Page 56

Tobie

I’ve been holding everything inside since Marc’s knee hit the white marble lobby, and he slid a diamond ring onto my finger.

He proposed.

The man who cheated on me decided he wanted me back.

A tear drips from my eye. I drag the back of my hand across it the way I have all the others.

I whisper to myself, “Just a little farther.”

We hit a pothole, and I rock in my seat as the driver’s apologetic gaze briefly hooks mine. “Sorry about that. One day, someone will do something about this road.”

I look away, too focused on holding everything in for just a little farther to care about the potholes, my red eyes, and the pain that hasn’t faded for a second.

The echo of Marc’s proposal fills my head to overflowing. I’d burst it like a balloon if it would release the pressure.

“Tobie,” he says, still on his knees, one hand grasping mine. That gigantic diamond glints on my finger. I don’t remember him taking it from the velvet box and putting it on me.

“Say something,” Marc softly orders.

What do you say to a man who was the center of your world for years?

A man who just slipped a ring on your finger, giving you the thing you always thought you wanted?

“I don’t love you anymore.” It’s only when I met Reid, Caleb, and Javier that I realized how hollow the life we shared was.

The corners of his eyes pinch. “Tobie ? —”

I pull the ring off my finger and offer it to him. “Give this to someone you want to marry, not someone you suddenly want because you can’t have them anymore.”

When he doesn’t take the ring, I drop it and walk away.

He follows me out, the ring in his hand, and it’s clear he doesn’t believe me.

“They don’t love you, Tobie.”

I barely notice the doorman, who swings open the door as I pass him to get outside.

Marc circles my wrist and draws me back, blue eyes pleading with me to reconsider. “But I do.”

I lift my face to him, and I don’t see love in his eyes. I just see a need to win. “Should I marry you because I can’t be with them?”

He doesn’t respond.

I pull my arm from his loose grip and walk down the steps, get the first cab, and turn my cell phone off.

The campus is almost empty of students when the cab parks outside my dorm. I ask the driver to wait ten minutes. Students have already left for spring break, including Max, and I desperately wish she were here.

I keep my head down, slipping off my shoes when I’m inside my dorm and gripping the hem of my dress as I jog up the stairs to get to my room.

I strip and change into sweats. I leave everything on the floor, my focus on stuffing everything I think I might need into my bag.

It doesn’t take me long.

I’m out of my room and sliding into the backseat of the cab ten minutes later.

And at the airport thirty minutes after that.

Now I’m here.

Knock. Knock.

It takes a second for the lights to flicker on. They start from the top and work their way down. So does the soft creak of footsteps on the staircase.

The door swings open.

I take in my dad’s sleep-weary face, and I stop holding everything in.

I burst into tears.

He doesn’t say a word. He just opens his arms wide, drawing me against his chest and giving me all the love I’ve ached for.

That I came home for.

Thirty minutes later, we’re on the couch, and I have a blanket wrapped around my shoulders and a pint of Ben & Jerry’s Phish Food in my left hand.

“You want me to kill him?” my dad asks.

It’s not a good idea to eat so much refined sugar. I’m already on a fast track to feeling like garbage tomorrow with the lack of sleep, stress, and now sugar. But it’s ice cream, and Dad knows this is my absolute favorite. He always keeps a tub in the freezer for when I come home.

Some moments require ice cream, and this is one of them.

I dig another chocolate fish from the tub. “No, Dad, I don’t want you to kill him.”

He gives me a probing look. “I’ve been watching Crime Scene Investigation . I had to take a break from the gore after two seasons, but I know enough.”

It’s a lot further than he got with The Walking Dead . Two episodes, and he was done. So was I. I don’t think either of us slept for more than an hour that night.

I’ve tried telling him to stop watching television shows with gore, but for some reason, he keeps going back to them. I don’t think he understands why himself.

A smile pulls on the corner of my lips, and I struggle to flatten it. “Two seasons of CSI does not mean you’ll get away with murder, Dad.”

“No, but the gloves I wear and the DNA I remember to wipe from all surfaces will.”

I lose my battle to contain my smile.

His smile follows a split second later. He wraps his arm around me and drops a kiss on the top of my head. “Stay home for as long as you need, okay, Junebug?”

“Okay, Dad.”

“I’ll burn the body. Maybe even set fire to the building in case I missed any DNA.”

I peer up at him. “Should you be talking about burning bodies with your daughter?”

“Any father would do the same if his little girl came home with a broken heart.”

I believe him.

Other than telling him that Marc cheated and we broke up, I haven’t gotten into the specifics. It hurt when it happened, but that isn’t the reason for my tears or why I came home to Lawrenceburg.

“Sorry I woke you up in the middle of the night. I didn’t realize I forgot my keys until I got in the cab at the airport.”

“You should have called from the airport. I’d have come to get you.”

I sigh, trying not to think about my phone. It’s been off for hours. Something tells me that it’s going to blow up with unread texts, voicemails, and voice notes when I turn it on after running away from my life without a word to anyone.

I focus on my ice cream instead. “From now on, my mode of communication will be by carrier pigeon. We can put a cage in the tree outside my window, and I’ll deliver and receive my messages from there.”

He dips his spoon into my ice cream. “Do you have any clue how much pigeons crap all over the place?”

“Doves then. They’re prettier anyway. Do they shit everywhere as well?”

He raises an eyebrow.

I huff. “Shit is an essential bodily function, not just a curse. And I’m twenty-two. Old enough to be dropping f-bombs if I want.”

“Not under this roof, you’re not, young lady.” He frowns into the ice cream tub. “Did you eat all the fish already?”

“Yes,” I say with no apology.

He kisses the top of my head. “Just this once, I will not complain.”

Smiling, I rest my head on his shoulder.

I woke him in the middle of the night, and he has to be up at six to get ready for work, but he will sit by my side until five if that’s what I need. “Thanks, Dad.”