon’s office was on the second floor.
I took the stairs. I was more sure of what I was doing than I had been of anything in years.
Maple had just seen me with Sapphire, and Sapphire had said what she’d said, and Maple had walked away, and I still had a meeting to get to and a plan to execute, because giving up was not something I was going to do.
She had spent her whole life around people who gave up on her.
I was not going to be another one.
***