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“I had no idea who you were,” I continued. “And admittedly, we started off on the wrong foot. But the more I got to know you, the better I liked you. I was sad when we got back to the city and I had to leave you. You saw me when I was standing outside your car yelling at you to open up. You saw how happy I was to come running back, right?”
He let his head fall back against the headrest. “I saw,” he said. “You were happy to see me. But that was when I was still Ian Dundunderfuck. It was before you knew about the money.”
“And now it’s after I know about the money, and I still like you for you, don’t I?”
“Give it some time to sink in,” he said. “Once you picture all those zeros in your head, you won’t be able to see past them. It’ll overwhelm your entire fucking soul. It’ll change you and it will change the way you see me, just like it does with everyone else. You’ll see.”
Man, this guy was determined to believe he was unlovable. “You get that my current poverty isn’t hereditary, right? Between the alimony and the freelance earnings, my mom brings in something like half a mill a year. She could retire tomorrow and live more than comfortably for the rest of her life. And believe me, she’d be more than happy to share some of that money with me if I was willing to take it. But I’m not. I haven’t accepted a red cent from her since I finished my undergrad. But the fact is, eventually I’m going to inherit everything, so I don’t need your money or anyone else’s. So, sorry, Ian, you have nothing to offer me on the financial front. I like you for your personality and I couldn’t care less about your father’s stupid money. Suck on it.”
He sat silently, his elbow on the windowsill, his thumb and forefingers massaging his forehead. “I want to believe that, Clara,” he said. “I want to believe it more than you could possibly under—”
“Pull off,” I said abruptly, pointing to the exit sign just ahead.
“The sign back there said rest area five miles. Can you wait a little longer?”
“No, get off here.”
Without questioning me further, he pulled off. At the end of the off-ramp were two signs. The one pointing left said “Downtown” and the one pointing right said “Dead End—No Services.”
“Turn right,” I said.
“Why right?” he said as he made the turn. “There won’t be a bathroom.”
“Believe it or not, I don’t have to pee.” We drove about a half mile further when I saw a ditch on the side of the road. “Right there,” I said, pointing. “Pull over.”
He veered into the ditch and turned off the car.
“OK, we’re pulled over,” he said. “Do you mind if I ask why?”
“I want to talk.”
“About?”
“You,” I said. “I want you to make me understand why you think you’re so damned unlovable.”
“No, you don’t,” he said.
“Yeah, I do.”
“Fine,” he said. “But trust me, you’re going to be sorry you asked.”
“That’s for me to decide,” I said. “Spill it.”
CHAPTER 32
Ian
In a time that felt like a thousand years ago, in a land that now seemed a million miles away, there was a thirteen-year-old boy who lived in a little red house in a tiny New York town. His mother was a teacher at a school called The St. Ignatius Academy for the Deaf and his father was a rising star in a world known as “finance.” The boy himself aspired to be a rising star in a world known as “girls,” but was having difficulty getting past the part known as “Hello.”
But the boy had a plan. It was the last day of seventh grade, and summer vacation started in four short hours. But more importantly, the first football practice of his life was just two short weeks away. The coach was Mr. Markle, the father of Sabrina Markle. She wasn’t the prettiest girl in school, nor the smartest or funniest. In fact, none of the other boys in school seemed to even know she existed. But she was all the boy could think about, and one day when he’d looked over the pages of his history textbook to take a peek at her, he had found her already peeking at him. He’d lain awake until four a.m. that night, delirious with the certainty that he was on the verge of getting his first real live-action girlfriend.
The following day, without his mother’s permission, he signed himself up for the football team, his head filled with visions of himself yelling “14, 25, 36 hut” as Sabrina eagerly cheered him on from the sidelines. He wasn’t entirely sure he’d be appointed quarterback, what with him never having thrown an actual football or watched an actual game, but he was tall for his age, so surely he’d be assigned to a position of stature. Wide receiver perhaps? Offensive tackle maybe? Goalie?
As it turned out, he would never know, because when he came home that last day of seventh grade, four packed suitcases were waiting for him in the entryway. Before he had a chance to ask his mother what was going on, he saw a limo pulling up in front of his house.
His father’s driver, Reggie, was walking across the lawn. The boy immediately ran to the front door and locked it.
Behind him, he heard his mother’s footsteps coming down the stairs.
