Page 4 of What He Always Knew

But I couldn’t be mad she’d shown up. Not really.

Because we’d never technically ended our relationship when I left.

I met Blake a couple of years before my family died. I was piss ass drunk at a dive bar on the lower east side, causing trouble with one of my buddies from Juilliard.

It was a normal night for me — play piano at the restaurant all night for rich people who didn’t hear me anyway, meet up with Ben at his place, hammer down some whiskey and stumble into the first bar we found. Crashing karaoke bars was our favorite, because we could make fun of other drunk assholes and feel a little better about the fact that we were thirty years old and still partying like we were twenty-one.

Neither of us were in a relationship, neither of us had kids, and neither of us had plans. We were the perfect pair.

But on that particular Friday night, Blake had stumbled into the same bar with a group of her girlfriends. She’d gone on stage solo and sang the most beautiful version of Fleetwood Mac’sDreamsI’d ever heard in my life, and I’d declared on a stomach full of whiskey that I’d marry her one day.

We went on our first date a week later.

Blake had never really been my girlfriend. She was more of a friend who liked to get naked as much as I did. We’d meet up every now and then, sometimes going months between seeing each other, and every time we got together, we lost ourselves in each other. There were long nights spent in my apartment, smoking cigarettes and making out between stories. She’d always be gone the next morning before I woke up, and I never really knew when I’d see her again. I just knew that I would.

But when my family died, everything changed.

Blake had been there for me. She was the only one. She’d helped me with everything — the funeral, the will, the reporters, my bills, my job. There was so much to do, to handle, and I could barely get out of bed in the morning. In fact, on most days, I didn’t. But Blake was there, handling all of it. She’d even tried to save me from myself when I was blowing through my inheritance, begging me for a small portion of it to invest.

That was all that was left of it now.

She hadn’t just been there to handle the paperwork, either. She’d been there on the long, torturous nights where I’d break down into tears and drink myself stupid trying to mourn my loss. It was in that time that I realized those nights we’d slept together, the nights she’d shared my bed, we’d also shared a deeper part of ourselves.

She loved me. She loved me enough to be there for me in one of the darkest times of my life. And in that time, I realized I loved her, too.

Blake moved in with me a few weeks after my family passed just to make sure I wouldn’t hurt myself. She took care of me like a mother, like a sister, like a friend, and like a wife.

So, I made her my girlfriend.

But when it came to moving, I hadn’t thought twice about her. It was shitty, and I hated to admit it out loud. But that was just the way we were. She had never told me she loved me, and I never told her. She was there when I needed her, and I was there when she needed me. But she was busy with her own life just as I was with mine, and though we lived together, it was almost more as roommates than anything.

Sure, we had the title, but it didn’t feel like anything had changed between us. We were still the same boy and girl who slept together and didn’t talk for months at a time, except now we still shared a bed.

So, when I left, I didn’t even consider the fact that she might want more.

I just thought that was where it ended. We had a few conversations about keeping in touch, about seeing each other when I came back into town, but we never said we would stay together. We never said we would do the long-distance thing, or that she would move, or I would come back.

Then again, we never said we were done, either.

And so, I couldn’t really be mad that she’s surprised me, probably thinking it’d make me happy to see her. And in a way, I was. Blake was perhaps my onlytruefriend I had anymore.

But I had no idea how to explain her to Charlie, or vice versa.

And I had no idea what her being here meant.

“I need to get going,” I said after she’d run off a list of all the things she wanted to accomplish that day. I dumped what was left of my coffee in the sink and swiped my coat off the counter. “I’ll leave the spare house keys hanging on the hook by the door, and just text me if you need anything.”

“Okay,” she said with a bright smile. “I’ll make dinner tonight, too. What time do you think you’ll be home?”

“Not sure.” My mind shot to Charlie. “But I’ll let you know.”

Blake smiled, hopping off the barstool and skipping around the kitchen island until she was in my arms. I had no choice but to catch her, to pull her into me, and when she leaned up to press a kiss to my lips, I kissed her back.

And I felt like absolute scum.

By the time I made it to school, it was only ten minutes before the first bell. It was the latest I’d been since I started, and I knew without a second guess that it was too late to talk to Charlie before the day began.

Still, I bolted to her classroom, and when I saw her standing at her whiteboard with her teacher’s aide, I didn’t know whether to sigh with relief or crumble from the pain. Her eyes flicked to mine as she ran over the day’s plan with Robin, and they didn’t give anything away before they were gone again. I watched her intently, waiting, watching the clock behind her, knowing there wasn’t time to hear all I hoped to.