Page 75 of The Perfect Deal
“First of all,” I began, and Poppy gave me a warning look that my choice of words might trigger Landon to stop listening. I took a deep breath and started over. “Landon, I don’t need your permission to date your sister. She’s a grown-ass woman. She can date whoever she wants to. You’re not her father.”
“There’s such a thing as the bro code. Have you forgotten about that?” he asked me, his eyes so narrow, they were barely slits.
“Oh, no, I’m well aware of that ridiculous pact guys make that puts someone else’s illegitimate feelings over their own happiness, though I have to remind you that you technically broke a similar pact with your sister when you started dating her best friend. Or does that conveniently not count?”
“My relationship with Poppy has nothing to do with this,” he spat. “Liberty knew Poppy and I were in love with one another, and she approved.”
“What if she hadn’t?” I suggested. “What if she would’ve thrown a screaming fit the moment that she saw the two of you together? Or if someone even suggested it to her over breakfast?”
I hoped he’d see the similarities, but he was too mad to think straight. “This is not the same. We love one another, and you are just fucking my little sister, someone I thought you respected, man. I should’ve never told you that you could go out with her to begin with.”
“That’s not true, Landon.” So many parts of his statement had me wanting to punch him in the face, but I decided to concentrate on the most important aspect of all of them. “I love Liberty. I’ve loved her since we were in middle school, bro. She loves me, too. The fact that you’ve been too blinded by everything going on in your own life to see it shouldn’t be my problem. Yet, it has been. For years. Everyone else has known. They’ve seen the way we look at one another, the way we dance around it so as not to hurt your feelings. But you’ve been too caught up in your own life to even notice.”
Landon’s expression didn’t change for several seconds before he finally asked, “How long have you been fucking her?”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake!” I ran a hand through my hair, not surprised when several strands came out. “Not long, Landon. That’s not the point. Did you hear anything I said to you?”
“What I heard was that you’ve been lusting after her since we were in middle school,” he replied. “Did you fuck her in high school?”
“No. What I said was I have been in love with her since then, but we have been putting our feelings aside because of you. All of this has been for you. If she would’ve thought you’d be okay with us dating, we would’ve gotten together years ago. She would’ve never dated that asshole Grady if you would’ve just gotten your self-centered head out of your ass for a few minutes just once in the last decade and a half and noticed that your little sister is in love with me. But you don’t notice other people’s feelings because you don’t care about them.” My anger was making my words sharper than they otherwise would’ve been, meaner.
“You fucking prick.” Landon shook his head at me. “Liberty means everything to me. I’ve always tried to protect her. For you to stand there and say that bullshit makes me want to punch you in the face even more. If anyone should know how badly I want to protect her, especially after what Grady did, it would be you. But you don’t seem to care about any of that as long as you get to fulfill some ridiculous fantasy you’ve had for fifteen years.”
I stared at him in stunned silence, not sure how to respond to that. Was he really going down this path? Trying to put me in the same boat as Grady?
Taking a deep breath, I stepped away from him. I’d said everything I could to try to convince him that my intentions were good, that I loved Liberty, and that he needed to step back and let us figure it out for ourselves.
But I also realized that Liberty hadn’t said a word to him before she’d fled the room, and that couldn’t be good. She might be in a position where she didn’t want to continue to see me for fear that her brother would never accept our relationship. If that was the case, then my friendship with Landon was ruined for nothing.
“Listen,” I finally said, hearing the defeat in my own voice, “maybe you just need some time to think through what I’ve said to you. I’m sorry that I hurt you. That was never our intention. We’ve been trying to avoid that for years. That’s why we’ve never acted on our feelings before. But now that we’re here, you need to understand that I love your sister more than anything, and I always have. I want you to be my best friend again, Landon. You’re one of the most important people in the world to me. But it should tell you something to know that I’m willing to stand here right now, look you in the eye, and say, ‘If I have to choose between you, my best friend my whole life, and the woman I love, who happens to be your sister, Liberty, I choose her. I will always choose her.’”
With those words, I heard Poppy let go of a little sob, which I hoped was a good thing because it meant someone was paying attention and had understood how much I meant what I’d said. Then I turned and walked away.
A crowd had gathered in the lobby area near the windows next to the door we’d gone through to have our “discussion.” When I walked through, they parted, everyone staring in shocked silence. Embarrassment coursed through me as I realized the entire neighborhood now knew all of my business. My parents would be hearing about this soon. It seemed a little ironic that my father would’ve never tried to tell me who to date, but my best friend would.
As I walked away, Arlo grabbed my arm. “Joshua, man, I feel so bad. I’m so sorry.”
“It’s not your fault, bud,” I told him, finding a smile deep within me. “It’s a good thing, actually. He needed to know.” I patted Arlo on the shoulder and headed off to the elevator. While I wished that Landon would’ve found out a different way, I hadn’t been lying to reassure Poppy’s younger brother. In a way, it felt good to have everything out in the open.
The elevator seemed to take forever to arrive. Fear that Landon would come after me, ready to argue again, plagued me as I watched the floors slowly roll by on the little ticker above the doors. Finally, it arrived, and I stepped on, closing the door so that I was alone before I headed up to my room.
The hallway stretched on before me. Trudging toward my room, I listened through the blanket of silence to hear if perhaps Liberty was crying. When I got to my door, I heard nothing from hers, so I went inside.
The pain and heartache I felt were overwhelming. I wanted to go to her, to take her in my arms and tell her we’d be all right, that as long as we had one another, nothing else mattered. But I didn’t know if she felt the same way. For years, she’d been so careful not to let Landon know how she felt about me. Now that he did, she might want peace in her family more than she wanted to be with me.
I thought back to that night we had been in Hawaii when Landon and Liberty’s father had let Landon know that he didn’t approve of his son dating Poppy. She’d given a rousing speech about accepting people for who they are and then ran out. Landon had been an idiot not to follow her right away.
Was I being an idiot now?
I wasn’t sure, but my gut was telling me to give Liberty some space. For one thing, I couldn’t handle losing her completely, especially not right now. Not after I’d just potentially lost my best friend of over twenty years.
With a deep sigh, I dropped down on my bed and lay on the pillows, staring up at the white ceiling. In the distance, I heard the rhythmic crash of the waves against the ocean. It was soothing, in a way, hearing that endless song of the sea meeting the shore. How many other people had stayed here and listened to that sound, contemplating life, knowing that no matter what happened, some things always remained the same?
Liberty and I loved one another. In my heart, I knew that to be a fact. Sometimes, things got choppy, and we had to work through them, but at the end of the day, I just had to believe, like the moon calling the sea to her side, I’d be beckoned back again. Now, my job was to wait until the commotion settled down and I was welcome to return to her loving embrace.
As for Landon, I hoped he’d see the error of his ways, that Poppy or someone would talk some sense into him. I couldn’t imagine my life without my best friend in it, but I couldn’t keep living this way either, tiptoeing around, afraid I might offend him. No, what I said to Arlo stood true. It was better that Landon knew the truth. What he did with that information was up to him. I’d done everything I could.
It was time to wait.