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“Yeah.”
“Is it that bad?” Garrett downed the rest of his whiskey. “And is it wrong that knowing you almost might be broken up makes me feel a bit better?”
“You’re terrible.”
“I’m not terrible. I never cheated on Jen. You never cheated on Rob. It’s not wrong to fall in love, Kelly.”
“It’s all just coming to a head. With my drunken confessions the other night, yours tonight. We’re being selfish. They’re good people. We’re hurting them, and that’s what I can’t live with. I love him.”
“You’re breaking my heart,” Garrett said. “But I get it.”
I nudged him, shoulder to shoulder. “Rob’s too good for me, I’d say. But all the ways we’re different, our families and everything—it all adds up to me liking the security only because it gives me an excuse to fail before I’ve even tried to change.”
“There’s safety in numbers.”
“There’s safety in the number two, that’s for sure.”
“I do love you, Kelly.”
“I know,” I said. “And I’ve counted on that for far too long. In my mind, you were the solution to everything. If you didn’t have a girlfriend. If I told you how I felt. If we weren’t just friends, then my whole life would turn in the direction I wanted it to. But what I’m just figuring out is thatIhave to turn it that way. I can’t expect Rob to do it, and I certainly can’t expect you to do it.”
“What happened in the last five days to make everything so fucked up?”
Garrett paid the waitress for his scotch and offered me a slug. I shook my head. “We figured out that we have to grow up.”
“Had to happen sometime.”
“It really did.”
I laid my head on Garrett’s shoulder and felt the familiar calm. I wasn’t angry. I wasn’t feeling guilty because I didn’t have to hold it in any longer.
“Are we okay?” I asked. “I mean, are you okay?”
“We’re okay.” He squeezed my hand under the table and didn’t let go. “I don’t know if I’ll make it without completely cracking up, but I have to at least try.”
“What time is her flight?”
“Let’s not get all Hollywood.”
“If there was ever a time in your life for you to get ‘Hollywood,’ it would be now, when you haven’t said a proper good-bye.”
“Shit. When you put it that way.”
“Is she leaving tonight?”
“She’s trying to get on a WestJet red-eye.”
“You need to go, like now, because it’s already eleven, and you certainly don’t want to be trying to get a cab after the bells have chimed midnight and the whole world has decided New Year’s Eve is rubbish and now they want to get home and eat a bag of chips.”
“You’re so romantic.”
“It’s my greatest hidden feature.”
“Thanks, Kelly.”
“You’re welcome, and here, I’m scrawling this on a napkin—please give it to Jen. I know she’ll probably never trust me—hell, she’ll probably never like me, but at least I can say I’m sorry.”
I took the Sharpie I had in my pocket from writing the VIP signs for some of the chairs and scribbledJen, I am truly, completely, wholly, incredibly, sorry. About everything.
