Page 59 of Old Habits

Will sets two ice cold beers on the counter. “My mom.”

I pause. “Rachel? Really?”

He nods. “Whenever Sara would start ranting and complaining about you and us, Mom would hum and agree but once Sara turned away, she’d look at me and wink. I think she enjoyed living vicariously through you.”

“I knew I always liked your mom.” I pull the tab on my drink. “What about your dad?”

“He never said much other than a passive ‘whatever, just don’t knock her up.’”

“Ouch.” I wince slightly. “Actually, Hank used to say the same thing, come to think…”

“Dads will be dads,” he says. “Though… I still don’t think it would have been the worst thing. I know you disagree, but… admit it, Jove, you and I would have made a cute kid or two.”

I ignore the sudden burn in my chest. “Maybe.” I take a quick sip and the cold drink stings all the way down. “I still don’t think the timing was right.”

“I accept that,” he says. “It took a while for me to see it but you were right about that. Twenty-year-old me with a wife and a kid basically spelled disaster. I gave into the fantasy that once you get married everything falls into place but I had no job, no real direction, and no motivation to change it. Hell, I lived at home with my parents and I spent every dime I had on that ring. What the hell was I thinking?”

“You did what everyone said you were supposed to do,” I answer. “It happens to the best of us.”

“I should have listened to you back then. You were right about everything else. I’m not sure why I thought this was different.”

“Not everything else. I mean, have you seen my closet?”

He chuckles. “I’ve spent so much time thinking about what I’d do differently if I could just go back in time to that night. As awful as it was… now that you’re back, I don’t think I would have changed a thing.”

“Really?” I ask.

“Seeing you again, like this…” His eyes fall to my waist. “It’s like a pause is what we always needed to get to this point.”

“So, what you’re saying is…” I smile as I glance around his kitchen, “that me taking off was the best thing that ever happened to you?”

“In a way, yeah.” He steps around the counter to stand beside me. “I changed and became a better person and a more responsible man because I lost you.”

My breath catches. “Well…” I swallow. “You’re welcome.”

He looks at me now like he always used to, like I was the only girl in the world worth gazing at. It floors me the same way and I can hardly move as he places a hand on my cheek.

“You know,” he says, “I have this memory from when we were kids. I must have been about ten-years-old. I was walking home from school and I saw you sitting on the swings in the park. I said hello to you but you didn’t look up.”

I chuckle. “Sorry.”

“You had your head down just staring at your shoes and I remember thinking, ‘but she’s so pretty. What does she have to be sad about?’”

“Oh, I probably wasn’t sad,” I joke. “My resting bitch face came in around the same time as my breasts.”

He laughs. “I could tell the difference, even back then. Not with your breasts, of course. Although, they developed beautifully, by the way. Kudos.”

“Thank you.”

“I used to say things to you just to get you to smile,” he says. “It worked sometimes and it would make my day.”

“Mine, too,” I say, trembling beneath the touch of his hand.

“Then, I’d try to make you laugh. That was harder to do but not impossible.”

I raise a brow. “Is that why you used to trip up the stairs at school a lot?”

“It is.” He nods.