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Chapter Twenty-Two
Normal had never felt so abnormal.
We weren’t talking. It was all silence. And not the good kind. Not the okay kind we were so used to sitting in together. The next week was fucking torture.
When it wasn’t her and me sitting in a silence that was just begging to be broken, it was her and him parading around the school like the fucking loved-up fuckers they so clearly were. He had his hands on her. He kissed her. She giggled and blushed and fawned all over him like we’d had nothing.
I’d been angry most of my life, but I was angrier than I’d ever been.
Most of it was my fault. The rest had caught me off guard and I blamed myself for that, too. If I’d just been old reliable Roman Lombardi, then this would be fine. If I wasn’t Roman Lombardi, then this would be fine. I’d either not care or I’d be the right kind of guy. Win-win.
But like so much in my life, the reality was lose-lose.
I’d been feeling so shit that I’d barely even heard Rocco’s voice all week. The only voice in my head was my own, but it was saying all the same things.
When I flew out the door the next Monday morning, I found Mum hugging Piper.
So, everyone was allowed to hug her but me? Was that it?
“Mum, I thought you guys had left?” I growled at her.
Mum let got of Piper and looked at me. I kept walk towards them as I straightened my blazer collar that was still sitting awkwardly against my neck.
“Yes! We’re leaving now!” Mum said happily as she went to her car. “Oh, Roman. Wednesday. Are you free?”
My gaze narrowed. “Why…?”
“I have a meeting and need you to look after Maddy.”
I nodded slowly. “Sure…”
“Great. Thank you, love. Bye, Piper!” She swung into the car and started the engine.
“Bye, Uncie Roman!” came a very muffled scream accompanied by a thump on the window from inside the car.
Maddy’s face was pressed up against the glass as best she could from her car seat. I gave her a wave and a nod with slightly less anger than I’d been greeting the world lately.
“I’ll see you tonight, trouble!” I kept waving until they were out of sight, then glared at Piper. “What are you doing?”
She was understandably confused. “What do you mean what am I doing?”
I sighed and scrubbed my hand over my jaw. “Nothing. Just. Fucking. Nothing. Come on. We’re already late.”
“I didn’t think you cared,” she sassed.
I opened the door for her as had become the norm, and reminded her, “I don’t. But you do.”
“What’s up?” She begged me with her tone and her eyes.
She turned around and looked at me. Even now, she had a way of stilling everything in me. Stilling it and simultaneously making it all worse. I pulled some hair from where it had stuck to her lipgloss, but my hand wouldn’t leave her cheek.
“I’m adjusting, Barlow,” I told her.
“You’re doing a stellar job of it,” she huffed sarcastically.
Like I didn’t know.
“I know. Okay? I’m just… I’m trying here, Barlow. What did you expect? We’d have all this figured out straight away?”
