The Royals Next Door

With everyone here watching, and knowing that the pub is full of tourists who don’t give a rat’s ass about his family’s history on the island, Joey is trapped.

He looks at me, and I glare right back at him as he says, “Sorry, Piper.”

He can barely make eye contact with Harrison. I don’t blame him. “And I’m sorry to you. The bill is on me. Whatever else you want is on the house.” Joey waves Amy over. “Amy will take care of you.”

“Better late than never,” Harrison mumbles under his breath.

Joey then walks quickly out of the patio, avoiding the eyes of the customers as he passes by. Amy, on her best behavior and with a nervous smile plastered on her face, takes Harrison’s order for a double of Scotch.

When she leaves, I let out a long, shaky breath, staring at Harrison with a mix of trepidation and awe. “I thought you were going to kill him.”

Harrison closes his eyes and breathes in deeply through his nose. “I wanted to.”

“You stayed in control.”

He nods. “Barely.” He opens his eyes and looks at me. “He deserves so much worse than what he got.”

“I know. But humiliating him is just as good.”

“The nerve he has to talk to you like that . . .”

“Like I said, I know my assholes.”

“I don’t understand how you could have been engaged to him.”

I give him a tight, sad smile. “I didn’t understand until my therapist explained why. Since then, I’ve been single. Guess I’m too afraid of making the same mistake. Too afraid of being attracted to the wrong people. Least I know the warning signs now.”

“And what are those?”

“Someone who’s handsome, controlling, emotionally unavailable.”

Something in my words must strike a chord with him, because he flinches slightly. “That sounds a lot like me. Especially the handsome part.”

“At least you can admit you’re emotionally unavailable.”

“Just what I’ve been told,” he says, and then starts looking around. “Where is that drink?”

With that slightly awkward blip over, the rest of our night at the Blowhole passes uneventfully. I talk a lot about my mom, and the other assholes I dated, and the work I did with my therapist, and my complex PTSD and everything like that, while Harrison listens and drinks. And drinks, and drinks.

Soon I know it’s time to leave. He’s slurring his words and wavering slightly in his chair.

“Okay, time to go, I think,” I tell him softly, getting to my feet.

Harrison grumbles something and then gets up, and for a moment I think he’s about to keel over. I go to him and take his arm, pulling him across the patio and leading him out of the pub.

It takes a bit of effort to get him in the car. It’s feeling more and more like I’m trying to see how many clowns can fit in a Volkswagen, and while I’m driving us home, he passes out, his head against the window.

Shit. What a night. Never in my wildest dreams did I think it would end up like this, with Harrison getting shitfaced and threatening to break Joey’s thumb and ruin his restaurant. In a way I’m glad it happened, because Joey needed to be put in his place, especially after he was so insulting to the both of us, but I can’t help but feel a little uneasy that this is going to come back to bite us in the ass in some way. In small towns, but especially on an island, word travels fast.

A little too fast.

With the gate fob at the ready, we pull past the SUV and then up the driveway, Harrison suddenly stirring.

“No,” he says, slurring. “Don’t take me back. I don’t want them to see me like this.”

I pause and then reverse back down the driveway and turn left into mine, coming to a park.

“You just need to sleep this off,” I tell him, getting out of the car. “Come on.”

I go over to his side, open the door, and start to pull him out of the car. He doesn’t come easy. When he gets to his feet, there’s a lot of his weight leaning on my shoulders, his arm around me for balance, and it feels like I’m trying to stop a giant boulder from rolling down the hill.

We stagger up to the house and open the door. My mother’s bedroom door is closed. Liza is probably in there with her, which is good. She doesn’t need to see this and worry.

We make our way to my bedroom, and I lead Harrison to the bed, where he keels over facedown.

I then unlace and pull off his boots, noting his brightly colored yellow socks, and take a throw blanket from the easy chair and toss it over him. I get a glass of water and some Advil from the kitchen and put it by the bedside table. He’s already asleep and snoring lightly.