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“I thought you promised you’d always love me.” He walked out of the room.
I always would love him, but even if I told him that, he wouldn’t believe me. And it was kicking the issue to death because if I tried to reassure him, he’d think it was a door.
I’d thought that reaching for what I wanted would ruin everything and it had, just not in the way I’d anticipated. I thought it would be me begging him to stay, to love me. Brackish pride welled. It was sour and stagnant because I hurt so much, but it was pride nonetheless that I had settled.
And that I truly believed that it wasn’t okay to treat me this way and I wouldn’t accept it. Even if it meant losing him. Even if it meant being totally alone.
I wouldn’t ask Hollie or Rosa to choose sides. They were April’s friends too, and I wasn’t going to play the friend break up game where you divvy up the group. I was just going to bow out.
Maybe that’s what I needed. A totally new start.
I thought about how empty the house would be without Kieran and maybe it was time for that to go too.
Something like hope surged through me. It was warm and soothing and while it didn’t wash away the pain, or fill in the cracks in my heart, it was soft like feathers.
Or maybe it was a padded room. Selling the house was crazy.
Or was it? I’d have more money to invest in Chubbalicious and money to live on. I could move to an apartment, get roommates… I spent most of my time in my room anyway. This house hadn’t been a real home to me as a child and now that Kieran and I were broken, what was the reason to stay?
I could be shed of everything and really start over.
I could start as the woman I kept saying I wished I was.
Both feet in the frying pan. Why not?
15
I grabbed my laptop and headed to the coffee shop armed with my new sense of adventure and my to do list.
It was time to stop fucking around.
What had I been waiting for anyway?
The easy answer was failure.
Truly, I’d expected to fail in some massive, horrible way. Now it had happened, I’d failed with Kieran and with Brant. I’d lost both of them.
And it wasn’t the worst thing in the world. That’s not to say I didn’t miss both of them, or that maybe some night I’d be sitting by myself in fuzzy slippers, with gelato and watching P.S. I Love You and bawling my eyes out. I’m sure I would.
I’d definitely miss watching the stars from the roof of The Rooster and I’d miss Saturdays with Kieran, coffees with the girls, and the way Brant made me feel… I’d miss it all and it hurt that it was all gone.
But I was still here. I still had my dreams and I’d come to the realization that nothing was going to stop me from shooting for those stars I watched so often.
I wasn’t afraid to fail anymore.
Even though that lesson came with a lot of pain, it was a gift. I could see that even now.
I bought a mocha and scanned the shop for an empty table. I saw Ryan sitting in the corner and he waved me over.
I lowered myself to the chair and propped my laptop open. “Hey, what’s up?”
“Trying to write this paper. Been procrastinating.”
I peered around the edge of his tablet and saw a picture of a guy wearing nothing but a jock strap. “I can see why.”
He blushed. “It’s a calendar I’m working on for the football team fundraiser.”
“And who is that?” He was hot, to be sure.
“Fain.”
“That’s his first name?”
“James Dean Fain.”
“Oh Christ, even his name is hot.” I looked back and forth from Ryan to the picture. “You like him?”
“Like is kind of a tame word. Obsessed is more like. If he’d just let me see his damn tattoo…”
“You couldn’t just, you know, ask to see it?”
Ryan raised a brow. “His standard response to anything is ‘fuck you’ so I rather imagine that’s what he’d say if I asked to see it. And it’s on his back. It’s like a phoenix wrapping its wings around some kind of brand. I just need to see it.”
“Well, if you get any pictures, let me know.”
“You’re really easy to talk to, Claire.”
“Yeah, I get that a lot.” I laughed and tried not to feel a hollow echo because that’s exactly what Kieran had said to me the day we met.
“Ryan Wells. Who knew?” A petite girl leaned on his shoulder and he snapped the tablet cover closed.
“Who knew what?”
“That you’re a chubby chaser. I couldn’t figure out why you wouldn’t go out with me, but now I know.” She looked up at me. “No offense. You’re BBW hot all the way.”
