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The wine slides down, warming my chest, and before I know it, I’m slightly tipsy and singing along to the radio. Mom sings alongside me, the bottle of wine almost empty as she moves to the fridge for another.
If there’s one thing that can be said for my mom, it’s that she’s the coolest person in the world. The shit I’ve dragged to her doorstep is plentiful, but she’s never once judged me. Instead, she holds my hand, wading through the trauma with me until she knows I’m ready to go it alone.
“I dropped out of college,” I whisper, unable to make the words stronger. Mom nods, her expression never straying from the neutral expression she wears. I swallow, grabbing my glass and tipping the remaining liquid down my throat before telling her the story . . . from the start.
She purses her lips, tears welling in her eyes when I get to this morning. I don’t tell her about the letters, or the pictures, the ones I’ve got stuffed in the trunk of my car. Too ashamed to admit I’ve let Sebastian control me once more.
Instead, I focus on Maverick and Willow, the first card to fall before the whole deck crumpled.
“God, Mom. She looked at me with so much hatred, and he just stood there. I never expected her to forgive me, but I thought that maybe we could find some common ground again, you know? We were friends for so long.”
“Did you give him a chance to say anything?” My eyes snap to Mom’s, my brow furrowing. “Don’t look at me like that, Beatrice.” Topping up both our glasses, she drops onto the stool beside me, taking my hand in hers as she continues.
“I know teen drama is well out of my ballpark, and it’s been a long time since I was your age.” Raising my brow, I chuckle. Mom was seventeen when she had me, it’s hardly going back to the dinosaur era. “But I do remember that when things hurt, I would react first, then think later. And I know you, baby. If there’s one thing you’ve become really good at over the last two years, it’s pushing away the people that love you.”
“Mom,” I breathe, sighing as I close my eyes. I pull in a deep breath, holding it for four long seconds as I push away the fog. “I did react first. But I waited hours, and he never came. And all I could do in that time was think. He told me that I ruined him once.” She gestures for me to elaborate, sipping her wine as I do. “And while we may have both learned over the months that that wasn’t the truth. Staying there now, coming between him and his family. Him and his future. I would ruin him. I get why they hate me, Mom, and there’s no way I could have ever asked him to pick sides. How could I? This isn’t just about me pushing him away.”
“Isn’t it? Nobody is asking him to pick sides.”
“But he did,” I whisper, dropping my gaze to the marble. “I know it’s wrong of me to have expected him to leave her there and come find me, but when he didn’t, it hurt so bad. I have given so much of myself to other people over the years, too much of myself. But this time, I stole pieces from him too. Pieces that we’ll never be able to fit back together. We’re bad for each other, Mom. There’s so much history there, painful history. And this morning just proved that.
“He’s getting his life back together, after what I did to it. And I know I’m not entirely to blame, we both made poor choices back then, but now I can make the right choice. I can let him go, let him move on, for good this time.”
“You honestly think that’s the right choice?” she asks, her head cocked to the side as she watches me. “You really think he’s better off without you in his life?”
No . . . I don’t know.
“I do.” I nod, strengthening my resolve. I made this decision, and I have to live with it.
No matter what doubts spring to my mind, it is the right one.
It has to be.
Pushing off the counter, I start to clear the containers and cutlery from our dinner.
“He deserves a real shot at life with people who love and support him at his back. Not someone that will only drag him down.”
“Don’t you think that’s his decision to make?”
“Maybe,” I say, my lips trembling. “But it doesn’t matter now. I made the decision for us, giving him the chance he deserves.”
Maverick
The days drag, each feeling longer with Beatrice gone.
For a split second in the mornings, I forget, expecting her to be tucked under the comforter when I peel my eyes open, but she never is. And then reality comes crashing back down. It’s suffocating. But I still get out of bed, forcing myself to get through the day.
Letting her go, giving her the freedom she asked for, it’s for the best. It’s got to be. Because if not, then she threw us away for nothing, and I just let her walk out the door. And that’s not something I can think about.
Maisie slides onto the bench beside me, a half smile, half grimace on her face as she holds a cup of coffee toward me. “Peace offering?”
A chuckle slips past my lips, and I shake my head, taking the to-go cup from her hands. When Maisie found out Beatrice dropped out, her first stop was my apartment, and boy, did that girl chew me out. She said more than a few choice words, and if looks could kill, I’d have been six feet under, buried beneath a pile of shit. Which I’m starting to think I deserve the longer I go without seeing my girl.
Her shoulders sag in relief, and she laughs to herself. “I’m sorry, Maverick. I shouldn’t have blamed you.”
“Don’t worry about it.” I shrug, turning to look out over the quad. It’s quieter this morning, the chilly temperatures drawing students inside where the warmth is. My own skin pebbles as wind batters around us. “I’m guessing you spoke to her?”
“Yeah, I have.”
