It's a Fugly Life (Fugly #2)(24)
Clara gave me a little smile. “Never. Because you’re human. You’re also your biggest fan.”
“So I’m a narcissistic self-hater?”
“Split personality all the way,” she replied with a smile.
“Ha. Not funny.”
She dropped her smile. “Who said I was joking?”
“Okay. That’s really not funny.” I frowned.
“Sorry. Just a little therapist humor.” She stood and gave my arm a squeeze. “You’re doing fine, Lily. Just try to remember what I said and start using that tenacity on yourself. I’m here if you need me.”
Okay, self, get ready to rumble. “Thanks, Clara.”
I felt a little lighter as I left her office and traipsed through her garden out to my car, which was really a big old van with a lily pad logo on the side. Not so cool, but I needed it to haul inventory.
As soon as I slid behind the wheel, that annoying heaviness took a seat on my chest. Okay. Focus. What do I need? What do I need?
I needed closure with the two men in my life. I needed to say goodbye to Patricio, even if I felt angry with him. I also needed to see Max and really explain where my head was at. If I didn’t clear out the muck, I wouldn’t be able to find room for what I needed: space for me. And if I didn’t do that, I would keep hopping from one thing to the next, trying to fill some void in my life without truly knowing what the void was.
I started my engine and headed to my apartment. I would call my mother on the way and ask her to look after the shop while I was gone. Today, I’d completely baled and couldn’t afford more lost sales even if miniscule. She loved coming in and helping me from time to time, but she would freak out getting to be in charge of the entire thing herself. She was a model worrywart.
This moment proved to be yet another milestone in my life: accepting help from others, something I’d never quite mastered.
One step, Lily.
I’d left Patricio two messages while on my way to LAX, a two-hour drive but worth the trouble because tickets to Chicago were cheaper compared to the local airport. On the third attempt to call Patricio, I knew he simply didn’t want to speak with me, but this was no longer about him. This was about me. That’s right. I’m being selfish for once! Totally selfish! Boohoo for you, men!
“Patricio, I didn’t want to do it like this, but I need to get a few things off my chest. First, I don’t want to marry you or see you anymore. Seems silly to say that after you said we were over this morning and you called me a whore—” I still can’t believe he did that. A-hole! “—but I know you can be a hothead, so I didn’t want you thinking this is a fight we’ll recover from. It’s not because I am cheating on you with Max—I’m not. And that kiss, well, there’s no excuse, but it just shows I’m not ready to commit to you or anyone until I settle my past. Speaking of pasts, I don’t know if you slept with Adeline again, and maybe I don’t really want to know, but I’m not ending things because of her. It’s because we’re not right together. And I’m sorry things ended like they did because…” My eyes unexpectedly started to tear up. Why? Why was I crying? “Because I really enjoyed,” sniffle, sniffle, “our time together.”
Patricio had been the first semi-normal relationship I’d ever had. Okay, maybe not semi-normal since he was a celebrity and our relationship occasionally made the tabloids. But we’d gone out on real dates, unlike my relationship with Max, my boss at the time. He’d taken me on his corporate jet to a fashion show in Milan after asking me to be his ugly-aversion therapy tool. We’d ended up connecting in the strangest of love-hate relationships of all time. Then, that night at the party, after the fashion show where I’d danced with Patricio, Max and I got in a huge fight. He’d completely lost his cool seeing me with another man, like I’d lost mine seeing him with Adeline. The result was Max taking me back to my hotel room for an angry, mind-blowing f*ck—my very first ever—that opened up a can of worms I hadn’t been expecting. I had felt, as maybe I did now, that we didn’t make sense and it would only lead to utter heartbreak. That was what I believed, like an idiot, who couldn’t accept a good thing when she had it.
I let out a sigh and then cleared my throat, to finish the message. “Patricio, I wish you the best whether it’s with Adeline or someone else. Goodbye.”
The moment I hit the end call button on my console, I immediately felt lighter. Better. My stomach even relaxed.
I was finally on the right track.
After picking up my rental car at O’Hare, I headed straight to Danny and Calvin’s. I would sleep on their couch and have the comfort of knowing that Danny would be there for me after I said what I needed to say. To Max’s face. But that would be tomorrow morning.
Tonight, because of the hour—almost eleven o’clock—we were going to have a late dinner at their apartment.
The moment I hit the nearly empty freeway, my phone started chirping like mad. My hand twitched with the urge to pick it up off the passenger seat, but at this very moment, my little silver RAV4 rental was approaching the spot where I’d wrecked my car on the opposite side of the freeway.
I took a breath and moved into the fast lane, the closest I could get to the exact spot. I remembered the location because there was an In-N-Out directly to the side of the road. Funny the things you remember when your life flashes before your eyes.