Chapter Three
Luke
“Dude, I’m all for having a good time and living it up, but maybe you should slow down? You have to go to work tomorrow. You can’t call off again.”
Evan reaches across the sofa to snag the bottle of beer from my hand. I don’t budge, aimlessly staring at the football game on television, the faded plaid couch an extension of my body at this point. I’m wearing the same jeans and T-shirt I wore yesterday, my black beanie keeping my semigreasy curls tucked away. Floyd is curled up on his back on my lap, giving me more motivation to not move an inch.
Evan goes to put the beer on the coffee table, but apparently changes his mind and starts swigging it.
I don’t care. I don’t care about anything.
“Did you hear me? Look, I love that you’re here and I think it’s awesome you’re having a good time and all. But I have rent to pay, you know?”
I turn to eye Evan, who is, in typical Evan fashion, talking way too much with his hands.
“Yeah, I know. I’m going to work tomorrow. I can’t stand sitting here another day anyway.”
“That’s the spirit. Look, I know this sucks right now, but give it a few weeks and you’ll be asking ‘Lila who?’ You’re not tied down anymore. You can have all the girls you want, and man, do I have some to show to you.”
He pats me on the back now, or more like slaps me, apparently in a gesture of male bonding.
It just pisses me off. We might have been best friends in high school, but we’re on completely different levels now. Evan, the eternal bachelor, is all about getting all the girls he wants. That’s just not me, not anymore.
You could find me fifty supermodels right now and tell me they’re mine for the taking, and it wouldn’t stir anything.
Because the fifty of them… they wouldn’t be her, not even close.
Evan jaunts off to the kitchen, probably to dig out some Fritos or something. I just stare, the murmur of the game blending into the background. I don’t see anything that’s happening. I barely hear Evan rambling on about tomorrow and bills and some bet he made with Steve.
I just keep playing the memories over and over, thinking about how I ended up here, and wondering how I’m ever going to move on from this.
Most of all, I sit and think about what a fool I’ve been and how I should’ve never let it come to this. My cell phone catches my eye on the coffee table.
It’s not too late. It’s only been a few days. Maybe it’s not too late.
But then I think about those final words I said, and the ultimate nail in the coffin. I think about that look in her eyes when I took that last box out of the apartment. It was a teary look and a pleading look. Still, somewhere in there, I saw something else.
A look of hope.
Maybe this is what Lila needed all along. Maybe I was an idiot for thinking I could be good enough for her, could be what she needed. I’m too far gone for that, too far lost to be the man Lila Morrow deserves. It’s about time I figured that out.
But it doesn’t make this shitty feeling in my chest any more bearable. It doesn’t make me want to stop drinking beer after beer, to go out there and live life.
The thought that Lila is no longer mine makes me want to do exactly what I’ve done for the two days since moving into Evan’s bachelor pad—sit, stare, and fade into nothingness.
No matter what Evan says, I’m not going to just forget about Lila. I’m not going to merge into the bachelor life seamlessly.
I’m not going to stop missing her and wondering how I could’ve stopped this train wreck from imploding.
I’m not going to stop wishing I could get her back but remembering that she’s better off without me.
So I stare at the television until I nod off, the morning alarm rousting me and Floyd from the plaid couch for the first time in half a day. I drag myself to the shower and finally rinse off the residue from the breakup days ago. I wash away the Luke I was with Lila and try to start fresh.
But the new start I thought we’d both get doesn’t feel too great, I realize, as I trudge out the door to work.
***
“There he is. The free man,” Dean bellows as I get out of my pickup truck, parked outside our latest job. It’s a gray day, drizzle mercifully bringing the temperature down. I could use a relatively easy day.
Dean’s already setting up at the tiny ranch house we’re working on today. He’s got the ladder out and is chipperly jaunting from his truck to the house, setting up tools, whistling annoyingly.
I’d be ready to choke him if it weren’t Dean. That’s just how the guy is. Eternally in a good mood. He readjusts his sunglasses, eyeing me as I pull out my thermos for some coffee. I know I look just as rough as I feel.
“You doing okay, buddy?” he asks, slapping my back. “You finish getting everything moved in? Sorry I couldn’t help you. Cassie’s parents were in for the weekend, and I had to do my time.”
“It’s okay. Yeah, we got everything in.”
“You really doing okay? You look like shit, if I’m being honest.”
I sigh. “I know. Just… it’s been rough.”
“I know. But listen, let’s just put in a hard day’s work, not talk about you-know-who, and maybe it’ll help. Things will be all right. Give it some time.”
“That’s what everyone keeps telling me. But I don’t know. I don’t know if I did the right thing,” I confess. Dean’s been a close friend, and he’s an honest friend. I know he won’t sugarcoat anything. Plus, unlike Evan, he’s out of the single-is-better phase.
Dean shrugs. “Just don’t think about it too much. It sucks, I know. You and Lila had a good thing going, and I liked her. I really liked her. It’s hard. But if it wasn’t meant to be, if it couldn’t work out, well, then you owe it to each other to try to move on and be happy. And, not to sound all sappy and shit, but if you’re meant to find your way back to each other, you will. In the meantime, enjoy the bachelor life. Drink some extra beers. Because someday, when you get married, you’ll be the one spending weekends with over-the-top in-laws eating Thai food and answering eight million questions about home repairs. Trust me,” he says, rolling his eyes.
I grin. “That bad?”
“Worse. I had a full two-hour conversation with her mother about the best types of blinds for the house. Seriously. The woman can’t give us an inch of space.”
I smile, letting Dean ramble on about his in-law problems, happy to drown myself in someone’s else’s world, even if just for our shift. Dean and I spend the day ripping up the old roof, the drizzle and cool temperatures making the work easier than normal. Once we’re done, we clean up, set things up for tomorrow’s task, and head to our vehicles.
“You want to go out or something?” I ask, thinking maybe everyone’s right. Maybe I just need to give this whole moving on thing a try, or at least the forgetting part.
“Can’t. We’re going blind shopping,” Dean says, grinning.
“Oh, man. They got to her then?”
“Uh-huh. Why didn’t anyone tell me on my wedding day that in four years, I’d be spending my Monday night blind shopping after a hellish weekend with in-laws?”
“You love her,” I say, grinning.
“Of course I do. But Jesus, sometimes, a guy needs to cling to his masculinity a little, you know? Not feel so tied down.”
I nod, saying goodbye to Dean as I jump in my truck, knowing all too well what he’s talking about. I head back to Evan’s, which still doesn’t feel like home or like mine. I head there, regardless, to think about things too complicated and exhausting for a Monday night. Mostly I think about how much freedom I have now—and how little I actually appreciate it.
Breaking up fucking sucks.