Chapter 12
I was coming out of my bedroom with a beach towel slung over my shoulder at the same time Max was coming out of his room.
“You look nice,” I said. He was wearing jeans and a t-shirt. Despite the fact that he hadn’t bothered to dress up one bit for his date, he still looked good. His hair was damp from his shower and he smelled great.
“Thanks,” he said as I followed him down the hallway.
“You smell really good, too,” I said. I mean, why not? He was going on a date. He might be nervous. He’d helped me feel better more times than I could count. Who doesn’t appreciate a compliment every now and then?
He looked at me over his shoulder as he swiped his wallet off the kitchen counter. One side of his lip quirked up. “Good to know,” he said.
“Is it new?” I blurted out. “Your cologne, I mean?”
He stuffed his wallet in his pocket and gave me a quizzical look. “Yeah, it is. We sell it in the gift shop.”
I knew it!
He raised an eyebrow at me and I realized I may have been smirking to myself. “I just really like it, that’s all.”
He didn’t seem to know what to say to that. I didn’t know what to add to it.
I stood there feeling awkward for a second. Despite this being more or less my idea, now that the evening had arrived, I wasn’t all that happy to see him go. I didn’t want to send him out into the world smelling so scrumptious. I especially didn’t want to send him off to Tori smelling that way. I tried to shake the thought from my head. What was wrong with me? It felt selfish to wish that Max would stay home.
“Are you sure—”
I cut him off, knowing where he was going with this already.
“Positive,” I said, though I really wasn’t. It had seemed like such a good idea at the start of the week. Now that his night out with Tori was looming, I wasn’t happy about it and I wasn’t exactly sure why. I was saved from pondering it anymore because my phone rang. I did a quick scan of the kitchen and spotted it sitting on top of a tray of beads. “Okay then, have fun tonight,” I said.
“I’m sure I will,” he replied. I was fairly certain he was going for sarcasm. I smiled and pretended I didn’t notice. I snatched my phone off the table and let myself out through the deck door.
“This is your official one month check-up,” Lanna told me. “I’m calling to see how things are going. Not the sugar-coated version. I want the real deal. Spill it. Spill it all.”
I shrugged to myself as I traipsed, barefooted, over the sand. “Good. Things are going good.”
She paused. “That’s it? You’re going to need to give me more than that.”
“Okay,” I took a deep breath. “Here’s the deal. Since I’ve been here, I’ve hardly thought about Collin at all. Wait, that’s not true. He was all I could think about those first few days, maybe even weeks. But Max, he kept me so busy I didn’t dwell on it. Not like I could have, anyway. Now that there’s some time and distance between us, I’ve had time to really think things over.”
“And?” she impatiently pressed.
“And I think you were right,” I said as I whipped my towel out, trying to spread it across the beach. It was surprisingly gorgeous for this late in the evening. However, the light breeze made spreading out my towel in a one-handed fashion a little more difficult than I’d anticipated. “I think Collin and I were never a good fit. I think we were both pressured to fit into this nice, neat little relationship.” I had spent most of the week thinking over what she’d said to me. It had seemed so absurd at the time. Yet, after giving it some thought, doing some major soul-searching and reality-checking, I thought there may be at least some truth to what she’d said. “So we tried to make it work. But obviously, something was missing or simply not right if it was blown all to hell before it even really got started.”
“Have you talked to him yet?”
“He’s still calling. But I haven’t answered.” He’d increased the frequency of his calls to almost daily. Not once had he bothered to leave a message. I wished that he would, just to give me an idea of what he was calling about. For all I knew, he’d pawned the ring and wanted to let me know what he got for it. I knew I would have to deal with him eventually. But an admittedly childish part of me wanted to make him wait it out.
“So do you think you’re over him?” she hesitantly asked.
“Trying to be,” I answered. As for never being in love with him at all, as she’d suggested, I didn’t agree, not completely. I was pretty sure I had been in love with him. Just maybe not for the right reasons. “I’ve spent a lot of time thinking. I mean, what else do I have to do all day? The more time I spend with Max, the more I realize that I want someone like him,” I admitted.
I was met with dead silence and felt the sudden urge to back up the conversation.
“I mean, don’t worry, I don’t want Max. I just want someone like him. He’s just so good to me. He’s sweet, he listens to what I have to say, we have so much fun together. I mean, aside from you, he’s my best friend.”
“Huh,” was the stellar response I got from Lanna.
I raised my eyebrows and paced, waiting for her to tack something else onto the conversation. She didn’t and I stopped, frowning. I glanced up toward the house. Max was watching me as he made his way to the car. I lifted my hand in a wave. He waved back as he slowed. I was sure he couldn’t hear the conversation. Not with the gentle breeze and the sound of the waves dancing against the sand. He cocked his head to the side, as if he knew this conversation might pertain to him.
“But like I said, don’t worry, I’m not into Max,” I quickly assured her. I didn’t want her to be concerned that I’d mess up the dynamics of our friendships. “It’s just that thanks to him, I might kind of know what I’m looking for now.”
“I wouldn’t worry. At all,” she finally said. “I’m just surprised to hear you say that. You know I think Max is great.”
I watched as he got in the car, backed out, and disappeared down the road.
“I’m finally going to meet his grandparents. They’re having a Fourth of July celebration at the winery.” Somehow, so far, Max had always come up with excuses to not show me around. “He said they want to meet me. It’ll be nice to meet them too. He talks so much about them. Besides, I’ve been living in their house. I owe it to them to at least give them a thank you in person.”
“Meeting the family, huh?” Lanna asked with a little click of her tongue.
“Guess so,” I replied. I plopped myself down on the towel. It was bunched up in places but I didn’t particularly care. I sprawled out, enjoying the warmth of the late afternoon sun. “Have you seen Collin? I mean, have you seen him around town or heard what he’s up to?”
“Yes,” she said immediately. “And if I was a better friend, I’d probably sugar coat what I’m about to tell you. But—”
“You’re not a sugar-coating kind of person,” I said.
“Exactly. So I’m just going to tell you he’s been seeing Monica Miller.”
The words were like a mental slap in the face. “Oh,” was all I could manage.
“The thing is,” she said, this time her voice had softened, “he’s kind of…well…he’s been telling everyone that you left with Max because you two have something going on. And while the girls and I have been doing our best to do damage control, some people believe it because you left with Max the way you did. I’ve been doing my best to let people know that you left with Max because he’s your friend. And you only walked out on your own wedding after you caught your slime ball of a fiancé cheating.”
She stopped her ramble. I flew back into a sitting position and I shot out, “He’s blaming this mess on me?”
I could visualize Lanna nodding on the other end. “Yes. He’s simply trying to take the blame off of himself.”
“By turning it around on me.” I slumped back into to the sand.
“Yes.”
“That jerk,” I seethed. Maybe he’d been calling to tell me about Monica. That would be the decent thing to do. Yet there was nothing he could say that would justify putting blame on me for leaving with Max.
“Yes. Again,” Lanna said. “He is a jerk. I agree.”
“Max and I did not have anything going on before. We don’t have anything going on now,” I grumbled.
“Preaching to the choir, babe. I’m well-aware of just how platonic that relationship is. Collin seems to think—”
“If he makes it look like I’m to blame, like I was the one cheating all along…” I couldn’t even finish it.
“That even if he was caught once, it was only because you’d already broken his heart.”
With that realization, the last little tendril of love that I felt snapped. In that moment, I felt nothing for Collin but absolute disgust.
“Are you okay?” she asked. “Maybe I shouldn’t have told you but I thought you had a right to know. Not just that he was dating but especially about what he’s been saying.”
“I’m fine. Furious,” I clarified, “but fine. I just wish he would’ve left Max out of this. He’s a good guy and he doesn’t deserve to be dragged into this.”
“Speaking of our buddy Max, where is he?” she wondered.
“He’s out,” I said with a frown. “He just left.”
She hesitated but when she spoke again, she sounded flustered. “Out like, cruising in his car? I mean, I know he does that. He loves his car. That’s what you mean, right? Because you don’t mean he’s out like…?” She stopped as if unable to finish the thought. Or, at the very least, unable to finish the sentence.
“Yes, he’s on a date. There’s a girl, Tori, and she seems to really like him. It may not have been the best idea but I was kind of insistent that he go out with her.” I gave her a quick recap of what I was now thinking wasn’t a very brilliant plan, after all. I was met with silence. I peeked at my phone to be sure I hadn’t lost her. “Lanna?”
“You set Max up on a date?” she asked. She let out a laugh that resulted in more of a snort. “With a girl?”
“Of course with a girl,” I stated, not at all seeing her point.
Her laughter erupted over the phone line. “How did he take that?” she asked after she’d pulled herself together.
“Not well,” I admitted. My eyebrows were bunched in confusion. “Why are you laughing?”
She had stopped but the laughter still held in her voice. “Poor Max,” she said.
“Why would you say that?” I asked.
“It’s nothing,” she tried to assure me. “So, tell me, how were the big trees?”
***
I found myself constantly glancing at the clock. Max was out a lot later than I expected him to be. Ridiculous, really, that I thought he should be home at a decent time. He was an adult. He was on a date. He didn’t have to come home at all, I suddenly realized.
An unpleasant feeling coursed through me.
I wasn’t jealous, was I? I told myself I wasn’t. What kind of friend would I be if I was jealous of Max because he was out having fun? And I was sitting home alone on a Friday night, watching a bad movie and missing my best friend. I pushed the feeling away. I needed to be happy for Max. He should be out having fun. He shouldn’t be spending his time babysitting me and keeping me entertained. I wasn’t his responsibility.
Yet, if I were to be honest with myself, I’d have to admit that I was disappointed that he was out. And that I wasn’t. Absurd, considering he’d only agreed to go at my insistence. How capricious could I be? It was completely unfair to begrudge Max for having some fun.
I blamed my miserable mood on Collin. I’d been tossing the idea of him and Monica around all night, trying to get used to it. While I didn’t exactly like the thought of them together, I found that I really didn’t care. In fact, in a small way, it was a relief. If he was seeing someone then surely no one—meaning our parents—would be expecting us to get back together. In a strange, twisted, roundabout way, he’d done me a favor.
What I wasn’t happy about was his bad-mouthing Max. I was so angry about it; I almost called him to set him straight. The only thing that stopped me was fear that I’d catch him out on a date. I figured a call between us would be strained enough. I didn’t want to talk to him while Monica was hanging over his shoulder, or sitting on his lap, or doing whatever else it was she might be doing.
I decided my boredom was getting the best of me. I rarely, or never, sat home alone on a Friday night. I was always either out with Collin, or my friends. I couldn’t even call my friends because I knew they were all out, together, back in Chamberlain. I couldn’t expect them to stop what they were doing just to make chitchat with me because I was moping.
I knew that of course they would, they just shouldn’t have to.
I finally used the remote to click the TV off. I headed to my room. I wasn’t buried under the covers more than five minutes when headlights flashed through my window and sliced across the wall. I slammed my eyelids closed, telling myself I did not need to go check on him. That thought lasted until I heard the front door open and close.
I padded out of my room to the kitchen where I heard him getting a glass of water. He turned and gave me a small smile when he heard me coming.
“Did you have a good time?” I asked. I narrowed my eyes at him. His hair and shirt both looked a bit disheveled. I raised my eyebrows, curious.
His answer was a shrug.
“Was the music good?”
Another shrug. “It wasn’t bad.”
I took a step closer, squinting as he finished off his glass of water. I swiped a napkin out of the holder on the counter and slid it across the corner of his mouth. I held it up with a smirk, letting him see the lipstick smudge.
“You must’ve had kind of a good time.” I meant for the words to be light, despite the fact that my chest suddenly felt heavy.
He let out a sigh. “Yeah, I guess. She can be kind of aggressive. And she really doesn’t like to take no for an answer.”
Oddly, I didn’t want to ask for details. Normally, I would love to tease Max. But now, I couldn’t tear my gaze from his hair. It was obvious someone had been running their fingers through it. And I was pretty sure that someone wasn’t Max.
My fingers twitched, wanting to run through his hair, too. I blinked in surprise. I quickly told myself the only reason I would want to do that was to fix it. To pat it down, back into place like it should be. It was not because I was wondering if it was as soft as it looked.
It just wasn’t.
“You okay?” he asked. He was watching me warily.
“Um,” I muttered, wondering if I was. “Yeah, I’m fine.”
“Are you sure?” he asked. “Because for a minute there, you looked a little freaked out.”
“What? Me? No. Noooo,” I assured him. “I’m fine. Good. Great, really.”
He gave me a little nod. “Okay then, I’m going to bed.”
“Oh, okay,” I said.
He reached over and gave my shoulder a squeeze as he walked past me. I stood there, in the middle of the kitchen watching him go.
A dull ache set up residence in the pit of my stomach. To my dismay, I realized that I wasn’t jealous of Max because he was out having fun. I was jealous of Tori. I just wasn’t exactly sure why. Maybe because she was edging in on the time I could be spending with my best friend?
I glanced down at the napkin in my hand. The shimmery pink streak seemed to be mocking me. Confusion swirled through my veins. I thought there was a possibility, though I didn’t want to admit it to myself, that might not be the reason at all.