Page 44 of Nothing At All

My brain remained foggy, like shards of glass cotton candy filled it up, and thinking about what had happened in my kitchen with Lila hurt. I shoved the eggs and cheese back in the refrigerator, popped a couple of ibuprofen with too-hot coffee, and stumbled back to bed, grateful my phone was still missing. I could sleep and maybe things would look better when I woke up.

Probably not, but maybe.

Eyes closed, forcing my thoughts to be still – we would think about Lila and how I’d said I love you and she hadn’t said it back when I woke up – I focused my attention on my toes, then my ankles. The right one ached a little. Rotating my foot, I folded my arms behind my head. I moved my attention to my calves, then my knees and thighs.

My left hip hurt. Bet I’d gone down at an angle when I tripped over Williams trying to fend off Reese. The bottom of my belly felt heavy with . . . dread, maybe? And my stomach gnawed a little below where my chest still ached . . .

I jerked awake, blinking at the ceiling. The light had shifted, from early morning gold to bright winter noon. A firm knock sounded, and I squeezed my eyes shut, opened them, closed them again. My brain seemed muffled, like I was underwater.

My dry mouth tasted godawful, too.

Another knock, and I rolled to my feet, holding the wall, then my bedroom door like an old man. I rubbed a shaky hand down my brow, hit the splint, and recoiled from the pain shooting through my face. Hell, that hurt.

Shuffling to the door, I grimaced at the scorched coffee smell hanging in the air. Or maybe that was just the lingering scent of my crash and burn with my girlfriend.

I guess she was still my girlfriend.

I shoved that under a layer of glass cotton candy. I didn’t avoid stuff – all that therapy Mama had paid for while I was in college taught me it wasn’t healthy. But the shit could wait until I could hold onto a straight thought.

Scratching my chest, I threw the door open without looking. “What?”

Chuck lifted a brow, dark gaze darting over my face. “You look like what.”

My derisive snort hurt my nose, and I winced. Turning away, I shuffled to the kitchen to turn off the coffee maker. “What are you doing here?”

“Heard you got your ass handed to you.” He grinned at my glare, an expression which hurt, too, because somehow everything in my face connected to my nose. He held aloft a familiar white shopping bag from Shay’s bakery. “Deanne and Mama sent you some goodies.”

I filled a glass from the tap and gulped it down while he unpacked soup, casseroles, pimento cheese, chicken salad, and cookies. “I’m not dying.”

“You ever known my mama to do anything halfway?” He tossed a skein of crackers down by the pimento cheese. “Or my wife?”

“No.” Bet Deanne never stared at him wide-eyed and open-mouthed and stunned like a landed fish when he said I love you. My shoulders slumped.

She didn’t love me.

A hollow yawned in my chest like when my father left.

I’d invested, leaned in, tried my best, and she didn’t love me.

I didn’t know what to do with that.

“Hey.” Chuck’s low, easy voice pulled me from the edge of despondency. He stroked his bearded jaw with his thumb and index finger. “What’s wrong?”

“Told Lila I loved her.” The words clogged in my throat. Avoiding hard truths – like my father was a cheating, deadbeat narcissist – didn’t make them go away. There was power in saying them aloud instead. “She doesn’t.”

“Yet,” Chuck said quietly.

“Maybe not ever.”

“Maybe.” Chuck could speak the hard truth, too. Like sometimes awful things happened – your brother was killed and your daddy turned to alcohol and that led to his death so your mama did the best she could in her grief but it left your whole family in a mess for years. We’d done UGA and coping with our messed up families together. Chuck leaned into his faith, I leaned into therapy, and we leaned into each other. “But today might just be yet.”

“Yeah.” Still, it sucked . . . and felt like never.

“Your feelings are hurt. I get that. You put yourself out there, and it didn’t go like you planned.”

I glowered. He shrugged.

“Look sometimes, two people are just at different places in the relationship.” He opened a white bakery box and pulled out a chocolate chip cookie. Flakes of sea salt glimmered on top. “Probably most times.”