Ugly Love: A Novel(80)

“Get out!”

“No!”

I stop fighting him. I get up and walk out myself.

He follows me. “Let me ask you one question,” he says, trailing me into the living room.

“And then you’ll get out?”

He nods. “And then I’ll get out.”

“Fine.”

He regards me silently for a few moments.

I patiently wait for his question so he can leave before I hurt him.

“What if someone told you they could erase that entire night from your memory, but in doing so, they also have to erase every single good thing. All the moments with Rachel. Every word, every kiss, every I love you. Every moment you had with your son, no matter how brief. The first moment you saw Rachel holding him. The first moment you held him. The first time you heard him cry or watched him sleep. All of it. Gone. Forever. If someone told you they could get rid of the ugly stuff, but you’d lose all the other stuff, too . . . would you do it?”

He thinks he’s asking me something I’ve never asked myself before. Does he think I don’t sit and wonder about this stuff every fucking day of my life?

“You didn’t say I had to answer your question. You just asked if you could ask it. You can leave now.”

I’m the worst kind of person.

“You can’t answer it,” he says. “You can’t say yes.”

“I also can’t say no,” I tell him. “Congratulations, Ian. You stumped me. Good-bye.”

I begin to walk back to my room, but he says my name again. I stop and put my hands on my hips and drop my head. Why won’t he stop with it, already? It’s been six damn years. He should know that night made me who I am now. He should know I’m not changing.

“If I would have asked you that a few months ago, you would have said yes before the question even left my mouth,” he says. “Your answer has always been yes. You would have given up anything to not have to relive that night.”

I turn around, and he’s heading toward the door. He opens it, then pauses and faces me again. “If being with Tate for a few short months can make that pain bearable enough for you to answer with maybe, imagine what a lifetime with her could do for you.”

He closes the door.

I close my eyes.

Something happens. Something inside me. It’s as if his words have created an avalanche out of the glacier surrounding my heart. I feel chunks of hardened ice break off and fall next to all the other pieces that have detached since the moment I met Tate.

???

I step off the elevator and walk over to the empty chair next to Cap. He doesn’t even acknowledge my presence with eye contact. He’s staring across the lobby toward the exit.

“You just let her go,” he says, not even attempting to hide the disappointment in his voice.

I don’t respond.

He pushes on the arms of his chair with his hands, repositioning himself. “Some people . . . they grow wiser as they grow older. Unfortunately, most people just grow older.” He turns to face me. “You’re one of the ones just been growing older, because you are as stupid as you were the day you were born.”

Cap knows me well enough to know this is what had to happen. He’s known me all my life; having worked maintenance on my father’s apartment buildings since before I was born. Before that, he worked for my grandfather doing the same thing. This pretty much guarantees he knows more about me and my family than even I do. “It had to happen, Cap,” I say, excusing the fact that I let the only girl who has been able to reach me in more than six years just walk away.

“Had to happen, huh?” he grumbles.

As long as I’ve known him and as many nights as I’ve spent down here talking to him, he’s never once given me an opinion about the decisions I’ve made for myself. He knows the life I chose after Rachel. He spouts off tidbits of wisdom here and there but never his opinion. He’s listened to me vent about the situation with Tate for months, and he always sits quietly, patiently hearing me out, never giving me advice. That’s what I like about him.

I feel that’s all about to change.

“Before you give me a lecture, Cap,” I say, interrupting him before he has the chance to continue. “You know she’s better off.” I turn and face him. “You know she is.”

Cap chuckles, nodding his head. “That’s for damn sure.”

I look at him disbelievingly. Did he just agree with me?

“Are you saying I made the right choice?”

He’s quiet for a second before blowing out a quick breath. His expression contorts as if his thoughts aren’t something he necessarily wants to share. He relaxes into his chair and folds his arms loosely over his chest. “I told myself to never get involved in your problems, boy, because in order for a man to give advice, he’d better know what the hell he’s talkin’ about. And Lord knows in all my eighty years, I ain’t never been through nothing like what you went through. I don’t know the first thing about what that was like or what that did to you. Just thinking ’bout that night makes my gut hurt, so I know you feel it in your gut, too. And your heart. And your bones. And your soul.”

I close my eyes, wishing I could close my ears instead. I don’t want to hear this.

“None of the people in your life knows what it feels like to be you. Not me. Not your father. Not those friends of yours. Not even Tate. There’s only one person who feels what you feel. Only one person who hurts like you hurt. Only one other parent to that baby boy who misses him the same way you do.”