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“It’s not about giving up.”
“Then what’s it about?”
I ran my hand over my head and let out a long breath. “I don’t know.”
Dissatisfied with that answer, Jo rolled her eyes, then whipped out her phone and tapped a few times before coming to sit next to me on the couch. “I just told Trevor I’d be late.”
“You didn’t have to do that. Like I keep saying, I don’t wanna talk about it.”
“Well, youneedto talk about it. I know your usual deal is to suffer in silence and be all broody, but it’s been over a week. I see it eating at you.” When I didn’t reply, she dipped her head and caught my eye. “Grayson asked me why you were sad.”
That had my attention. “He did? What did you tell him?”
“I told him you weren’t sad, you were just trying to get us settled into our new lives and that moving to a new place can be stressful for grown-ups. All true, by the way—it is a lot.”
“Yeah.”
“Then I took it as a chance to check up on him and see if he was feeling overwhelmed at all. He said he’s not. He went off on a whole thing about how excited he was to make new friends in school and stuff. So, good job there, Dad.”
The compliment felt good, since I spent a fair amount of time worrying about messing the kid up. But I was still mad at myself for not hiding my feelings well enough if my six-year-old picked up on them. Maybe Jo was right. Maybe I did need to get it off my chest.
I leaned forward, resting my elbows on my knees. “The thing is, I don’t know what to say that would even matter. Talking about it with you—or anyone—isn’t going to fix it.”
“What will?”
“A time machine.”
She snorted. “You’re out of luck, there, sorry. But maybe if you tell me what the problem is I can help. I still don’t even know what happened between you guys in the first place. You’ve never told me.”
Jo hit the nail on the head earlier when she said I liked to suffer in silence. Talking about Layla was a no-fly zone after we broke up. It wasn’t on the table, and I never gave in.
At the time, it was all too painful. I still loved her so much and hated that I’d needed to walk away. But now that I knew her side of things, guilt swirled in my gut. Maybe some part of me knew I’d made a bad choice, and it kept me from being able to get the words out.
Giving in, I braced myself for her reaction. “I broke up with Layla after I found out about Grayson.”
“Oh, dang. I always figuredshebroke up withyou.” When I gave her the side-eye, she chuckled. “What? Sorry. You were so dark about the whole thing. Why did you break up with her?”
“I broke up with her because neither one of us wanted kids anytime soon, and I was scared that if she found out about him, she’d come with me without fully knowing what she was getting herself into. I thought she might eventually leave—or worse, stay and resent me.”
Jo reared back, eyes like saucers. “No you didn’t.”
“The kid had just lost his mom, Jo.”
“What’s your point?”
I heaved out a sigh and stood, pacing the living room. “My point is that I knewIwasn’t going to leave Grayson, but I couldn’t know for sure that Layla wouldn’t. I didn’t want him to go through that again.”
“Or maybe you didn’t want to go through that yourself on top of suddenly becoming a dad and everything that went with that, so you pushed her away.”
“No, that’s not it.”
“I disagree. I also think you’re an idiot and you really messed up. How could you say you loved her and then assume the worst of her?”
Pain sliced through me. “Now you sound like her.”
“Good. I hope she called you out.”
“She did.”
