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“Are you proposing?”
“Gross.” I roll my eyes and he laughs again but not like before. This laugh sounds harsh. Bitter. “You know what I’m saying, Ry.” Shifting in my seat I look down at his hands. They’re scarred. Clenched into fists. Resting on his knees. I’m not like those nurses at the center. I’m not afraid of Ryan. He’s the closest thing I have to a big brother. Even when we were kids and fought like dogs, we were friends. “Is that something you want for yourself… later.”
“It doesn’t matter what I want, Tess.” He looks at me then, his deep brown eyes fixed on my face. “Who’s going to want me?”
“What’s not to want?” For some reason, I feel defensive. “You’re—”
“A mess. I’m a fucking mess.” He doesn’t look away, his deep brown gaze going dark and bottomless. “Burned. Broken. So fucked in the head I can’t even tie my own goddamned shoes half the time.” He laughs when my gaze dips to the ugly pink scars clawing their way past the collar of his dress shirt. “That’s not even the worst of it. You should see what I’ve got going on below the belt.”
I feel the blood rush away from my face, even as I shake my head. “None of that would matter to the right woman.”
“The right woman?” He repeats it like I just spoke to him in a foreign language. “I can’t have kids, Tess. I can’t even get it up to try, so unless Mother Teresa has a Tinder profile, I’m pretty sure I’m shit out of luck.”
We both sit there in stunned silence, digesting what he just said out loud. That he’s twenty-eight and impotent. That’s he’s damaged beyond repair. So far gone that no one in her right mind would want him.
Finally, he unclenches a fist and lifts his hand to give his face a rough swipe. “Look—let’s just pretend the last five minutes never happened, okay? We’ll go inside and I’ll do my best to pretend I don’t want to jump off a fucking bridge.”
His admission knocks the air from my lungs. “Don’t.” I shake my head. My fingers find each other in my lap and squeeze each other so hard I can feel my bones bend beneath the pressure. “Don’t say things like that. You can’t—”
“I can.” His tone is cold. Hard. “And if I wanted to—really wanted to—there’s not a goddamned thing any of you could do to stop me, so like I said, let’s just—”
“My mother killed herself.”
I would’ve sworn I only thought it. That the words bouncing around inside my skull never escaped my mouth but his head snaps back on his neck and his face goes pale, like I just slapped him. “No. She died of an aneurysm.” He shakes his head at me like I’ve got it all wrong. “Your dad—”
“Lied. He lied to everyone because he couldn’t accept what really happened. She killed herself, Ryan. I’m the one who found her.” I can still see it, like I just pushed the door open. Like she’s still in front of me, floating in a tub full of cold, red water. “She left me without ever giving me a chance to make it better and I live with that every day, so no, you can’t. If you love Henley, you can’t do that to her. You won’t.”
“I didn’t—” He reaches for me, tries to pry my fingers apart but I pull away from him, shaking my head.
“Promise me.” I don’t have to say anything else. I don’t have to clarify. He knows what I mean. What I’m asking for.
“Okay.” He nods his head, hard and fast, like he’s willing to give me anything I ask for, as long as this conversation can be over. “I promise.”
I’m out of the car and across the lot before I know what I’m doing.
Away.
Away.
I have to get away.
And then he’s in front of me. Not the Ryan that came back, but the Ryan he used to be. The years fall away and we’re kids again, standing in the Gilroy’s living room, surrounded by whispering grown-ups about how vibrant and beautiful my mother was. How much she’ll be missed. How lost we are without her. He’s wearing one of Con’s hand-me-down suits and I can’t cry.
It’s been days, and I still can’t cry.
I’m sorry, Tess. I’m here for you, okay? If you need me, I’m here. I’ll always be here.
When he said it to me then, I nodded and thanked him. Gave him a flat smile before wandering away.
This time, he doesn’t say a word. He just opens his arms and waits for me.
I step into them and let him hold me.
But I still don’t cry.