Lies were like a virus, touching everything, infecting everything… even the truth. I couldn’t find solace in a single thing I said to Nick. Everything was tainted because of a single lie.
I didn’t understand how people could do this so frequently; it felt like I was suffocating under the weight of it.
“Iris, are you okay?” Catherine asked as she placed a hand on my arm. Snapping out of my trance, I turned to face her.
“Oh, yeah. Sorry. I guess I spaced out.” I smiled and moved to step around her when she stopped me.
“Are you sure?” Her voice was low and concerned. “Maybe you’re coming down with something.” She put the back of her hand to my forehead. I felt like the small child she was treating me as.
I gently grabbed her wrist and pulled it away. Trying to give her a more reassuring smile, I said, “Yes. I’m fine. Just stressed with the end of school, I suppose.”
It was the middle of December, classes were wrapping up and it was a plausible enough excuse. But truthfully I was overwhelmed. I rarely felt this way, but surrounded by everyone I loved (minus Aster, who wasn’t flying in until the twenty-second), and with a black cloud hanging over us, I felt completely alone and incapable of handling what was to come.
My parents decided to have a Christmas party. They wanted Kent and Calla to have a do-over with Nick, and they also figured it was a perfect time to meet Nick’s mom. But they invited over other friends so it didn’t resemble the ambush from a month earlier.
Catherine brought Trevor, and that was who Nick was currently talking to. Kent and Calla had done an excellent job steering clear of him, and every time my mother noticed she frowned and looked at me in question. I shrugged and downed whatever drink was nearby.
So now I was lying to my mom.
And every time Nick looked over at me, he seemed worried. Not for himself, but because, like Catherine, he thought I was getting sick. They had all this concern—all this love—for me and I was lying to them.
I spotted Calla across the room, bouncing Mirielle and staring at her husband with a faraway look, like she’d already lost him.
My hand laid flat against my stomach. I was truly going to be sick.
“Really, dear. Maybe you should go lie down…”
My eyes met my sister’s. She nodded—resigned—and inclined her head toward the bedrooms before disappearing down the hall. I looked back at Catherine. “That sounds like a good idea. Will you let Nick know if he asks?”
She smiled. “You mean when.”
“Huh?” I asked, already distracted by the conversation Calla and I were about to have.
“You mean when Nick asks about you.” Catherine pushed a stray strand of hair behind my ear. “Because he will. I’ve never seen him like this with someone. Like he always wants to know where you are. Not in a creepy way,” she rushed to add, providing me with my first real laugh tonight.
“You’re just…” I held my breath as she thought of the word. “The sun. His sun. He orbits around you, like he has no choice. Like you’re necessary to his survival.”
My heart stopped. It was quite possibly the sweetest thing she could have said.
You’re lying to her. You’re lying to him.
That thought kick-started my heart, cracking it right down the middle.
“Listen to me.” Catherine blushed and waved away the words. “I start dating and become a sappy romantic.”
Leaning forward, I hugged her. “Thank you,” I whispered. I didn’t know what for, possibly for everything. For coming into my life. For bringing Nick into my life. Or just for being who she was.
We pulled away and with one last watery smile, I turned and left before I could blurt everything out. My steps were quick as I walked down the hall toward the room my parents had set up for Mirielle.
I stopped short in the doorway when I heard my sister’s soft cries. She had put her daughter in the crib and was standing above it, staring down at her. With one last glance down the hall, I stepped through and shut the door.
“I never wanted to put you in this position,” she whispered.
“I know, and I…” I stepped away from the door and went to her side. “I don’t know what I’m supposed to do. I love you and Kent. But I love Nick, too.”
Calla sniffled. “I know you do.” She looked up at me with a small smile. “It’s in your eyes.”
I reached down and rubbed my niece’s cheek.
“He told me he loved me, but I couldn’t say it back. Not when…” I pulled my hand away when I felt it clench in frustration.
What did my love mean if he didn’t know? Like a tree falling in the forest when no one was around, was my love of any use if I couldn’t tell Nick?
“I’ve tried, Calla. I have, but I can’t do this anymore. It’s only been a week but I feel like I’m being ripped apart. I can’t lie to him. Every day he looks at me with so much love and trust, and every time I continue to say nothing, I’m betraying that. I love him. And I haven’t been able to say it because I don’t want to do it with a tainted heart. Please…” I started crying.
My big sister pulled me into her arms, holding me secure with one hand around my back and comforting me with the other as she ran her hand down my hair.
“Shhh… I already talked to Kent last night. We both understand. We’re… we’re so sorry, Iris. This wasn’t how any of it was supposed to go.”
Mirielle slept peacefully, her soft snores filling the room, while Calla and I held on to each other and fell apart.
Iris was acting weird. I tried not to read into it. I tried not to assume it had anything to do with me saying “I love you.” But nearly a week had passed and she was still fidgety.
I was standing with Trevor, talking about how I was looking into taking a couple business classes so I could start making owning my own restaurant a reality, when my eyes landed on my ma. She was standing by herself, staring down the hallway I knew led to the bedrooms.
“She’s worried about Iris.” I looked back to see his eyes on my ma as well, a frown pulling at his features.
“Me too. She…” I blew out a breath and grabbed the back of my neck. “I told her I loved her. I think it might have freaked her out.” But even as I said it, it didn’t feel right. I just couldn’t imagine what else was going on.
“Your mom told me what happened last time you guys were here,” Trevor said with a shrug. “Maybe she’s worried about a repeat.”
Nodding, I looked around for Iris. It was a possibility, but again, it didn’t feel like the truth. I frowned when I couldn’t find her—also noting that Calla was missing—before excusing myself to go talk to my ma. Trevor said he’d hit the bathroom and join us, but really I think he was just giving us privacy.
“Hey,” I said as I walked up. She turned toward me, throwing on a bright smile.
“Hi, dear.”
My lips lifted, trying to match her smile. “Do you know where Iris is?”
“Oh. She still wasn’t feeling well. I told her to go lie down.” My smile dropped as I moved away from my ma, but she stopped me. “Maybe give her a few minutes?”
I tried to relax as I nodded, but it was really just to appease my mother. When Iris and Calla stepped out of a bedroom door ten minutes later, I felt my muscles loosen. They were whispering, their shoulders hunched over like a painful weight rested on both of them.
Iris’s eyes met mine when they split up at the mouth of the hallway. My mother and Trevor had been talking amongst themselves for the past five minutes, so I didn’t bother saying anything before I made my way to Iris.
“Hi.” She smiled—nowhere near as bright as normal—in response, but didn’t say anything. “You feeling better?”
“A little.” I pulled her into a hug and rubbed my hands up and down her back. Her arms wrapped around my waist and settled on my lower back. And I felt her sigh in relief as she snuggled closer to me, assuaging some of my unease.
Iris stayed close to me for the rest of the night. I didn’t mind, but it felt like such a one-eighty from her pulling away that I felt a building dread in my stomach. One that told me I was about to be crushed.
The only good thing about my mind being this preoccupied with Iris was that I barely had any time to think about Kent. We exchanged a few tense nods, but other than that, it was like he didn’t exist.
Until the end.
Everyone else had cleared out. The only people left were Iris and her family, my ma, Trevor, and me. Kent and Calla were in the nursery, checking on Mirielle, while the rest of us said goodbye in the foyer.
“Nicky, why don’t you and Iris go say goodnight to Mirielle? Trevor and I will wait here,” my ma said with a wide grin. I knew what she was doing. She was trying to get me to have at least one conversation with Kent tonight. Iris seemed a bit taken aback, and she looked like she was about to let me off the hook. But I knew how much this would mean to my mother.
“Sure, Ma,” I said as I grabbed Iris’s hand. “We’ll be right back.”
It felt like I was dragging her down the hallway. We both stopped when we heard low voices and sniffles coming from the room.
“It’ll be okay. Please believe me,” Kent said. I frowned as Iris froze next to me.
“I’m scared,” Calla cried.
“Don’t be. We’re going to make it through this as a family. I promise.”
“I love you.”
“I love you, too, Lily.”
Now it was my turn to freeze.
Lily?
“Lily, I don’t…” He sounded torn.
Iris’s hand jerked in mine and I let go.
It couldn’t be…
This is the only way to and from their house…
Fertility treatments…
Lose her…
As the pieces fell into place, I felt myself being torn apart. But I tried to hold out hope. I turned my head toward Iris, ready to find her confused.
When my eyes met hers, my knees nearly buckled.
She wasn’t confused.
She knew exactly what had happened.
And like an idiot, I’d let myself fall… again…
I knew it. I fucking knew it.
That was the first conscious thought I had once I got over the shock.
“Nick,” Iris began, reaching for me. I stepped back and glared, swiftly shaking my head before I stormed past her and into the room.
“It was you?” I asked Kent as the door slammed against the wall. They both looked down into the crib as I felt Iris come up behind me.
“Can we talk somewhere else? She’s sleeping…” Calla whispered.
“Sure. Let’s go in the backyard and have some hot cocoa and sit around the fire pit while we discuss this,” I bit back.
“Nick—” Kent began.
“No.” I was tired of lies. “Did you run me off the road?”
He swallowed, running his gaze over his wife before looking back at his daughter. With his head still facing the crib, he said, “Yes.”
“We’re sorry. It was an accident—” Iris’s sister started before I cut her off.
“Stop. I don’t want to hear any of it. I just… I can’t believe I was actually this stupid.”
“Nick, you weren’t—” Iris spoke up again.
“Don’t. Just don’t.” I shook my head. “I have to get out of here.” I about-faced and walked toward the front door. There had been no shouts, so when I heard their laughter abruptly cut off upon seeing my face, I wasn’t surprised.
“What’s wrong?” my ma asked as she stepped forward.
“Is Mirielle okay?” Iris’s mother immediately asked, looking ready to race down the hall.
“She’s fine. I’m leaving.”
“Nick, wait,” Iris said as she joined us, Kent and Calla closely behind her. “I’m sorry.”
“What’s going on?”
Iris turned toward my mother, ready to explain, but I beat her to it.
“Remember how I wondered why a perfect stranger would give someone their kidney?” Iris paled as my ma’s wide eyes shifted between us. “Kent here is responsible for putting me in the hospital. That’s why Iris sought you out, why she gave me her kidney.”
I turned to face Iris, really looking at her for the first time. “Was it out of guilt? Or were you hoping to keep me quiet in case I remembered something?”
“What?” she gasped—and I had to give her credit, she looked genuinely horrified. Her face paled further and her lips went slack. But I wasn’t falling for it. Not again. I still couldn’t quite wrap my head around the fact that I was in this place again, betrayed by someone who I thought loved me…
But she never said it back, did she?
“Please, Nick… that wasn’t it at all. I love you. I didn’t—”
“Oh, now you love me?” I asked, my hands clenching into fists. “Well if that’s not a Hail fucking Mary, I don’t know what is. I said it a week ago, and what did I get? Nothing. Not a damn word. Just a smile and a kiss. Like that would keep me from noticing the three words I didn’t get back? But now that you’re in hot water, all of a sudden you love me?”
I could feel my lips curl into a snarl. “Let me guess? I’m not to go to the cops with this? That’s why I’m suddenly worthy of your love, right?”
“N-no, of c-course not. I—I…” She trailed off as a loud sob racked her body. “I didn’t want to lie, but I felt like I didn’t have a choice.”
I firmly planted my feet and crossed my arms. I would not walk over to her. I would not comfort her.
“Everyone has a choice. The choices may suck. They may be hard as hell to make. But everyone has a choice. You had a choice, and it wasn’t me.”
I watched her flinch and stumble back, like I actually hit her, and I’d never hated myself more. Her sister was softly crying in the corner as Kent stepped forward.
“Nick—”
“Don’t,” I growled, my head swinging toward him. “Don’t you say a fucking word! You left me for dead on the side of the road without a care in the fucking world.”
“That’s not true.”
I shook my head and turned to leave when Iris reached out and grabbed my wrist. “Please—”
I ripped my arm away and watched in horror as she lost her balance and fell to the floor. She looked up at me like she didn’t know me.
At that moment, I didn’t either.
Iris waved away any offers for help and stood up on her own. Then she wrapped her arms around herself, like she was holding herself together. Something that was supposed to be my job.
“I know you don’t believe me, but I didn’t know—”
“You’re right, I don’t,” I interrupted.
“Nicholas,” my mother hissed. I turned to find her disapproving eyes on me. How could she still not see?
“I’m leaving.” Shaking my head, I headed toward the door.
“Nick,” Calla called out frantically. “I know we have no right to ask anything of you, but… could you wait until after Christmas before you call the police? I… we’d like to see our daughter’s first Christmas.”
I shut my eyes against the pain. Not just mine. Calla’s. Kent’s. Iris’s. Hell, everyone’s. We were all hurting for different reasons.
I didn’t answer as I continued out the door, ignoring the cries and shouts for me to stop, to understand, to let them explain… I ignored it all.
Their explanations would fall on angry, deaf ears. In that moment, I truly didn’t care. I didn’t want excuses or to be comforted. I wanted to be alone.
Anger was the easiest mask to slip on, the most readily available. It was bulletproof—nearly indestructible. Little could penetrate it. Not grief, reason, or love.