TWENTY
Luke
Mallory was gone for three full days before I lost it. I drove out to The Landing at noon and spent six hours there, drinking my pain away. When Baker and Wolfe showed up after work to try to get me to go home, I tried to fight them. Lucky for me, I wasn’t able to do more than just stagger around the bar.
“Let’s get you home,” Wolfe said as he and Baker each grabbed one of my arms. I didn’t want to go home, but I knew I needed to get out of this bar.
In Baker’s truck, I sat in the passenger seat with my head almost completely out of the window, just in case. I hadn’t thrown up from drinking in several years, but the way I felt, I knew it was a definite possibility. Behind us, Wolfe followed along behind the truck. When we got to my apartment, they had to more or less carry me up the stairs. They deposited me into the bathroom.
“Throw up, take a shower, do whatever you have to do to get yourself cleaned up,” Baker demanded in a harsh voice. He’d never been serious a day in his life, but here he was, firm and even fatherly. Rainey must have rubbed off on him. I groaned when I wondered what Rainey and Gabby would have to say about this. Lucky for me, Rainey was getting ready to visit Mallory in Boston and Gabby was busy helping Irene get the Wells’ house ready for the sale.
The door slammed behind Baker and I was left alone with my thoughts. I thought I might feel better if I purged, so I leaned over the toilet and let go. Several minutes later, my head cleared a little and I was able to start the shower. The steamy water refreshed me even more. When I stepped from the shower, I felt like this afternoon was some long ago dream. Or nightmare. But I was reminded of exactly what I’d done when I stepped out of the bathroom and into my living room. I had thrown on a pair of jeans and a t-shirt I had hanging on the back of the door in the bathroom. Wolfe and Baker stared me down as I approached them in the kitchen.
Wolfe leaned casually against the counter while Baker stood rigid in the center of my kitchen, arms folded across his chest. I was about to be scolded and I never felt like I deserved it more. Wolfe handed me a bottle of water and a handful of aspirin. I took them gratefully.
“Are you an idiot?” Baker asked me after another minute of silence.
“It would seem so,” Wolfe replied for me. He was right, of course. I was an idiot. I never should have let Mallory go back to Boston, never should have started drinking today, and never should have become friends with these two.
“I have my reasons,” I mumbled. I swigged more water.
“Reasons for ruining your life? Do tell,” Baker insisted.
He wasn’t going to back down and I suddenly wished for the days when we would joke nonstop. I wasn’t too sure I liked this serious Baker.
“Mallory and I are done. She told me so herself. She doesn’t want anything to do with me. I never should have gotten involved with her when she came back. She wasn’t looking for some commitment, she only came home to bury her father. I think that much is obvious. And as to my drinking, I know it was stupid. But I couldn’t deal with the pain of being again,” I explained.
“Alcohol won’t numb the pain, Luke. If anything, it worsens it. Trust me, I know,” Wolfe said quietly. I looked at him and realized how much he understood exactly how I felt. Mallory and I might not have been married, but we had been so happy. And now all that remain between us was regret and broken promises.
“You’re right,” I said. “Thank you both for getting me out of there when you did.” It was a thanks and apology all rolled into one. They both nodded.
“So, now that you’re coherent, what are you going to do about Mallory?” Wolfe asked.
I was confused. “Do? There’s nothing to do. She’s gone,” I said. The words gripped my heart and shred it into a million tiny pieces.
“Only if you let her go. She still has feelings for you, Luke,” Baker insisted.
I knew he was right. She’d told me as much the night before she left. I want you to want to be where I am. Was she saying she wanted me to come to Boston? To make some romantic gesture to her? I wasn’t sure, but I wasn’t about to move to Boston, either. I hated the city.
“I know she does. And I am in love with her. But it doesn’t matter if we can’t work our problems out. There are too many complications,” I said.
“You’re a coward,” Wolfe spat.
“Excuse me?” My head was still a bit cloudy, but he couldn’t be talking to me.
“You are. The woman you love wants to be with you, she just doesn’t know how. If Gabby asked me to stop the earth so we could be together, I wouldn’t stop until I found a way to do it. I would do anything to keep her in my life,” Wolfe said, and then emphasized, “Anything.”
His words sparked the harsh reality of what I was letting go. Mallory wasn’t just a fling for me, she wasn’t someone I had a one-night stand with and could easily toss aside. She was Mallory. My first love, and really, my only. I’d been with women in our time apart, but none had evoked the emotions in me that she did. None of them completed me, as cliché as that was. I could be myself around her without worrying she would be unimpressed or repulsed. She had been my best friend. And I wasn’t ready to let that go. Not without a fight.
“You’re right,” I said.
“You’re damn straight he’s right. I’m sick of watching this soap opera of your life, Luke. Mallory is the one, you dumbass. So stop trying to run away from her and get your shit together,” Baker scolded.
Again, he was this fatherly figure who knew more than I did and wanted me to make the right decisions. What happened to the guy who only wanted to drink beer and chase tail? Rainey had changed him. I found it astonishing and terrifying.
I begged for an answer. “So what do I do to get her back?” A headache formed in the back of my brain and I knew I would feel it for a while. I rubbed the back of my head to try to ease the pain, but to no avail.
“How much do you love her?” Wolfe asked.
“What?”
Baker glanced at me. “How much are you willing to sacrifice in order to be with her?”
There it was, the word I had been afraid of since she was sixteen and told me she wanted to go to Boston for college: sacrifice. The truth was, I hadn’t been ready to sacrifice anything back then. I was a stupid kid who thought the girl I loved would follow me anywhere, even if I didn’t go anyplace.
“Anything,” I breathed. It was true. I wanted nothing more in my life than to be with her. She was like my own personal sun and every breath I took revolved around her. I couldn’t stand to be without her any longer.
“Move to Boston.”
I blinked at Baker’s words. Was that the answer? Would moving to Boston really make her happy? I wasn’t so sure.
“But—”
“No buts, Luke. If you want to spend your life with her, then you have to give up your life. Move to Boston, like she asked you to three years ago. Make the ultimate sacrifice for her. She’s already lost her dad, she doesn’t want to lose you, too. But she doesn’t want to be the only one making sacrifices, either,” Wolfe said.
It sounded like he knew what he was talking about. I nodded to acknowledge his words but I didn’t speak. I couldn’t. Was I capable of giving up my entire life just to be a part of hers? As much as it sounded like the perfect plan, I didn’t even know how to begin. My confusion must have been apparent, as Baker gave me his opinion.
“This is how I see it: you move out of this apartment, pack up all your stuff, and show up at her door,” he suggested.
For all his claims about my soap opera life, his option seemed too dramatic for me.
“Wait a second,” I said as a frightening thought occurred to me. “What if she doesn’t actually want to be with me and this plan backfires?”
“Well, I can take over you apartment. I’ve been looking for something else for a few weeks,” Wolfe said. “So if she still turns you down, you won’t really lose anything. But my name will be on the lease instead of yours and so you’ll just be staying with me until you find a new place.”
“This isn’t just some psychotic plan to steal my apartment, is it?”
“Yes, Luke, he’s been plotting to steal your apartment while you’ve been a dumbass,” Baker joked. That was the Baker I remembered. He always saw the lighter side of every situation.
I laughed along with them and mentally planned my trip. I would pack tonight and leave in the morning.