After Ever Happy (After 4)

“It’s not just . . .” I take a deep breath. “It’s not that.” It’s a whole lot of shit that I’m not going to tell him. I fold my hands over my lap, then go to put them in my pockets before realizing the cast isn’t going to fit. Awkwardly, I fold my hands over my lap again.

“I don’t know what happened between you two, but you can’t blame me for wanting to help her. I’ve known her my whole life, and I’ve never seen her like this.” Noah shakes his head in disapproval.

“I’m not discussing anything with you. You and I aren’t on the same team here.”

He sighs. “We don’t have to be rivals either. I want the best for her, and so should you. I’m not a threat to you. I’m not stupid enough to think she would ever choose me. I’ve moved on. I still love her, because, well, I think I always will, but not in the way you love her.”

His words would be much more acceptable if I hadn’t despised his ass for the past eight months. I stay quiet, my back leaning against the wall in front of the bathroom while I wait for the shower to shut off.

“You two broke up again, right?” he asks nosily. He doesn’t know when to shut up.

“Obviously.” I close my eyes and let my head fall back slightly.

“I’m not getting into your business, but I do hope you’ll tell me about Richard and how he ended up in your apartment. I don’t get it.”

“He was staying at my place after Tessa left for Seattle. He didn’t have anywhere else to go, so I let him stay with me. When we left for London, he was supposed to go to rehab, so imagine the surprise when he ends up dead as a fucking doornail on the bathroom floor.”

The bathroom door clicks open, and Tessa walks straight past both of us, dressed only in a towel. Noah has never seen her naked before—no other man has—and selfishly I’d like to keep it that way. I know I shouldn’t be worried about shit like that, but I can’t help it.

I GO INTO THE KITCHEN for some water, and am enjoying the silence when I hear Carol’s soft, timid voice: “Hardin, can I talk to you for a minute?”

I’m already confused by her tone, and the woman has barely started speaking.

“Uhm, sure.” I stand back a little, keeping a safe distance from her. My back is against the wall in the small kitchen by the time I stop moving.

Her expression is tight, and I know this is just as awkward for her as it is for me. “I just wanted to talk about last night.”

I pull my eyes from her and glance at my feet. I don’t know how this is going to go, but she’s already pinned her hair back and cleaned the mess of makeup that was smeared under her eyes last night.

“I don’t know what got into me,” she says. “I should have never acted that way in front of you. It was incredibly stupid, and I—”

“It’s fine,” I interrupt, hoping she’ll just stop.

“No, it’s really not fine. I want to be clear that nothing has changed here—I still feel strongly about you staying away from my daughter.”

I look up to meet her eyes. It’s not like I expected anything different from her. “I wish I could say I will listen to you, but I can’t. I know you don’t like me.” I pause and can’t help but laugh at my understatement. “You hate me, and I get that, but you know your opinion doesn’t mean shit to me. I mean that in the nicest way possible. That’s just the way it is.”

She catches me off guard by laughing along with me. Like mine, hers is a pained, low-ringing sound. “You’re just like him—you speak to me the same way he spoke to my parents. Richard never cared what anyone thought about him either, but look where that got him.”

“I’m not him,” I snap. I really am trying to be as nice to her as possible, but she’s making it difficult. Tessa has been in the shower for so long, and it’s taking everything in me not to check in on her, especially given Noah’s presence.

“You have to try to see this entire thing from my perspective, Hardin. I was in the same type of toxic relationship, and I know how these things end. I don’t want that for Tessa, and if you loved her the way you claim, you wouldn’t want that for her either.” She looks at me, seeming to expect a reaction from me, but then continues. “I want the best for her. You may not believe me, but I always raised Tessa not to depend on a man, the way I did, and look at her now. She’s nineteen years old, and she’s reduced to nothing each and every time you decide to leave her—”

“I—”

She holds up her hand. “Let me finish.” She sighs. “I envied her, actually. It’s pathetic, but a part of me was envious that you always came back for her the way Richard never came back for me. But the more you left, the more I realized that you two will have the same ending that we did, because even though you come back, you never stay. If you want her to end up like me—alone and hateful—then you keep doing what you’re doing, and I can assure you that’s exactly what will happen to her.”

I hate the way Carol sees me, but even more than that, I hate the way that she’s right. I do always leave Tessa, and even though I come back, I wait until she’s comfortable and then I leave again.

“It’s up to you. You’re the only person she seems to listen to, and my daughter loves you too much for her own good.”

I know she does—she loves me, and because she loves me, we won’t end up like her parents.

“You can’t give her what she needs; you’re only holding her back from finding someone who will,” she says, but mostly what I hear is Tessa’s old bedroom door closing, meaning that she’s out of the shower.