“I have something I need to talk to you about.” Jill sounds nervous as she sits next to me on the couch the next morning before she goes to work, and a pang of anxiety darts through my chest.
“What?”
“Our lease is up for renewal on October first.”
I nod. The date is marked in my calendar, but now that I know for sure I’m not moving in with Brian, I just assumed we’d let the renewal happen like we’ve done for the past three years.
She clears her throat. “We have to give thirty days’ notice if we plan to move.”
My brows draw in.
“I...um—it’s just...” She draws in a breath then blurts out the words. “Becker asked me to move in with him.”
My jaw drops a bit. “He did?”
She nods. She looks so nervous to tell me that I can’t help but lean over to give her an awkward couch hug. “I’m so happy for you.”
“But what about you?”
I lift a shoulder, masking the fact that the same thought is running through my head. I’ll have to give up what seems to be the one good thing I have going for me—sharing a house I love with my best friend. There’s no way I can afford the rent on this place by myself, and I don’t want to live alone. I’ve never lived alone. Jill has been my roommate since I moved out of my parents’ house.
I shake my head. Jill doesn’t need to worry about it. She just needs to know she has her best friend’s support. “I’ll figure something out.”
Maybe I should just move back to Phoenix. I’d consider the option if I wasn’t tied into a contract and about to start a new school year in a few days. I think of Tess next. I wonder if she’d let me crash in her guest room for a while, or we could get a new place together.
After my conversation with Jill, I decide sitting around wondering what to do won’t get me anywhere. In an effort to utilize my energy for something good, I go to school. I check in with the secretary and get my keys. I pop my head into my principal’s office, but he’s in a meeting with another teacher. I’ll try again before I go home.
I head to my classroom, and it looks just like I left it in May but with cleaner carpets. Desks are stacked against one wall, and I start the tedious and sweaty process of unstacking them and putting them into a new seating arrangement. We’ll start the year in pods of four and see where it takes us.
This all feels so meaningless, the workout of moving desks and chairs, wiping down my white boards, logging onto my computer. I go through the motions, but I have no emotional ties to any of it. I write up goals and the date for the first day of school and organize my desk drawers. I print my syllabus. It’s all shit I can do next week with the inevitable time we’ll get in our classrooms, but now it’s done.
I decide to start the copies of my six-paged syllabus in the copy room before I head back to Mr. Monroe’s office.
When I walk in, I see the one person I was hoping not to run into today.
His brows shoot up when he sees me. He’s wearing khaki shorts and a black Desert Lights High School shirt and he holds a piece of paper in his hands. His light brown hair is shorter than it used to be, and his eyes seem like a richer shade of dark chocolate than I remember. “Reese Brady,” he says, his lips tipping up in a smile.
“Justin Nolan,” I say, mimicking his tone.
It’s funny how less than a year ago, this was the guy I thought I was going to marry someday. Looking at him now after everything I’ve been through in the past few months, I can honestly say I don’t feel a thing for him anymore.
My parents loved him, he fit in well with my sister and Ben, and I saw a happy future with him. It was the very second things started getting serious that he wanted out. He wasn’t ready for marriage and kids, and nothing proved that more than the day he broke my heart by throwing the opposite of the old cliché at me. It wasn’t him, it was me.
He just didn’t see me as his wife.
It was a sad reality I finally moved on from, and now here he stands in the copy room. I managed to avoid him except at faculty meetings the last half of last year. It was easy since he’s in the science department and I teach English.
“How was your summer?” he asks.
I can’t help my grimace as I reflect on Reese’s Summer of Sin in Sin City. “Eventful. Yours?”
He nods. “It was good.” He looks down at the sheet of paper in his hands and I step over to one of the open copiers. I punch the numbers I need into the machine and start the job.
It’s a little awkward standing in silence in a room containing only my ex and me, but he breaks the silence with small talk.
“What sort of events filled your summer?”
I debate how much to tell him. “I started seeing someone.” I’m not sure why those are the words that slip out. Maybe to be hurtful, or maybe to just let him know I’ve moved on.
He smiles. “Good. I’m happy for you.”
“I’m not seeing him anymore.” I watch as the pages flip out of the machine into the tray.
“Oh.”
“I traveled a little. Phoenix, Los Angeles, Chicago.” I leave it at that. He doesn’t need to know who I was with or why I went.
He sets some more papers in the copier he stands in front of and punches in some numbers. “How are the Bradys?”
“They’re good. My sister’s the same, still with Ben. They just got engaged. How’s your family?” It’s weird to be making small talk with someone I was about to make a lifelong commitment to just eight months ago, but at this point I can hardly remember our time together.
“Good. My sister started dating some guy from New York.”
“New York? How did that happen?”
“He threw out a bunch of money at her table one night and they got to talking. He only played at her table because he was attracted to her.” She’s a blackjack dealer downtown.
I chuckle. “And she fell for that?”
“She fell for him, I guess.”
“What did you do all summer?” I ask.
He lifts a shoulder. “I had science camp with the kids. Spent some time volunteering, building houses with Habitat for Humanity.”
“Ugh,” I mutter as I think about what a truly good guy he is. We could’ve had it all, but he chose to end it and now I’m not even a little bit in that place anymore.
Instead, I find myself hung up on an unattainable rock star like some obsessed teenager who needs to get a life.
Seeing Justin sparks a new fire in me.
Who knew all it would take is a heart shattered by a pair of brothers to find some closure with my ex?
“You want to grab a drink?” Justin asks. My head whips up from watching the monotonous papers roll out of the machine, newly decorated with the black ink from the words I typed.
“Oh, I don’t think so. But thanks for offering.”
He doesn’t do a very good job hiding the fact that he’s offended by my rejection.
“I’m just not in a place to grab a drink with an ex right now,” I say.
Understanding lights his eyes. “I didn’t mean like that,” he says. “I’m...uh—I’ve met someone.”
“You’ve met someone?” I ask. In the past, the fact that he’d moved on might’ve hurt me. But hearing it now doesn’t have that effect on me.
He nods. “At science camp, of all places.”
I chuckle. He’s pretty hot for a science nerd. “I’m happy for you, Justin.”
“Thanks. I only asked because you seem like you could use a friend.”
“What makes you say that?” I ask.
“The way you’re staring at those copies like you want them to hurry up so you can run the hell out of here. The way you’ve heaved out enough carbon dioxide to make a can of soda.”
My brows furrow.
“Carbon dioxide is what we breathe out, and it’s also used in carbonated beverages,” he says, as if he just clarified his earlier statement.
My brows draw down further.
“You’re exhaling a lot,” he says, pulling his papers from his copy machine. He gathers up the other papers he copied and steps closer to me. “Sighing. I’ve never seen you like this, and you might recall my soft shoulder and open ear and all that if you need someone to talk to.”
He’s inviting me to spill my guts using the words he always said to me when I was having a bad day.
“Thanks, Justin. I appreciate it. I’ll be okay.”
“What happened to you, Reese?” he asks softly.
“I had my heart broken.”
He touches my shoulder in a friendly gesture. “You became my best friend when we were together, and I miss that. I miss our friendship. I miss you.” I keep my eyes focused on the copy machine. “The only reason I ended things was because you started feeling more like a friend to me than a girlfriend. But that feeling of love—friend or otherwise—it doesn’t just disappear overnight.”
I nod, refusing to move my focus from my papers, refusing to let the heat burning behind my eyes turn into tears. “Thanks,” I whisper, and then he leaves.
My copies finish running and I head for Mr. Monroe’s office. “Come on in,” he says when I knock on the doorframe.
“You wanted to see me?” I want to ask about his connection to Brian, but I’m not sure how to work it into the conversation.
“Yes. Have a seat.” He clicks a few buttons on his computer then faces me. I study him for a few beats. William Monroe is in his sixties, I think, and he has grey hair and wears glasses and a suit to work every day. He’s shrewd and smart, and I feel a little like I’m in trouble as I sit in the principal’s office.
“Ms. Brady, the senior English team needs a new direction, and I’d like you to be the lead.”
“What about Devin?” I ask, naming last year’s lead.
“He won’t be returning this year.”
“He won’t?” I’m stunned. Devin had the kind of school spirit and excitement for teaching everyone in the profession should have. I want to ask what happened, but I refrain. I’m sure I’ll hear it through the grapevine eventually, but I’m surprised I’ve fallen so far out of the loop.
He shakes his head but doesn’t offer further details. “The level lead comes with compensation and extra responsibility. Is that something you’d be up for?”
I know what it entails—extra meetings, organizing a team of around ten teachers, and keeping everyone on the same page so all our students are offered a similar challenge regardless of who their teacher is.
Extra responsibility sounds like the perfect focus for me. It’ll give me something to throw my energy into. “I’d love to,” I say.
“Great. Theresa will email you some paperwork and you can get started next week. Kathryn will be in touch with your responsibilities.”
“Thank you for thinking of me,” I say. I get up to leave.
“One last thing, Ms. Brady.”
I turn back around to face him.
“Thank you for your work with FDB Tech Corp. Their generous donation will go far this year.”
This is my chance, so I grab it. “About that, Mr. Monroe. Did the president of that company ever get in touch with you?”
Mr. Monroe nods. “Mr. Fox called me in May to inquire about our Homecoming donations. He mentioned he saw on the website how we have our teachers work with local businesses, and he specifically requested you.”
“And that was it?”
Mr. Monroe nods. “Was there something else?” he asks.
I shake my head, glad it’s cleared up as I go into this school year—glad Mr. Monroe is none the wiser about what went down with the Fox brothers. Those personal details are things my boss never needs to know about my life. “Thank you.”
I text Tess as I slide into the driver’s seat of my car.
Me: Are you free for dinner?
She doesn’t reply until I’m home twenty minutes later.
Tess: Just ate, but I’m free for drinks. I can sit with you while you eat.
Me: You want to come over?
Tess: Sure, be there in an hour.
When my doorbell rings a half hour later, I assume it’s Tess a little early.
I’m wrong.
Brian Fox stands on my porch. He’s wearing a suit and a gash still stretches across the bridge of his nose, though it looks a lot better than it did a few days ago. Bruises shadow his eyes, but they’re not as black as I would’ve imagined after the beating he took. He looks like my dick of an ex-boyfriend, but despite that, he still looks like the hot business mogul he is.
“What are you doing here?” I ask.
“Can we talk?”
“Go ahead,” I say, gripping the door with one hand and not inviting him in.
He clears his throat. “Can I come in?”
“No.” I shake my head and press my lips together.
He blows out a sigh. “I came here to tell you how sorry I am. I said some pretty awful things, and you didn’t deserve that. I was hurting and I was drunk. When I drink too much, I lash out. I say things I don’t mean, things that aren’t true.”
“Are you really standing on my porch telling me that you weren’t using me to get back at him?”
He shakes his head. “I won’t deny that’s how it started for me. But I didn’t expect to fall in love with you along the way.”
I roll my eyes.
“It’s the truth.”
“What do you want?” I ask.
“I want to apologize.”
“For saying the things you said or for getting caught?”
“For coming between you and him. For the intentions I had when I started something with you. But I’m not sorry for falling in love with you.”
My heart softens just the tiniest bit, but I’m too hurt by the fact that he only ever wanted to be with me in the first place as an act of revenge.
So instead of accepting his apology,
I go to close the door, but his parting words freeze me in place.
“Then why aren’t you with him?” His voice is soft.
I open the door to stare at him with my jaw hanging open. “Because of you!”
“I want to make it up to you.”
“You came between me and what could have been the love of my life. How do you think you can make it up to me?”
He lifts an unsure shoulder. “I don’t have an answer for you. But I do have these.” He reaches into his pocket and pulls something out into a closed fist. He holds his fist out to me, and I open my hand.
He drops two orange chips that read Cosmopolitan into my palm.
Pumpkins.
Two of them.
That’s two thousand dollars sitting in the literal palm of my hand.
“They were always yours,” he says softly. “I’m sorry for everything I did. I’m sorry for coming between you and Mark. I’m sorry I fell in love with you along the way. But most of all, I’m sorry for saying things that hurt you.” He turns and walks to his car, and I stare at the pumpkins in my palm in stunned silence as he gets in his car and drives away.
He didn’t wait around for me to accept his apology or thank him for the chips or throw them in his face. I wouldn’t have done any of those things.
He didn’t even wait around for me to say that he’s a liar. He never fell in love with me, because if he did, he would’ve been strong enough to let me go the very moment he realized my heart belonged with his brother.