Chapter Twenty-Nine
Boyd handed Mason the last four quarters in his pocket and finished his beer. Claire sat with her legs crossed and her dark skirt in place. Boyd had not been able to sleep. He didn’t know how to fix things, wasn’t even sure what exactly went wrong. Claire tapped away on her phone and met his eyes. He rarely thought about the past these days, but now that she was sitting across from him, Boyd found he was curious. Maybe Cade was right and the way to Ella was moving through his past.
“Mason asked me if you missed out by not being with me.”
“What did you tell him?” she asked.
“Standard answer.”
“We love each other, but we’re not in love with each other,” they both said in concert. Boyd’s chest hurt, not for what they could have had because the older they got, the clearer it became that he and Claire were not meant for one another. He hurt for Mason, for what he sometimes felt was selfishness on their part.
“What are you doing, Boyd?” She huffed and set her phone on the table.
“Oh, hell. What did Mase say?”
“That you love Ella and that she loves you. She loves him too.”
“He has no way of knowing that.”
“Are you kidding? He’s smarter than both of us put together.”
Boyd said nothing.
“Do you ever notice that martyrs are never happy?”
“I’m not a martyr.”
“Oh but you are. You’ve got this whole single-dad thing going on. I’m grateful you’re raising our son, you know that, but let’s not overdo this, okay? You love that woman. I know you well enough to state that as a fact with or without our son’s input. You have never looked at anyone that way, including me.”
“Claire, I’m not going to sit here with you and discuss my private life.”
“Sure you are.” She sipped her beer. “I’m the only person you can talk to who isn’t invested.”
“How can you say that? Treat it like an analysis?”
“We all have our strengths.” She snickered. “I may not be a great mom, but I know how to assess a major mess. Your problem is you don’t like change. Never have.”
“You’re way off. Raising a kid is all about change, being adaptable.”
“When they’re little, absolutely, but you’re struggling now. Now that you can’t have it all your way.”
“Not true.”
“True. That’s why you make beer.”
“Oh, this should be good. Tell me, Claire, why do I make beer?”
“Because you can control all the ingredients. You go to your happy place, growl at anyone who comes near you, and you create what you want.”
He had no words. How was it that he saw this woman twice a year and she was suddenly qualified to be his shrink?
“Mason was your biggest change to date. You had a baby with a woman who left you and her son.”
“I never blame you for that.”
“I’m not saying you do. You are the best person to raise him, but he’s getting older. Unless you want to make a complete ass out of yourself, you need to find a life outside of his calendar and blossoming interest in girls.”
“I have a life. I’m fine.”
“Be more than fine, Boyd. Let the doctor love you. You deserve to be loved.” She pushed the rest of her beer aside as if remembering she needed to leave. After applying her lipstick using a small mirror she pulled from her purse, she wiped some of it off with the napkin.
The pinball machine dinged from the back room and Boyd could barely make out the muffle of other people as he stared silently at a woman he’d known since college.
“By the way, you need to change your answer the next time our son asks you that question.”
“What?”
“The answer is yes. Yes, I did miss out by not being with you. I think it hurt and changed you and for that, I am so sorry. That’s mine. I have to live with the fact that I chose me over you, over both of you. I’m working on making peace with that, but in the meantime, be more than fine, Boyd. You are…” Her eyes teared up and Boyd instinctively reached for her, the mother of his son. “Don’t.” She held up her hands. “Listen to me because I’ll never say this again. You are an exquisite man, a truly good human being. I will be forever grateful to you for loving our son. So yes, Boyd. I did miss out. Don’t you do the same. Go love that woman for crying out loud. Accept the craziness that might bring. Haven’t you spent enough time keeping the peace?”
Boyd swallowed a lump in his throat as feelings he didn’t even know he had flooded to the surface.
“There’s so much of you in him.”
The tears spilled down her cheeks and she nodded, quickly brushing them away. “I have a flight to catch.”
He helped her with her coat and kissed her softly on her forehead. She wrapped her arms around him.
“Be kind,” she said.
His chest tightened and he understood why he shut some things out. Not because Claire broke his heart, but because they’d shared so much, been through so much. The fact that nothing other than Mason worked out, didn’t mean there wasn’t history and the pain and sweat of trying.
“Be strong,” he said.
She pulled away and quickly wiped her eyes. “Do you still say that with him?”
“Yeah.”
“Does he know it used to be our thing?”
He shook his head. He couldn’t speak.
She grinned, the past and the ache right there on the edges. “Keep it that way. Keep it alive with him.”
By the time Boyd exhaled, she got into a taxi and was gone.