Everly

I stayed away for a week. It was a week full of driving to the next suburb to go on walks, of burying myself in the blog, of focusing on my studies. But that focus was hard to come by.

I baked—Lord, did I bake. The receptionist at the old persons’ home down the road actually groaned when she saw me on day three, complaining I was giving the few healthy residents left diabetes.

“Sorry.” I’d smiled, then shrugged. “Maybe you can give them to some of the doctors instead?”

“Maybe.” She hadn’t seemed impressed with the idea.

Cameron hadn’t tried to contact me, and for that, I’d been grateful. I only saw him walk down my street once, and as soon as I did, I closed the curtains tight. I couldn’t see him. Couldn’t speak to him. Not yet.

Because as much as my days belonged to me, as much as I filled them with activity and work and general busy-ness, my nights belonged to him. I woke in a cold sweat, images of his hard body wrapped around mine so vivid in my brain. His lips scorching my skin burned through dream after dream.

With the sheets twisted around my legs and the ceiling fan blowing air around the room that was hot, too hot, guilt washed over me. Guilt for the things that had happened in the dreams, but worse—guilt for wanting the dreams to become reality.

And when the bunch of flowers arrived on my doorstep, I knew who they were from.

I just had no idea what to do next.

“What do you think?” I asked Jo, hoping for more of that sage sisterly advice she’d dished out when I first mentioned I was befriending Cameron Lewis. Strength. I needed the strength to say no, when right now, all my body wanted was to say yes, yes, yes.

“I think you should go for it.”

“I—pardon?”

“I think you should go for it.” She said the words simply, as if it truly were that easy. “I know you said he pushed you away after that kiss, but he brought you flowers. Flowers don’t mean ‘I miss you, my friend, and haven’t seen you for a week.’ Flowers mean ‘Let’s make out, bitch.’”

“Let’s make out?” I raised my eyebrows.

“You get the gist.” Jo brushed my comment off. “I think he likes you, or if he doesn’t, he at least knows he wants something with you—and he’s just trying to figure out what. So you should go for it. Be there for him as a friend, and if it turns into something more … well, that’s great.”

“But you said getting involved with him was a bad idea. You said no good could come—”

“I said you should talk to Sherrilyn about it. I said your heart might get broken, but, sweetie”—her tone gentled—“it sounds like it already is.”

Was it really that simple?

I liked Cameron. I knew I wanted to be with him. But I also knew he had pushed me away. Could we go back to being just friends, or would it hurt too much? And if I was to try take things further, would the guilt at what I was doing eat me alive?

“What about Bella?” I asked. “She’s—”

“Dead,” Jo finished simply.

“Joanna,” I warned.

“She is. And I know it’s horrible, and I know you feel responsible, but this is his life. His choice. I know you, and you’re hardly going to force the guy to be your man.”

“Yes, but he’s not over her. He’s not ready to move on, and Bella wouldn’t want him to. Not when she was his life.”

“Do you really think she was that selfish?” Jo asked.

“No! She wasn’t selfish, and—”

“And nothing. You’re making all these assumptions, when really, the only person who gets to decide if he’s ready, who gets to decide if Bella would want this or not, is Cameron. You might feel responsible for her death, but you didn’t orchestrate it in some sordid attempt to end up with him. Your feelings for him are new, and there’s nothing to stop you acting on them except your own stubborn sense of what’s right. Only here’s the thing—you’re not doing what’s right for you. And that is the most important thing of all, because if you don’t look out for yourself, no one else will.”

“That’s not entirely true. I have you, don’t I?” I diverted the topic, hoping to get her off my back.

“Of course you do.” Jo sighed. “And I’m sure you’d have Mum, if you’d let her. You know she’s sorry, Ev. She feels terrible about what she did.”

“What she did?” I gaped. “I think the problem was what she didn’t.”

Raise us. Act like a parent. Things she’d failed miserably at.

“It was a long time ago.” Jo went quiet for a moment, then, “Do you want to say hel—”

“No. Thanks, but no.”

Some problems were too big for me to overcome with a simple phone call.

Half an hour later, as I wiped the cake tin with a tea towel, I thought about my sister’s words. Do what’s right for you.

If I’d met Cam on the beach that day, if our friendship was as organic as he believed, would I still harbour this sense of guilt? Would I still feel like I was betraying a dead woman for having a crush on her husband?

Memories of the attack flickered in my mind. The stagnant air in the car. Bentley’s disgusted glances at me, as if he was repulsed by my presence and the weakness I’d shown. The news, so loud on the radio, breaking the silence.

The phone rang from where I’d placed it on the bench.

Bentley.

Ironic. What did he want? Why was he calling again now?

As I stared at his name flashing on the screen, the questions kept coming. Why had he cheated on me? Why had he blamed me for everything? And when did I become so used to accepting responsibility that I just added the death of Isabella Kennedy to my plate?

Rage fired through me from nowhere. I slammed the cake tin on the counter with a clunk, the noise competing with the phone. How dare he?

It rang again, and I picked it up. “Hi,” I said, clipped.

“Well, hello to you too. Is that the polite way to greet your husband?”

“What do you want, Bentley?” I asked, keeping my voice level. Perhaps the tenants had a problem with the house, and the real estate had called him again instead of me.

“I was just calling to see if you felt like having dinner together tonight.”

“What?” My voice rose in pitch. “You’re losing the plot. No way.”

“Oh, Everly. That’s a little rough.”

“A little rough was cheating on me. A little rough was blaming me for what happened with …” Pain squeezed a vice-like grip around my heart. Infertility. Such a simple word to describe such a complex situation.

“I … I made some mistakes.” Bentley’s voice was so soft that I pulled back the phone to check the connection. “But you have to admit, you did too. It takes two to—”

“I know,” I said, breathing heavy. If only he knew the depth of the mistakes I held against my name now. “Look, why don’t you go back to Linda, or whatever her name is, and leave me alone.”

“Actually, that was what I was calling to talk to you about.” He cleared his throat. “I wanted to tell you over dinner, but since you’re acting so irrationally—”

“I’m acting irrationally?”

“We’re pregnant.”

Oh.

I closed my eyes, leaning against the counter. Pregnant. Bentley was going to be a dad. The man I thought I’d share a family with was going to have one—with somebody else.

“Evvie? You still there?”

I nodded. “Yes. Yes, still here.”

All the fight left me. He didn’t say it, but he didn’t have to.

It must have been me.

I really was the reason we couldn’t have a baby.

“I hope you don’t take this too hard. I know you always wanted a family. Hey, I’m sure Linda wouldn’t mind if you came and saw our kid every now and then. Babysat, and all tha—”

What the fuck?

“It’s fine, Bentley.” My voice was slow. “Was there anything else?”

“No. That’s … that’s it.”

I ended the call without a goodbye, placing the phone on the counter. I was broken. Fundamentally. As a woman.

The news hurt, but once, it would have devastated me. Now, it was almost as if it were happening to someone else.

Slowly, I looked around the room. No photos. No personal touches. It was how I liked it, a reminder to not let anyone get too close, but the more I stared, the sadder it seemed. Was that what Bentley’s betrayal, what the attack had reduced me to? Someone who was too afraid to love? Someone who was so full of self-pity, she daren’t take a chance?

The answer was suddenly clear.

No.

I was not that girl.

I’d fought to be free of that monster in the past, and I’d fight to do it again.

I opened the door to the bin and jerked out Cameron’s bunch of flowers. It wasn’t my fault that Isabella had died.

It wasn’t my fault. It was as if a light bulb had just switched on.

“You forced her to go to that café, right at the time when a terrorist was about to visit?”

No. I hadn’t.

The choices had been out of my hands. Cam and Bella’s choice to go to Three Swallows. The terrorist’s choice to inflict an atrocity the moment he did.

I needed to stop blaming others for my unhappiness and disappointment. I needed to stop focusing on blame altogether.

I was unhappy because my marriage had failed to produce what I’d always wanted: love, children, and a happy future.

Somewhere along the line, I’d become convinced I was broken. And to some extent I was, because my heart had been smashed into tiny little pieces. But now, I knew.

The only person who could fix me was me. For me.

What I feel now is not my forever.