In the Middle of Somewhere (Middle of Somewhere, #1)(67)

“Um. Yeah,” I say.

Rex looks at me seriously.

“You helped me today,” he says. “You took care of me. Do you think less of me because I let you?”

“Of course not. I never said—”

“You never said it, but it’s clear. Somewhere along the line you learned that it’s a failure to accept help. That it makes you weak. Right?”

I try to look away, but he’s still holding my face. I don’t think anyone’s ever looked at me so hard.

“Right?” he says again.

“Right,” I say, and my voice cracks. I clear my throat. “But I know it’s not true. That’s what made me think of it: how much I wanted to take care of you today.”

“You know it’s not true here,” Rex says, tapping my forehead. “But it’ll take a while to believe it.”

I shrug, but I keep looking at his beautiful eyes.

“Well, then I guess we’ll just have to keep looking out for each other until we both believe it, huh?” Rex says.

“Okay,” I tell him.

“Okay,” he says, and he kisses me matter-of-factly, like we’ve just sealed a deal.

“Um, did I mess that up?” I ask again, pointing to the pepper.

“Nope,” Rex says. “It’s perfect for the sauce. It’ll just cook faster now.”

He shows me how to sauté the green pepper, onion, garlic, and tomatoes for the base of the sauce and mix oil and vinegar for salad dressing.

Rex nudges me with his shoulder, teasing me about being distractible. Apparently, I missed whatever he just said because I was watching him bend over to take the bread out of the oven. Rex’s teasing is always gentle, which makes it feel like a whole different animal than my brothers’ take-no-prisoners brand of humiliation.

“How are you feeling?” I ask him as we sit down to eat.

“I feel pretty damn good,” he says, looking at me. I meant his head, but I don’t think that’s what he’s talking about. I smile at him, but now that I’m not distracted by cooking, my mind is racing with questions. Should I tell him about Jay asking me out, or will that just give him more of a reason to be jealous? Should I tell him about Richard? Ginger said that’s what you do when you… date someone. Is that what we’re doing?

I shove spaghetti into my mouth until I can decide, but when I look up, Rex is looking at me, but isn’t eating.

“’S good,” I say with my mouth full.

“Something wrong?” Rex asks.

“No, I just. I was thinking, when I was in Detroit, that….” That what? That I should tell him what happened the last time I thought I was dating someone? That I should tell him how pathetic I am? Ugh.

“So, the main character in my favorite book is named Richard,” I say.

“The Secret History?” Rex asks.

“Yeah! How’d you—oh.” Right, the book had fallen out of my pants the night we f*cked against the tree. “But how’d you know it was my favorite?”

“It was worn,” he says. “And most of your other books looked like you bought them used, but not like they’d been read that many times. The Secret History had its corners all rounded, like it’d been handled a lot.”

Jesus Christ, he’s observant.

“Well, so, when I was in grad school, I met this guy and—this is so stupid—his name was Richard. And I had this idiotic thought that maybe he’d be like Richard in the book.” I trail off, embarrassed that I admitted this.

“It’s not stupid,” he says, taking my hand. “It’s actually incredibly sweet.”

“It’s nerdy,” I say.

“Yeah, maybe a little. And… he wasn’t?”

“Ah, no.”

Rex nods and starts to eat slowly, as I talk. I tell him about meeting Richard and about how things were between us. Rex keeps eating, but his left hand is clenched into a fist where it rests on his knee, and he keeps squeezing it tighter and tighter every time I say something he doesn’t like. When I get to the part about Ginger overhearing Rex’s friends calling me trash, he makes a sound like a growl in the back of his throat, but stops himself from interrupting me. When I tell him about walking in on Richard kissing another man, Rex’s face falls and he grits his teeth. He looks furious.

“I would never do that to you,” Rex insists, his eyes on fire. He looks like he’s about to say something else, but I just wanted to get it off my chest. I don’t want to rehash my own pathetic history.

I push the serving bowl toward Rex.

“You should finish it. I bet you haven’t eaten much lately.”

He smiles gratefully and puts the last serving of pasta on his plate.

“Yeah, I can never eat when I have them. Poor Marilyn,” he says. “She thought I was dying or something. She kept jumping up on the bed, trying to check on me, but I couldn’t stand the movement, so I shut the door. She was whining all night, trying to get in.”

I know the sound. It was the same sound she made the night I hit her. Remembering the way she lay on the ground, so helpless, makes me shiver.

“Hey,” I say, “you never told me how you knew what to do for Marilyn.”

“What, with her leg?”