Living Out Loud (Austen, #3)(60)

“You’re making progress,” she said as she wheeled herself over, stopping when she made it as close as she could with the maze of boxes.

I sighed happily. “It’s so good to have our things. I don’t know why, but it is. I don’t think I could ever be a minimalist. I forget things if I don’t have a touchstone to remind me.”

She chuckled. “Meg’s happy as a lark. She’s got Daddy’s old atlas split open on her bed, and she’s poring over the pages like she’s never seen them before.”

I walked over and sat in an armchair next to her. “And how about you, Mama?”

She took a breath, her fingers winding together in her lap. “I’m not quite sure how I feel. My worlds have collided—the one from before I met your Daddy and the other one, the one from before he died. The third one, I’m not sure about yet. It’s just as alien to me as it was when I woke up in that hospital bed.”

I nodded, knowing there was nothing to say.

Mama glanced at the window. “When I left here, I didn’t think I’d ever come back. And having the remainder of my life with your father here in boxes is comforting and sickening, all at the same time.”

For a moment, she sat, unmoving and quiet.

“You know,” she started softly, “when I met him, I knew. There was something about him, some magic, something in his smile and his eyes and the way his hand fit with mine, like they’d been cast together and split apart, and when they found each other again, there was a note plucked in both of us. And, after that moment, I marked my existence by the moments before and after him. So when my parents didn’t approve, it didn’t matter. There was only one thing I could do; I had to go with him. I had to be with him because I couldn’t see my life without him in it. But I don’t have a choice now either. He’s gone.”

“Mama,” I breathed, emotion pinching my lungs and heart.

Tears slid down her cheeks, but her voice was steady and sure. “What I mean to say is that I chose love, and I’d choose it again. I chose him over everything—family, money, career—because it was the only way for me to be happy, truly happy. Someday, you’ll find a love like that. You’ll find someone you love beyond anything in this world, and when you do, you have to choose that love and let it guide you. It’s all I wish for you girls—to love someone that much and be loved in equal measure.”

“But what about now? Now that it’s gone?”

She smiled, her breath hitching with a silent sob. “Oh, it’s not gone, baby. It lives here.” She touched her chest. “I’ll miss him until I draw my last breath, but his love made my life rich and full and meaningful. His love gave me three beautiful daughters, each who remind me every day of him—your smile and your eyes and your love for beauty in ordinary things, Elle’s quiet nature and care for others above herself, Meg’s laugh and uncanny ability to retain facts.”

A small laugh escaped me, and I brushed tears from my face.

“Anyway,” she said with a sigh that brought her composure, picking up a stack of books on the small table next to her, “I’m glad you have your things. Where are you going to put Lisa Kleypas?”

“Next to Eloisa James and Julia Quinn. Where else?”

She laughed and handed them over, and over the next hour, she helped me sort through it all until the massive shelf was packed ceiling to floor. And all the while, I thought over her admissions, sifting through my feelings and hers.

Deep down, I knew Will wasn’t the kind of man my father was, and I knew that Will and I didn’t have that magic, that awakening or devotion between us. I did have a lot of feelings though, feelings that hung in my mind like a fog, too vague to pinpoint without them disappearing.

I had a lot of feelings, but I didn’t know how I felt.

Part of me wanted to hunt down an answer, but the rest of me said I should take the gift of a beautiful man who went so far out of his way to make me happy.

Greg’s face flashed through my thoughts, my heart skipping a hard beat with a jolt. Because he fit that description just as much as Will did.

The difference was that I didn’t question Greg at all, not once. I trusted him implicitly.

But did I trust Will?

It was a question I couldn’t answer as easily as I would like, especially not after last night. I wondered how Greg would have handled it, handled me, but I only imagined he would have treated me with care and respect and quiet joy.

And I let myself wish for a moment that it could have been him instead.





16





Do vs. Feel





Greg

The fabric of my tie zipped as I tugged the knot apart for what had to be the tenth time.

I hissed a swear and lined up the tails, my eyes on my hands reflected in my bedroom mirror.

“Having trouble?”

I glanced behind me to find Sarah leaning against the doorframe, smiling. I grumbled a nonresponse.

This time, I’d pulled too tight. I huffed and pulled the knot out again.

“Nervous?” she asked.

“Does it show?”

“Not at all,” she joked. “I haven’t gotten the Annie update in a couple of days. Is she still…are they still together?”

My teeth clenched. “As far as I know. We have a sort of unspoken rule not to discuss him. But the last couple of days, she’s been under house arrest working on her Juilliard application.”