I called in sick to work after all, but it wasn’t to spend a bittersweet day with two of my favorite people. It was to take care of one of them.
Devastated was too underwhelming a word for how Aidan felt. I was devastated for him. The remembered sounds of Sylvie’s pleas would pierce through our silence, making me wince every time, and I could only imagine that sound was on a constant loop in Aidan’s mind too. Grief and exhaustion from having so little sleep the night before hit him and he passed out on the couch.
While he was out, I called in sick and set about looking through his fridge and cupboards to see what I could make him to eat when he woke up. Finding the ingredients to make a quick pasta salad, I thought about Sylvie’s bedroom as I worked. All of her things would have to be packed up and I’d rather I be the one to do it than him.
My eyes flew over to him every ten seconds, like I was afraid he’d disappear too. His large, long body was sprawled out on the couch as he slept. A big, strong guy who worked out five days a week and was one of the most potently masculine men I’d ever met.
It gutted me to see him knocked down like this.
As I chopped tomatoes, I began to seethe, wondering what the hell could be wrong with a person that they’d be so selfish as to cause the scene that I’d witnessed this morning. I worried for my sweet girl growing up with a man and woman as selfish as Cal and Sally. It wasn’t that I was blind to the truth. Sylvie was Cal’s daughter and it was his right to raise her. But I hated how it was always on his terms. He was too busy with his career to be around much when she was younger, but now that he’d finally decided to grow up, he demanded his parental rights—to hell with how much of a wrench it would be, not only for Aidan but for Sylvie.
My phone buzzed on the kitchen counter and I hurried to answer it so it wouldn’t wake Aidan. It was Seonaid. “Hey,” I whispered.
“Nora? Why are you whispering?”
“Aidan’s sleeping.”
“Oh.” She sounded sly.
I flinched. “No. Not oh. Something happened.”
“Aye, I popped around Apple Butter to see if you wanted to grab a quick lunch and your nutty boss said you were sick?”
I felt tears choke me and I found I couldn’t quite get the words out.
“Nora? What’s going on?”
“You know how I told you Sylvie’s dad wanted full custody.”
“Yeah.”
“He came and took her this morning. No warning, nothing. Him and his witch of a fiancée barged in here and literally ripped her out of Aidan’s arms. There was nothing he could do.” I sniffled, swiping angrily at my tears. “There was nothing I could do for him.”
“Jesus fuck,” Seonaid bit out. “That’s bloody awful.”
“They’re taking her to the States and they couldn’t even give him a day. One goddamn day to spend with her. What is wrong with these people? And they’re going to be responsible for raising her. I’m so worried for her, Seonaid.”
“Oh, babe, I’m sure her dad will take good care of her. He’s a prick but he’s her dad. And he hasn’t been horrible to her, has he?”
“Other than today? No,” I admitted reluctantly. “He loves her. But he’s so selfish.”
“I’m so sorry, Nora. I’m so sorry for Aidan. Is there anything I can do?”
“Thank you, but no. I’m going to stick around here today, make sure he’s okay.”
“Well, call me if you need me.”
I told her I would and we hung up. Aidan shifted on the couch and I tensed, hoping I hadn’t woken him. He didn’t move again, though, and I continued preparing lunch so it would be ready when he did wake.
A little while later, I was sitting at the counter with a hot mug of tea to warm the chill deep in my bones when Aidan groaned and sat up slowly. I watched him, pretty sure my heart was in my eyes, as he raked his hands through his disheveled hair. Then he rubbed them over his face, his shoulders slumping as if he’d just remembered what he was waking up to.
Sensing my gaze, he glanced over and I tensed at the dull sadness in his eyes.
“I made some lunch for you, if you’re hungry,” I said, my voice sounding small in the large space.
He shook his head. “I’m fine.”
“Aidan …” I bit back tears and he looked away, the muscle in his jaw flexing. “Maybe we should call someone or … I don’t know.”
“There’s nothing to be done,” he said, his tone flat, empty. “Whether it happened today, tomorrow, or a week from now, it wouldn’t have been any easier.”
Anger flashed through me. “But you would have known it was coming. It was despicable the way he did that! For you and Sylvie. God—”
“Nora, please,” he snapped, eyes burning with feeling now. “I was there, for fuck’s sake. I don’t need to relive it.”
Hurt, I clamped my lips closed and reminded myself this man was going through hell. I could forgive him for a bad attitude today of all days.
“What can I do?”
“There’s nothing to do.”
And he meant it.
For the next few hours, Aidan sat looking out his patio door window, his thoughts a million miles away. His body might as well have been too because he was giving off serious stay-back vibes. So I did. A few times his phone beeped and he replied to whoever it was, yet he never said a word.
But I wasn’t leaving him.
Toward dinnertime, I somehow managed to get him to agree to eat the pasta salad I’d whipped up. He was sitting at the counter, eating and staring sullenly at the same kitchen cupboard door when there was a knock at the door. It was a warning knock, not a request for entry, because the next sound was heels on the hardwood floor, and suddenly Laine was standing looking at Aidan.
What was she doing here?
And then I saw her tortured expression and I knew. She was the one he’d texted earlier. My stomach sank as I wondered if he’d asked her to come. I looked at him and he stared back at Laine with the same empty chill in his eyes he’d given me, which shouldn’t have reassured me but did.
“I know you said not to come,” Laine said softly. “But I had to make sure you were okay. Are you? Okay?”
She didn’t look at me.
Not once.
“Stupid fucking question, no?”
Laine winced. “You know what I meant.” She took off the gray winter coat she had on and walked over to the couch to lay it and her handbag on it. Then to my annoyance, she unzipped her boots and placed them neatly behind the couch. Turning to face us in skinny jeans and a stylish cream sweater that probably cost more than what I made in a month, I felt my insides twist with petty jealousy.
It was wrong, when all that should have mattered was that Aidan was surrounded by people who loved him, but I didn’t like her. Maybe if she hadn’t insulted me in every way possible, I might have grown to get over my jealousy.
Laine looked at Aidan’s back with longing she didn’t even bother to hide.
Yeah … even if she hadn’t been a bitch to me, I probably wouldn’t have been able to get over the fact that she was in love with him. Because clearly, she was. Right?
Finally, unable to avoid my gaze any longer, she looked at me. “You look tired, Nora. Have you been here all day?”
“The three of us fell asleep last night watching movies,” I told her, wanting her to know how close I’d grown to Sylvie and Aidan. “I was here when Cal and Sally came for Sylvie.”
At my visible distress, Laine’s eyes widened with concern. “How is Sylvie?”
Aidan tensed beside me and I placed a comforting hand on his arm. He ignored it. I squeezed him anyway and let go. “We don’t know. She wasn’t good when she left.”
“No, I bloody imagine not. I could kill Cal!” Laine marched past us and into the kitchen. I watched warily as she reached up and pulled open one of the cupboards. Grabbing a bottle of barely touched Macallan whisky, Laine shut the doors, opened the glasses cabinet, pulled out two glasses, and placed them in front of Aidan. He pushed his plate out of the way and waited patiently as Laine poured out two glasses.
He took the one she offered and she kept the other for herself. Then she looked at me. “You should go home, Nora. Get some rest. I can take it from here.”
Oh, I bet you can!
I tried my best to mask my reaction because now was definitely not the time for a jealous hissy fit. “I can stay.”
“You look like you haven’t slept in days,” Laine said, like she actually cared about my well-being. “Aidan, tell her to get some sleep.”
Aidan took a swig of whisky and shot me a look out of his deadened eyes. “It’s fine, Pixie. Go home, get some rest.”
Confused, I could only stare at him as he reached for the bottle to pour himself a fresh glass. Was I being politely dismissed by him too? Did he really not want me here? Was I an idiot to think he’d need me over a woman he’d been friends with for years?
I wanted to make sure Aidan was okay, but I also didn’t want to stay where I wasn’t wanted. “I can stay if you need me. I’m fine, really.”
“I plan on drinking this fucking miserable day to an end,” he said, his voice hoarse. “You don’t need to see that. Go home.”
My pride pricked, I immediately slipped off the stool beside him. Fine. If he didn’t need me, if he felt like he could unravel with Laine but not with me, let him. Whatever he needed. I wasn’t sticking around, feeling like an unwanted little girl.
She didn’t even offer me a glass of whisky. Like I wasn’t legal.
So I gathered my things, put on my coat and boots, and left his apartment without giving Laine the satisfaction of looking back.
Just as I stepped out of his building and tears of frustration threatened to escape, my phone rang. It was Seonaid again. I cleared my throat, not wanting her to hear I was upset. “Everything okay?”
“That’s what I was calling to ask. I wanted to check in. See how Aidan’s doing?”
I smiled grimly, thinking sometimes I failed to appreciate what a great person Jim’s sister was. “Uh … well … I think I was practically kicked out.”
“What?” she snapped.
Her instant anger on my behalf was gratifying. “His friend Laine … she turned up, got out the whisky, and made it clear it was time for the grown-ups to be on their own. Aidan’s too fucked-up to care. He told me to leave, to go home, get some rest. I don’t know if he meant it or if he wanted me gone too.”
“No, Nora, I don’t believe that.”
“I don’t know.”
“Where are you now?”
“Just leaving. I’m going to find a bus.”
“Okay. Well, let me know when you get home.”
As it turned out, I didn’t need to let Seonaid know when I got home because she was already there waiting for me. At the sight of her standing outside my door, everything I’d been holding back for Aidan’s sake burst forth. My friend wrapped me in her arms and somehow managed to get my key out of my purse and get us into the flat while she hugged me.
“Oh, babe …” She settled me on the sofa and bustled around in my kitchen, putting the kettle on. “I’m so sorry. I know how fond you are of Sylvie.”
“I didn’t even get to hold her, to hug her or tell her goodbye!”
Seonaid flew back to my side to hold me until finally, after what felt like forever, I had no more tears inside me. Eventually, I curled up in the corner of the sofa with a mug of tea in my hands and I whispered, “I feel weary, Seonaid. I’m only twenty-two and I feel so goddamn weary.”
Seonaid studied me thoughtfully. Her next words shocked the hell out of me. “Maybe if you stopped punishing yourself for crimes you didn’t commit, you wouldn’t feel so bloody weary.”
I gaped at her. “What?”
“Don’t you think I know why you started volunteering at the hospital, why you avoided me and Mum and even Roddy for so long? I mean, if it hadn’t been for me, you would probably have stopped talking to us altogether.”
Stunned, I opened my mouth but I wasn’t sure what to say. To deny it would’ve been to lie to her, and she deserved better than that.
Seonaid leaned toward me, her kindness shining out of her eyes. “I know you didn’t love Jim the way he loved you. He knew it too. We spoke about it. You were a kid. You made a mistake marrying him, but you didn’t intend for it to be a mistake. And you can’t go on punishing yourself for that. I loved my brother, dearly, but he loved you selfishly, Nora. He wanted to keep you all to himself, and that was a disaster waiting to happen. But you … you, babe, can rest assured that even knowing you didn’t love him the way he loved you, you gave my brother some of the happiest years of his short life.”
Tears slipped quietly down her pretty face and she gave me a sad smile. “If you’re punishing yourself for that, stop. Do you honestly think if you were this horrible person who ruined my brother’s life that I would still be here? That I would love you as much as I do?”
A sob burst out of me before I could stop it, and the tears I’d thought had dried up welled out of me again. I threw my arms around her, holding on for dear life. The relief I felt shook me to my soul, because this was Seonaid, the person Jim loved best.
“I’m sorry,” I sobbed, holding on to her like she was a life raft. “I’m so sorry.”
And for the second time that day, my friend soothed the grief out of me.
Sometime later, exhausted, I laid curled up on the couch, my palms beneath my head. I looked across the small space at Seonaid curled up on the opposite couch, seemingly daydreaming with glazed eyes to my wall.
“I love them,” I confessed.
Her eyes flew to mine in surprise. “Who?”
“Sylvie and Aidan.” I forced back fresh tears that threatened, tired of their salt on my skin. “I’m in love with him, Seonaid. It hurts to be this far from him while he’s going through this. It hurts so fucking much. I’ve never felt like this before. And I went into this thing with them knowing I’d get my heart broken. But I thought that was what was meant to happen. That I was supposed to help them through losing Nicky, be someone they could count on, use me up and move on from me better for it. Now my heart is breaking and I can’t stand it like I thought I could. Sylvie’s gone. I don’t know if I’ll ever see her again. And Aidan … this was the test, right? And he doesn’t need me. I don’t blame him because what can I offer him? I’ve nothing to offer a man like that. I’m merely some shop girl who doesn’t have the balls to get over her dead husband and pick up the pieces of her life—instead, I hang out at a children’s hospital like some pathetic widow.”
“That is enough,” Seonaid hissed, her eyes flashing angrily at me.
I flinched at the fury in her voice and slowly eased into a sitting position.
“You are not even twenty-three years old yet, Nora. You’re smart, you’re funny, you’re beautiful, and you have all the time in the world to pick up the pieces of your life and make something of it. And you will. I know, deep in my gut, you will. You’re special, Nora. It’s what drew Jim to you and I’m sure it’s what captured Aidan’s attention. He’d be lucky to have you. Any man would. And he’s just had the second-worst fucking day of his life months after the worst fucking day of his life. Stop putting yourself down and be what he needs. Go back there tomorrow, this Laine bitch be damned, and remind him that you are his best friend.”
With Seonaid’s words of encouragement buoying my confidence, I headed to Aidan’s the next morning. To my frustration, it was Laine who answered the door buzzer and let me into the building.
She was waiting for me at the apartment door and I felt a flare of panic when I saw she was wearing the same clothes she’d been wearing the night before. Her makeup was washed off and although she looked tired, it was clear she didn’t need a lot of makeup anyway. Her grim, pitying expression made my panic mount.
“Come in.” She gestured me inside, placing a comforting hand on my shoulder as I stepped into the apartment.
I barely heard her close the door behind me because I was stunned by the sight in the living room. Or rather, the lack of a sight.
All of Aidan’s music equipment, the instruments and computers, were gone.
Just gone.
The space was entirely bare.
“What’s going on?”
“Nora … I don’t know how to tell you this, and I’m sure I’m the last person you want to hear it from considering my past terrible behavior …” Laine’s sympathy made we want to scream at her to spit it out. “Aidan’s gone.”
My knees trembled, as though the floor had shifted beneath my feet. “Gone? What do you mean, he’s gone?”
Anger flickered in Laine’s eyes, frustration maybe. “Yesterday after you left, he suddenly started making arrangements to leave the country. He took a job in LA so he can be close to Sylvie, but it meant leaving early this morning.” She gestured to his space. “He managed to wrangle a company that could get his gear together last minute and he’s got someone over there looking for a place for him.”
No.
What?
I gaped at her in disbelief. The panic I’d felt earlier spread over my lungs so I was finding it hard to breathe. “He wouldn’t … he just left?” Without saying goodbye, without explaining? No.
Aidan.
The genuine sympathy in Laine’s eyes gutted me.
Shredded my insides. Or what was left of the tatters in there.
“Nora, I hope what I’m about to say will help in the long run, even if it doesn’t feel like it now. But … this would’ve happened, even if Sylvie hadn’t been a factor. Believe me. I’ve been in Aidan’s life longer than any woman and he is the ultimate bachelor. It doesn’t mean he doesn’t care about you—I’m sure he does—but he can be a real arsehole to women. I love him but it’s the truth. He makes them all feel like his best friend, like he’s never felt anything like it before, and maybe he even believes it for a while. I think he does. But only for a while. And then he gets bored and moves on. I was surprised he was with you so long until … well,” she winced in the damned sympathy again. “He told me you two never actually slept together, which is probably why you lasted longer than any of the others. Anticipation. Like I said. He can be such a bloke.
“But one I care about. Because he’s not a bad soul. In fact, he’s a very good man, and I know you saw that in the way he was with Sylvie. So please try to forgive him, Nora. He didn’t mean to be this cruel to you.” She gestured to the empty space in the sitting room. “He just needs Sylvie more than he needs anyone else. I’m sure you can understand that.”
Feeling like I might be sick while still clinging to the hope that there had to be some kind of terrible mistake, I pushed past her, heading for the door. “When does his flight leave?”
“In about twenty minutes. You’ll never make it to the airport, if that’s what you’re thinking!” she called after me as I fled the apartment.
No, I couldn’t make it to the airport in time. I fumbled for my phone in my purse. However, I could try to stop him from getting on that flight and find out what the hell was going on in his head.
Cursing when I discovered I couldn’t get a signal on the elevator, I burst out of it as soon as it hit the ground floor and pressed the call button.
“This is Aidan Lennox. Leave a message.”
“No!” I yelled in frustration when I got his voicemail. My hands shook as I quickly shot him a text message.
Where are you? What’s happening? Is what Laine said true?
Not even a minute later, my phone buzzed.
My pulse raced when I saw it was a reply from Aidan.
I’m more sorry than I can say. But I have to be where Sylvie is. You deserve better. Goodbye, Pixie.
Somehow, and I don’t remember how, I blindly found my way home to Sighthill. And although I left little pieces of shattered me on the sidewalk and bus and roads I crossed over, it wasn’t until I got inside my flat that the howling grief blew me into tiny fragments I was afraid I’d never glue back together again.