Saugatuck Summer (Saugatuck, #1)(42)

Robin nodded, looking relieved. “Okay. Good. At least you’re not in love with him.”

“No.” I dropped my gaze to my hands, folded on my lap. “I’m not sure if that makes it better or worse. If I were in love with him, at least I’d have something resembling a worthwhile excuse for doing it. ‘Sorry I destroyed your family, Mo, but, you know, it was just a fling.’ Ugh.”

“Is he in love with you?”

I shook my head, not looking up. “I really doubt it. I think mostly he feels sorry for me. I don’t mean in a pity-f*ck kind of way. I mean, he sees me as someone he just wants to help, someone he likes and feels bad for, but there’s nothing he can do about shit that happened years before he came along, so he just gives me what he can.”

“Somehow I doubt it’s as selfless as all that.” I looked up to catch a wry twist pulling at Robin’s lips.

“Maybe not, but he’s not the bad guy here. Or at least not the only one.” I shrugged helplessly. “I knew what I was doing. We both know we’re wrong but we keep going anyway. He’s not pressuring me or taking advantage of me. He promised that whatever happens, he’ll treat me with respect. So, now it’s just a matter of finding the right moment to end it and moving out. And praying that we don’t completely destroy the people we care about.”

“Hmmm.” Robin didn’t seem convinced, and I gave him a questioning look. “Sounds like you’re thinking of spilling your guts.”

“What else can I do? I can’t keep this a secret. Especially from Mo. She’s— She’ll know I’m hiding something.”

“I can’t tell you what to do there, but look. Before you go making any confessions, be sure you’ve got your head on right about why you’re doing it and what the consequences will be.”

“I know what the consequences will be. I’m going to lose my best friend, not to mention the rent-free room for the summer, which means I’m not going to be able to save enough money to go back to school in the fall.”

“I meant for your friend. I get that you’re in a bad spot and it’s hard to see outside that, but think what the consequences will be for her. Are you thinking of confessing just to make yourself feel better? Is it going to improve your friend’s life in any way? Will it improve yours? His? Who will be helped if you tell the truth?” I met Robin’s eyes, and must have looked unconvinced. Keep it a secret? Live with that lie? Really? “I’m not saying don’t confess, but ask yourself those questions before you do. You won’t be confessing just an affair, you’ll be outing someone who maybe isn’t willing to come out yet, and I really hope I don’t need to tell you how catastrophic that can be for some people. Don’t charge into it because you feel guilty and you’re hoping for absolution.”

I bowed my head and nodded. “Okay. Yeah. I get what you’re saying.”

“As for finding a place to stay, unfortunately I don’t know you well enough to offer you a key so you can crash out on the sofa in the office upstairs. Now, that’s no reflection on you personally; I wouldn’t allow anyone I didn’t know extremely well to have unsupervised access to a building with this much valuable inventory in it. I will, however, give you our home and cell numbers. If you get stuck with nowhere to go, call us. We’ve got a sofa at our house, too. We also have a guest bedroom, but it’s occupied for the next few months.”

I frowned, caught squirming somewhere between relief and pride. “Thanks, but I need to stop relying on others to bail me out.”

“It’s up to you, but there’s nothing wrong with accepting help for a while when you need it, until you can get on your feet. As long as you are trying to get on your feet, which I don’t think is a problem here. You just need an opportunity.” He chuckled softly. “Which we can give you. I can also offer you an absolutely iron-clad guarantee that neither of us will try to f*ck you. What I can’t guarantee is an uninterrupted night’s sleep. That is, unless you have a magical ability to tune out babies crying.”

My head came up. “Ling’s staying with you?”

“She’ll be with us for the first three to six months after the baby is born.” He smiled softly. “She’s our surrogate, and she’s going to stay on for a while to breastfeed. Then, once Zhen is sleeping through the night, Ling will go back to her own apartment.”

“Wow. That’s amazing.” I blinked, touched by this for some reason I couldn’t really name. The idea that Ling would do something like that for her adopted brother and his husband was astonishing.

Maybe because I couldn’t see one of my own sisters doing anything of the sort for me. I was lucky if they remembered to call me on my birthday.

Was this how family was supposed to do things? The question lingered with me as I thanked Robin again for his offer and returned to work.





I predicted this

Saw where I could bleed the whole time

Tried to hide every knife

Should have known you’d find a way to strike

—Casey Stratton, “Nailed to the Cross”

Brendan and I didn’t even make it two more weeks.

At the beginning of the last week of June, I came home from playing at the coffeehouse to find Brendan asleep on the sofa, his laptop still running on the coffee table beside him and his reading glasses askew on his face. I looked at him for a long, wistful moment, taking in how beautiful I found him and how much I’d come to enjoy being with him.