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"You did great," Ian compliments me for the millionth time. "Are you staying for dinner?"
"I'm not sure," I glance at Wilder who's grabbing our bags from the golf cart.
"Ah," Ian shoves his hands into his pockets. "You do like him."
"We're friends," I soften the blow. Friends with a non-sex, sexual connection because we have the same wound. The rejection wound. Yeah, that's not confusing or anything.
"Well, Ingrid," Ian grins, "hope to see you around."
"Uh, yeah," I force a smile. "Thanks for all the pointers."
I walk over to Wilder and exhale when I see Hendrix curled up on the golf cart seat, passed out.
"Should we wake her?" Wilder asks me.
"Nah," I purse my lips. "Let her sleep it off."
Wilder slings both our bags over his shoulder and points toward the exit. "You ready?"
"Yep," I lead the way. "I think I like golf."
"I had fun. Now I know why Cash liked to ditch us to play."
"He could have invited us."
"I'm kind of glad he didn't," Wilder adjusts the bags on his shoulder. "Can you imagine spending a day with Archibald on the golf course?"
"You're right," I chuckle. "That would have been torture."
"What I said earlier, I don't think Cash was trying to get out of spending time with you," Wilder sighs. "I think his life is complicated. I think his parents put a lot of pressure on him. You and me, we don't have that kind of pressure. We have cool parents. You have your mom and dad, and I have my mom. We have parents who take care of us because they love us, not because they need us to make them look good."
"You always defend him," I cross my arms over my chest. "Even when he leaves you behind for a European getaway and doesn't reply to your messages."
"He's my best friend," Wilder weakly argues. "What kind of person does that make me if I abandon him the same way he's abandoned me?"
We stop in front of my car and I open my trunk. "What kind of person isn't devastated that her boyfriend of four years broke up with her?"
Wilder drops the golf bags into my trunk. "You aren't devastated?"
"Should I be?" I ask him.
He leans against my car. "It was four years. That's a long time."
"If I let myself feel the loss," I tug at the end of my hair, "then that means whatever we had is really over. I don't want it to be over. I really love him—loved him."
"I thought he loved you, too," Wilder adds.
Tears fill my eyes. No, I don't want to cry right now. Not in front of my Wilder. "He left me. He broke up with me and left me like it was easy as breathing."
"I know."
"I just can't understand why." My bottom lip trembles. "Why didn't he want me anymore? What did I do wrong?"
Wilder grabs my hand and tugs me into his arms. I hold on tight as he lays his cheek on top of my head.
"I know what it's like to be pushed aside for something better, Blondie," Wilder confesses. "It's, uh, a different kind of pain. One that's impossible to ignore. You can't just put a band-aid on it and wait for the scrape to heal. It's like a broken bone. It takes a long time to get over, and the bone doesn't always go back into place right away. Sometimes, you have to re-break it. Then, you wrap it in a cast and hope you don't have to wear it forever."
I nod against his chest as several tears escape. "I don't want to re-break it."
