“I couldn’t now, even if I wanted to,” I said. “He passed away two years ago.”
I felt something descend onto my leg. I looked down and realized it was Abby’s hand. Her eyes were dripping with pity—something I couldn’t stand from other people—but for some reason, I didn’t mind it from her. Maybe it was because I knew she was struggling with her own things. Like her ex and how he cheated on her. Maybe that was why I felt the need to tell her about it.
Maybe I was just trying to let her know that it was never really the woman. Not completely. In my eyes, men that cheated always lacked something in themselves and were too damn cowardly to address it.
Maybe I was trying to convey that to her without really realizing it at the time.
“I can remember when my mother called and told me he was dead,” I said. “I didn’t even realize she was still in contact with him.”
“I couldn’t imagine, honestly,” Abby said. “But I suppose it’s different when you have a child with someone.”
“For a second, before I remembered why he was gone in the first place, I did feel regret. Guilt for not reaching out before he passed away. I wondered if maybe he had changed, fixed whatever part of him was broken. That’s what you need to understand about men that cheat. They’re broken people. It wasn’t my mother’s fault, and it wasn’t yours, either. They’re just chipped away and cracked, and instead of fixing themselves, they piece everything back together with glue and hope it holds. But it never does. Eventually, everything falls apart.”
I could feel Abby squeeze my leg before she removed her touch, and part of me wanted to reach out and take her hand.
“That’s why you hate the holidays,” she said. “Because thinking of family reminds you of all that.”
The only thing I had to offer was a nod because she’d hit the nail right on the head.
“Colin, you have got to let go,” she said. “Of this anger and this guilt. The man isn’t even alive now, and all you’re doing is allowing him to continue affecting you. I don’t think your mother would want that for you, and in a way, that means he won, you know? That broken man won something over you, and you don’t seem like the kind of man that accepts defeat that easily.”
“And what do you think I should do about all this?” I asked.
“Let go,” she said. “Cast it away. Let go of the guilt and the anger and try to be less serious about things.”
“Easier said than done, Abby.”
“None of the greatest things in life are easy to come by. Was your business easy?”
“No,” I said, snickering. “No, it was not.”
“Then why would you think this would be?”
For all the annoying traits and the terrible singing and the slamming of my buttons, she was a very intelligent woman when she decided to show it. Her words rang true and cut deeper than she had probably intended them to, and it gave me a lot to think about. She settled her vision back out the window as the snow plows slowly picked up their pace, and in that moment, she said something to me that shocked me to my core.
“I’m technically homeless,” she said.
But instead of launching into a diatribe about her life, she turned her face out the window and settled in for the ride.
And for some reason, that made me even angrier.
Chapter 16
Abby
I was floored by his revelation and by the fact that he simply opened up and started talking. He was telling me about his father and about why he didn’t enjoy the holidays. He was telling me why he was so uptight and why he was always so stern and serious. My hand descended onto his leg as I tried to provide some kind of comfort for him. But when he was done, I could tell he was uncomfortable.
“I’m technically homeless,” I said.
I was trying to level the playing field and trying to get him to understand that I knew what it felt like to hurt and to be hurt and to feel like there was nowhere to go. I wasn’t ready to tell him about the last year of my life. I wasn’t ready to tell him why I was homeless. I wasn’t ready to admit all of the stupid moves I’d made in my life. And why? Because I wasn’t ready to prove him right.
I wasn’t ready to show him that I was nothing but a stupid little girl.
I saw his gaze flicker over toward me before he trained his sights back out the windshield. I could tell he was listening intently even if he was looking out the window. I turned my gaze out onto the wintry landscape we were driving by and hunkered down into my seat. I knew he was waiting for me to talk, but I wasn’t ready. I knew he was waiting for me to offer up details about my life since he’d stepped out onto that limb, but I wasn’t ready to be out there with him.
He might’ve had a cheating father, but he also had a successful company. He still had his mother, who probably loved him more than anything in the world. I could tell by the fabric of his suits I’d felt the night before and by the way he could just rent one of these fully-loaded cars that he’d never hurt for money in his life. Ever.
Some people weren’t that fortunate. Some people just had hits that kept on hitting them while they were bleeding from their nostrils.
Just thinking about my past year raised a knot in my throat. I tried clearing it out and
