“No,” I say simply. “I’m just done trying to make a marriage work with someone who doesn’t know what it means to be in one.”
Chapter nine
"Enough" - charlieonnafriday
Mia
Brandon, Eric, Tony, Johanna, Rylee, and I sit in a booth at the same diner Grayson had taken me to the night I first arrived. While everyone is bouncing around ideas of what they think is happening with Grayson and Lily back at the house, I shift uncomfortably in my seat.
“They’re signing the papers,” Tony says confidently. “They’ve got to be signing the papers right now.”
“I don't know,” Eric shrugs. “I bet Lily does that thing where she makes her eyes look really big, bats her eyelashes a few times, and Gray forgets why he was mad—again. It’s not like this is the first time they’ve said they were going to split up.”
“Or she sings him some song she wrote on tour about how sorry she is,” Johanna laughs. “Except she wrote it years ago for some other guy and she’s not even sorry.”
I almost can’t bear to listen to them talk.
Every comment feels like a jab, a reminder that I’m tangled up in something I shouldn’t be.
I find myself, yet again, missing my bed at my apartment in Dallas and my uncomplicated life that definitely does not include kissing dreamy, hopefully almost divorced musicians who are old enough to know better.
“I bet they have hate-sex on the kitchen counter,” Tony suggests, earning cringes from everyone at the table. “Except the entire time, Gray’s picturing Mia and he accidentally screams her name.”
“What?” I almost spit out my drink.
“Please,” Rylee laughs playfully. “Mia, don’t tell me you haven’t noticed the way Grayson looks at you. As much as I absolutely do not want Lily and Grayson having sex of any kind on the kitchen counter, what Tony’s saying is totally believable.”
“Believable, sure,” Johanna sighs. “Can we all just admit that it would be great if they were really signing the papers right now? I’d much rather have Mia as a sister in law.”
“Right,” I murmur quietly. “I’ll be right back.”
I excuse myself from the table and walk outside of the restaurant, sitting on one of the benches. I pick at the skin around my nails and attempt to steady my breathing. It feels wrong to wish for someone’s marriage to be over.
I wonder if my father’s mistress has ever felt this way, and shudder at the thought of having anything in common with her.
I can’t think about me and Grayson being together… not until it’s a done deal.
“You okay?” a voice asks from behind me.
It’s Brandon again. Of all the people inside the restaurant who could’ve seen me unraveling, I’m oddly grateful that it’s him.
I struggle to find my words, laughing a little. “I don’t even know what to say.”
“I know,” he smiles, and I know he’s telling the truth. “It’s not fair for them to act like they know what’s going on when they don’t—especially in front of you, someone who genuinely needs to know.”
It’s like he’s speaking the exact words that were running through my mind when I was sitting at the table with everyone. They may have thought what they’re saying is funny, but really, it’s just my anxieties, exposed, being judged in a room full of people who don’t know any better.
“It was like this when Johanna and I split, too,” he admits. “Everyone assumed they knew everything, and they didn’t even know the half of it. They still don’t.”
“I’m not used to this,” I say quietly. “Being here, with you guys, it’s like everyone feels like they’re entitled to every detail. It just seems like I don’t have any privacy to feel all my feelings on my own terms.”
“I know,” Brandon replies. “It’s hard living so close to other people like this. It was a lot for me to get used to, too. But, look, if you just want one person to talk to about all this, I just hope you know I’m here.”
“I do,” I smile, and I mean it.
He puts his hand on my shoulder for just a moment and turns to walk back inside the restaurant. I sit for a moment longer, take a deep breath, rise from the bench, and walk inside behind him. I slide back into the booth beside Rylee.
“You good?” Rylee asks.
